Progressive Travels

Whatsamatteryou

2009-05-17T15:15:00.001-05:00

The band schedules have been in a constant state of flux so far this year, which is undoubtedly a result of the fact that I seem to find myself attached to more and more projects. This was a conscious choice of mine, albeit hesitantly so. Since my hours were cut back at my day job, I’ve been using cover band gigs to help make up the difference. I don’t necessarily like playing this much, but it is what it is. And right now, it is a financial necessity. So it goes.

There have been a few gigs since the last installation of this babbling weblog, and some other interesting stuff as well. I’ll try to encapsulate it thusly:

10 April 2009
BenWahBob played the opening weekend of the “Budweiser Party at the Park” at Fairmount Park in Collinsville, IL this year. This band has been playing those gigs every summer since before I was in the band, and I joined in 2003. We’re pretty much a staple there. It’s an odd gig in that we play for an hour to start, then play in-between the horse races...which usually only amounts to a few songs at a time. It’s fun, though, and a pretty decent paying gig. There are frequently 1000 people or more, and it’s a really good time when the place gets hopping.

One unexpected twist this time was an unexpected request from an unusual source. An extremely good-looking young blonde woman in a sock dress approached the sound man and handed him a note. He read it and handed it over to Carlos with a smirk. I assumed she was requesting a song we don’t know by a band we don’t cover, which is usually the case. When I asked what it was, I was told she wanted to hear some Rush.

Huh?

I usually remove any Rush from the set lists for these gigs, as experience has shown that it’s not venue appropriate. We have, however, been known to throw some in at the end of the night. This girl wanted to hear Tom Sawyer, which cannot be performed adequately without keyboards. We instead tossed out What You’re Doing, which I didn’t mind at all. I’m not sure why I am still surprised when attractive women are Rush fans, as I have seen plenty of them at their concerts over the years. For some reason, though, that is a band that is usually only requested by guys. This one was a rather pleasant surprise.

01 May 2009
BWB was scheduled to play at 21 Rock in Arnold, MO. The club had apparently had a few bad weekends in a row, and decided to cancel the bands for awhile. No surprise here. At least they told us before we showed up to play.

15 May 2009
The Incognito project was back at 21 Rock. The weather this day was more than a bit dicey, as there were severe thunder storms and tornado watches all over the St. Louis area. Before I even got into the shower, I called Bobby to ensure that we were indeed still playing. It’s a little over 50 miles for me, and I didn’t want to get there and find we’d been cancelled. He assured me that we were good to go, and we indeed were. After crawling around in the mud at Dawna’s (my van got stuck...don’t ask beyond that, as no good deed goes unpunished), the shower felt really good.

The gig went pretty well, and several of us joked that we sounded better this time after having not rehearsed for several weeks than we did the first time. I have long maintained that rehearsal for a cover band is highly overrated. I mean...after doing this for over 25 years, how much do you really need to practice to play other people’s music in bars for a bunch of drunks? Learn the songs, agree on the endings, and just play them. That’s where the magic happens anyway.

Some other interesting things happened in the last couple of weeks, too. I had to schedule a trip to Scotch Plains, NJ to work in an organ at St. Bartholomew’s Catholic Church. It’s really more of a Catholic school with a church in the middle. They recently remodeled the place, and in the process had Wicks Organ Company install a new organ. Well, it’s not really new. The digital part is, but the pipes came from an older existing instrument that they bought from another church in Saddle River, NJ. They were having some issues with the digital part, and I was “elected” to go fix it.

This was not necessarily a trip to which I was looking forward. I made the requisite arrangements, and called the Area Sales Director John Klauder to let him know the plans. He informed me that one of his employees would be picking me up from the airport in Newark and driving me around, to save the expense of a rental car...a very kind gesture. John is a great guy, so this was really no surprise. He told me that normally he would do it, but he was going to be busy most of that week working in Manhattan. He had secured a contract to disassemble and move several pipe organs at The Julliard School to help facilitate their ongoing renovations, and would be working there.

After I hung up, I started to think about that. Julliard. Hmmm. I’ve never had any desire to go to New York City. It’s never been a place that fascinates me in the least. But, Julliard? Now, that fascinates me. That place is undoubtedly the most prestigious music school in the world. It kind of is to musicians what Mecca is to Muslims. That’s something for which I would go into the city. When I received my flight confirmation from the travel agency, I called John back and gave him the flight info. He was at Julliard at the time, and was in fact talking at the time with the head of the Organ Department Paul Jacobs. I asked if it would be possible to visit the school while I was in the area, and was told I would be more than welcome to come in for a visit. Sweet! How could I turn that down? My arrangements would put me there on Wednesday, and the work on the organ shouldn’t take more than a few hours. Since my return flight was not until 16:30 on Thursday, this left me all of that morning to get over into the city, visit the school, and get back to the Newark airport. No problem.

My flight landed on time, and John’s helper Barry picked me up right on time. We drove straight to the church and dove into the problems. I was installing some additional audio equipment, and had to wait for an electrician to run some lines for me, which took longer than it needed. Union guys. We made a couple of runs to pick up some supplies, and before we knew it, it was nearing 18:00. We connected the computer to the console, and started on the voicing issues. This organ was a mess. Barry and I ended up going through the whole organ stop by stop to make the badly needed correction. It was no wonder that the priest was so disappointed with the organ. It was much better by the time we finished. It was also getting very late. We discovered that we needed a few more parts, and also discovered that all of the electronics stores were already closed. So, the plan was to pick them up in the morning, and finish the touch-up voicing then.

I got to my hotel in Newark at about 21:00, checked in, and headed straight for the restaurant in the lobby. I hadn’t eaten anything since the muffin I got at the airport Starbucks in St. Louis that morning. I ordered a cheese steak sandwich, and it disappeared at an alarming rate. It was outstanding, too. I went back to my room, and called John to make the arrangements for the next morning. He said that he would be driving me on Thursday, as the work at Julliard had progressed much better than he had anticipated, and he wasn’t needed there again until Friday. Our plan was for him to pick up the little shorting jumpers at a store in Manhattan before coming over to Jersey to pick me up, thus saving us some time. When we finished, he would drive me over to the school and save me the trouble of trying to navigate the trains and subway for the first time. I was all for that.

The next morning I sat in my room awaiting John’s call. When he did call, he was not bearing good news. He was having trouble finding a store that carried the parts we needed. I was skeptical. These little jumper straps are a common item in computers. I suspected that John was not presenting his requests correctly. After he failed to find them at several stores, I told him to just pick me up and we’d find something in Newark. I knew of an electronics store on Rte 22, the one that was closed the night before. We went there, and had them in hand in a matter of minutes. Back at the church, we put the jumpers in place, which fixed the problem as expected. After some finally voicing, John walked over to the rectory to ask the organist to come over and give it a listen. I sat there at the console and noodled a bit (no Mr. Crowley this time). As I played, I became aware of someone staring at me. I looked over to see a nun standing there watching me. She told me that she needed to have some of here students practice their speaking over the PA system. So, I gladly stopped and let them do their thing. It is their church, after all. John came back and informed me that this was the organist’s day off, and that he would not be able to come in to listen to it until later that afternoon. After the student left, I played a little more while John walked around and listened, then he played a bit while I listened. It sounded 1000% better than it did when I arrived the previous day.

On the downside, it was now almost 13:30. As my flight was scheduled to depart at 16:30, it became obvious that we would not have time to drive into the city and still get back in time to make the flight. I was seriously bummed about that. The one reason that I had actually looked forward to this trip had now evaporated. Oh, well. So it goes. I had gone there to fix an organ, and had succeeded at that. Anything else was just a bonus. John took me to the airport, apologizing for not being able to get me to Julliard. Maybe next time.

I ambled my way through security, found a little deli for lunch, then sat at the gate awaiting the trip home. When I checked in, my boarding pass said that the flight was delayed by one hour. When I arrived at the gate, the departure was listed as “on time.” After sitting there reading for awhile, I noticed that several people were murmuring about St. Louis. I looked up from my book to see a group of people following an airline agent over to our gate. I also noticed that the flight information was no longer on the gate display. I got up and walked over to the arrivals/departures screens, only to see that all flights to St. Louis had been cancelled, presumably because of weather. Great. The gate agent gave us an 800 number to call to make arrangements for another flight. It was the wrong number. After several of us protested, she looked up another number for us. This one worked. The agent on the phone wasn’t much help, though. The only options she offered were a flight at 12:20 on Friday, or one at 21:30 that night from LaGuardia. When I asked if the airline was going to get me to LaGuardia, she didn’t answer, but just read back the flight info. When I asked if they were paying for a hotel if I had to take the next day’s flight, she gave me the same response. I chose the following day, and thanked her for being so skillfully uncooperative. Other stranded passengers recounted similar stories. After reclaiming my baggage, I went back to the hotel and checked in for another night. I had a pizza from the restaurant delivered to the room, and sat there reading for the rest of the night.

As it turned out, I would have had plenty of time to get over to New York City. Figures.

Once again, I ruminated over the idea of trying to get to Julliard in the morning on Friday. However, I did not want to take the chance of missing this flight. So, I just checked out and went back to the airport. The flight did indeed leave on time, but had to stop over at Chicago O’Hare. The flight crew asked if I wanted to get off while they prepped for the rest of the flight. I told them that there was no way in hell I was getting off of that plane until it landed in St. Louis. They got a chuckle out of that. I was glad someone thought it was funny.

I finally made it back to St. Louis, just in time to be two hours late for a demo recording with BenWahBob.

I love traveling.

Unseen

2009-04-05T16:05:00.003-05:00

Forgive me, reader, for I have sinned. Once again, I’ve shunned my blogging responsibilities in favor of that thing called life. It’s been three weeks since my last confession...er...blog.

20 March 2009
Rock Bottom has a bass player who, unfortunately has to go out of town occasionally, which leaves them with a void to fill. Deron had asked me some time ago if I could fill in on a couple of weekends, but couldn’t remember at the time the exact dates in March. By the time he did remember, I already had one of the dates filled with a new project. I never heard back from him, and assumed they had found someone else to play that weekend. I was quite surprised when, in the middle of that preceding week, I saw my name listed on their MySpace Status Update as “special guest Paul J. Smith on bass.” Uh-oh. I called Deron immediately and asked what happened. He said he didn’t know about the other gig I had, never got the email. That doesn’t surprise me. Yahoo has been dropping the ball quite a bit lately. On one of my accounts, all of my Sent emails from the past three months have completely disappeared from the folder. Whatever. I told him I could play Friday night, but not Saturday. He agreed, and eventually got Geo Romer of Ivory Tiger fame to cover Saturday night.

I arrived at The Hideout in Granite City after a nice dinner with Dawna and her family to celebrate her youngest son’s tenth birthday. I’d never played this place before. In fact, the last time I was even in that building, it was a truck stop. They had a decent stage erected at one end of the building, a modest-sized dance floor, some tables for seating, and a few pool tables. For some reason, it reminded me of Big O’s in Keyesport, IL. It just had that kind of dirty roadhouse feel about it. Deron said his take was more like The White House in Taylor Springs, IL, but this place didn’t have a dirt floor like The White House, and the stage construction was infinitely better.

I brought out the Ampeg SVT-4PRO bass amp and SVT-610HLF cabinet, thinking I would need the power to compete with Derrick for sonic space. I was right. His Marshall cabinet was sitting at about ear level, and was blasting at my head all night. I actually put in ear plugs after the first set, even though I hate playing with them. Even with my cabinet pointing almost directly at me, I could barely hear myself while he was playing. That stage was just ungodly loud. I had that post-concert ringing in my ears when I left at the end of the night.

In spite of my whining about the stage volume, it was great to play with these guys again. To my surprise, Deron even whipped out Pink Floyd’s Comfortably Numb. I’d never played that one before in my life, and now that I have, I regret not having played it sooner. What a great song. We did our fair share of Rush as well, as one might expect, but didn’t get too carried away with it. In the end, everything came out at least OK.

The crowd wasn’t very big, but they made up for it in enthusiasm. There was a level of debauchery going on at the bar that one doesn’t normally encounter in every day life. Judging from some the pictures I’ve seen floating around on the internet, Saturday night made that look like a Sunday school picnic. To each their own, I suppose.

21 March 2009
One of the new projects I’ve recently found myself flung into is a revival of the band Incognito. This developed as a spin off of several other bands, including BenWahBob, Just Mr., and Lethal Judgment. The idea was to get together and play stuff we don’t normally play in our regular bands. We tried to put this together at some point last year, but couldn’t get it going for various reasons. This time we succeeded. We got together one evening and jammed, put together a set list, got together one more time, and showed up for the gig at 21 Rock in Arnold, MO. THAT’S how a band is supposed to work! Shades of Knucklehead.

I brought the SVT rig again, mostly because it was still in my van, but also because of the two guitar player arrangement. As it turned out, the stage volume never really got that loud. I really like the sound of that rig, though, so I didn’t mind a bit.

The crowd this night was small, as one comes to expect at this establishment. Most of the stuff we played came off pretty well, all things considered. I had quite a good time playing with these guys. Bobby and I have played together in BWB for some time, and I’d played with Tom several times while he was with Just Mr. Eddie and I have never played together before, though, which made it feel like an almost completely new band. Every one seemed to click together fairly quickly, and we sounded relatively acceptable. We even nailed the fun runs in Rush’s The Spirit of Radio. The owner really liked us (he likes Bobby anyway), and wanted to book more gigs immediately. I hope it’s not a snowy summer in Jefferson County.

Eddie’s son was there with a video camera, and Tom’s lovely girlfriend Lisa took some really great still shots of the band. Eddie and Bobby already have much of this stuff posted on their MySpace pages, and I suppose an Incognito page will soon follow. I’ll get some of the pictures up on my page at some point this week, perhaps even a video. Who knows...

28 March 2009
BenWahBob was back at 21 Rock in Arnold, MO...again. Joe, the sound man, teased me about having just been there last week. I have played there three times this year already, all of them within a four week period. I told him I was the new house bass player, which is funny if you know that he is the house bass player, less funny if you don’t.

There really is no more standard fare for the new BenWahBob. We seem to whip out different stuff every time we play. This is a good thing, after so many years of the same stale old shows. We did some of that this time, and I almost remembered all of the words to one song, and almost remembered some of the words to another. Carlos, seeing one on the set list, decided we should do two Rush tunes in a row. Easy for him to say – he doesn’t have to sing them. So, we did What You’re Doing as planned, then did I Think I’m Going Bald because Carlos likes that song. I’ll surely not complain about playing more Rush. One guy who was in attendance kept asking all night for more old Rush. At the end of the last set, Carlos actually started the guitar intro to The Spirit of Radio. Woops...bad move. Bobby and I jumped right in, and after some nervous glances back and forth wondering if we were actually going to play it, I walked up to the mic and started to sing. There were a few rough spots here and there, but we finished the song, including an outstandingly faked guitar solo which Carlos had never before played. The funny part...the guy who had been practically begging for more Rush had since departed, and that was one of the songs he wanted us to play. Lesson: never leave early, as the end of the night is when all of the fun stuff happens. We even started to play Bastille Day, got through the first verse and chorus, then decided to call it quits. We’d pushed the Rush thing far enough for one night. All in all, a pretty fun night.

Bass Hanger inventor Dan Martin came out for awhile, too, as I’d promised him a picture of his fantastic product in action. I’d used it the previous weekend, but didn’t think to bring my camera. I took some pictures this night, and still need to send them to him. Sorry, Dan. They’re on the way.

I also picked up some more music recently. I finally broke down and bought a box set of J.S. Bach’s Complete Organ Works. Wow. I have listened to almost nothing else since I got it. With 179 pieces of music on 11 CDs, it will probably be awhile before I tire of them.

Musical Snobbery

2009-03-15T22:46:00.001-05:00

BenWahBob has been fairly busy of late. We normally schedule gigs about every other weekend, as none of us really want to make it a full-time job. So far, though, the beginning of this year has been a bit heavier than normal, playing three weekends in a row recently.

That’s not really a big deal. In the past, I have been used to playing sometimes as much as 4 or 5 gigs in a week. It’s just a little unusual for this band. Add to that the several other start-up projects I have been involved in, and my time has been quite tightly regulated. It was with no small amount of relief that I found myself with some time to work on my pipe organ yesterday. I really need to get that thing finished, both so I can play it and so I can move on to other things.

Here’s a short synopsis of the three most recent gigs:

21 February 2009
All Stars Sports Bar in St. Peters, MO is a place I played several years ago before quitting BWB. The stage was a bit bigger than I remembered, probably due to the fact that we now have one less person up there. The gig went fairly smooth, in spite of the drunken idiots who couldn’t – or wouldn’t – stay out of the way while we were loading in equipment. There was one guy who kept ogling Carlos’ wife much of the night. Carlos made it perfectly clear to him that she was taken. I guess he later threw a fit when he realized he couldn’t have her, and got himself banned from the establishment, fortunately with no bloodshed involved.

28 February 2009
BWB went back to 21 Rock in Arnold, MO for what we all pretty much deem a paid rehearsal, as the turnout at this club is usually staggeringly low. On this night, though, we had a fairly decent crowd. All of the BenWahBabes were in attendance, including a rare appearance by The Lovely and Gracious Dawna. This gig was actually kind of fun. We whipped out some new (old) stuff, and almost played it right. Chuck Mann and some of his buddies came out for awhile, probably to promote their gig there the following weekend with the band Capone. There was one girl there who blew my mind. She looked young, and was very attractive with long, blonde hair and a nice body. Then, she smiled. She looked like a hockey player from the old Federal League, as she was missing most of her front teeth. Wow! Gotta love Jefferson County, Missouri. There was a chick fight at the end of the third set, complete with hair pulling and clothes ripping. Dawna (who was not involved) took that as her queue to leave, and she did just before the police arrived.

07 March 2009
Motley’s Pub in O’Fallon, MO has become a new staple for the BWB schedule. Jessica Motley runs a good bar, and is building a good reputation as a music venue. They even improved the electrical situation on the stage since the last time we were there. The BenWahBabes were out in force again this night, and they brought some of their drinking buddies. It was a pretty good party, with no real drama to speak of beyond the really drunk guy who was making most of the women uncomfortable until his wife drug him out of there. Jess gave us a hard time at load-out, citing the fact that it was nearly 04:00 already and she wanted to go home. She then giggled and noted that that included the change to Daylight Savings time, but only after she enjoyed the stunned looks of disbelief on our faces. I like her.

I didn’t want to take too much space recounting the details of events that you should have attended in the first place, because I wanted to address an issue that seems to be presenting itself more and more often of late: allegations of Musical Snobbery. This has been an issue that seems to have followed me for some time. I know why, but I refuse to accept the flawed premise. That’s why I’m going to address it head-on now.

What exactly is Musical Snobbery, you might ask? Well, as far as I can tell, it has absolutely nothing to do with me personally and everything to do with the misguided opinions of others. I prefer to listen to what I consider “good” music, and eschew what I consider “garbage.” Example: I like rock bands like Yes, Rush, Kansas, and Dream Theater, but have little use for bands like AC/DC, Poison, and Nirvana. Some people hear or read that about me and respond with something along the lines of “Oh...you listen to THOSE guys.” Ummm...yes, I do. I also listen to a lot of J.S. Bach and Antonio Vivaldi, if that helps you to reinforce your opinion.

...which brings me to my next example: I can read music and I play about 10 different instruments, which seems to make me “one of THOSE guys.” I’ve never understood how the pursuit of music can tag someone as a snob, even amongst his peers...especially amongst his peers. I can remember as a youngster hearing about people who could play many different instruments and thinking, “Wow, how cool is that!” I found it to be a source of inspiration, not degradation.

This all came boiling up again in a conversation I had last week with a drummer friend of mine who frequently gets tagged as an a-hole and difficult to work with. I’ve worked with this guy on several occasions. I can see where he might rub some people the wrong way. When I told him this, he wanted to know what I meant, as he is always interested in working on his “character defects” (his words). That’s the part that set this blog in motion.

This fella – we’ll call him Eddie – is one of the most talented drummers with whom I have ever worked. He’s worked hard over the years to get to this point, and continues to work hard at getting even better. He has no lack of natural talent either, which doesn’t hurt. The problem for him, though, is twofold; he expects the best from other musicians around him, and he’s honest in his assessments of them. Many people don’t seem to care for this second part. Musicians have notoriously fragile egos, and when it is not being inflated, and is, in fact, being brought down to earth by an honest opinion, this can cause friction. Thus, he’s the a-hole for being honest enough to say what others are probably thinking, too.

I don’t understand how we’ve gotten to the point where honesty and accomplishment and striving to be the best you can be have come to be considered a “character defect.” How is it that my desire to be a better cellist makes me a snob, but a band who has written the same three-chord song over and over since 1974 is awesome? There truly is no accounting for taste, especially in music, and I completely understand that. There are some really talented musicians in this world who make some truly awful noise. You don’t have to like it. That’s one of the great beauties of art. But, don’t call them snobs just because they are doing something you don’t like or understand, or because they choose to continue their efforts to better themselves.

Rather, try to use it as inspiration. I did. I still do.

I think I’ll go do a little more work on that Bach cello piece.

Buckets on the Stage

2009-02-01T14:42:00.001-06:00

Super Bowl Sunday. Yes, I said it. I wrote it. I’m publishing it on-line. So, sue me. I’ve been a Pittsburgh Steelers fan since I was a little crumb cruncher. The first time I saw Lynn Swann catch a ball that would have been uncatchable by anyone else, I was hooked. My father was a St. Louis Cardinals fan, and my grandfather was a Dallas Cowboys fan. Needless to say, Sundays were always interesting. History shows that Pittsburgh came out on top more often than not. They were a dynasty in the 1970s, and seem of late to be regaining that glory. It’s no secret for whom I am rooting today.

But, enough of that.

16 January 2009
I had one more gig on the schedule to help out my friends in Poisoned Apples during their transition. Not only were they in the process of replacing a bass player, but their drummer Steve was leaving as well. The current gig at hand was at ThatOnePlace in Fenton, MO. I had played there a few times before with Those1Guys, but that was back in 2002. The place hadn’t changed at all. I arrived around 19:30, loaded in my minimal equipment, and was ready to go in about 10 minutes. Sweet. I ordered some food, and sat down for some conversation with the band.

As we all sat there, most of us eating, it became apparent that almost everyone was sick. I had just gotten past some manner of flu earlier in the week. I wasn’t even sure I would make it to the gig until that afternoon. Everyone else seemed to be about two days behind me. Only Eric, the guitar player, seemed well.

As we began the first set, some strategically placed beer buckets appeared on the stage – in the event that anyone had a gastronomical emergency. Nice. Brandy put hers behind her at the front corner of the drum set...right in front of me. When she told me why it was there, I informed her that if she puked in front of me, I would probably puke on the back of her head. She looked at me in somewhat disbelief, and I suggested that she really not take that chance. She left it there anyway. Steve had one next to him behind the drum set, and Eddie put one next to his guitar amp. This was looking like it might be an entertaining evening.

We made it through the first set with no spewing. That was a good start. About midway through the second set, Brandy turned around and gave me a look of desperation. She said, “I almost puked at the end of that song.” Great. Here it comes. If it happened, I knew I probably wouldn’t get past the reflex, and suspected that the others onstage wouldn’t either. That would surely start a stampede towards the door for any patrons lucky enough to witness it.

As it happens, no one spewed all night. We made it through the last set with scarcely even a belch. I must say, Brandy sounded quite good considering the situation. Kudos for the professionalism.

I know this is without a doubt the grossest blog I’ve ever written. But, hey, I’m just recounting the story as it happened. Don’t hate the messenger.

I used that little Ampeg B200R combo amp again, as the BA500 was still out of service. Eddie played bass on one of the songs in the third set, which afforded me the opportunity to get out front and listen. That little amp sounded great. It had just enough muscle to be heard on the stage, too, which is quite possibly the deadest stage on which I’ve ever played. Kudos to Carlos Bedoya for another great design.

Load out went pretty quick at the end of the night. Eddie went looking for Eric to give him his cut of the financial bonanza, but couldn’t find him. He turned up later coming out of the restroom where he had apparently been puking. That made it 100%. Everyone was officially sick.

Of course, we’re musicians – we’re sick anyway.

New Places, New Faces

2009-01-15T10:54:00.001-06:00

09 January 2009
The main ideas behind the new trio format for BenWahBob were to play more stuff we wanted to play, play some different places, explore the challenges of gigging as a three-piece, and just have fun for a change. We seem to be accomplishing all of these. Our set list has changed drastically in the last year, we’re digging the trio challenges, and we’re having more fun than we’ve had in many years. We are also booking at some venues that are new to us. This past weekend, we played at a place in Smithton, IL called No Jacks Bar & Grill. It is a relatively new place which has only been in existence for about a year. A friend of Bobby’s recommended it to us, and thought we would go over well there. So, we booked it.

We got together the weekend before at Carlos’ shop to tweak Bobby’s newly revised PA system. Our friend and long-time cohort Mike Stevenson came by to work some of his magic on it. The sound went from white bread to art bread in no time. The man definitely knows how to massage audio equipment.

I got to the club around 19:30-ish. Bobby was already there, and had half of the trailer unloaded already. While we awaited Carlos’ (who got lost) arrival, we debated the idea of using the whole system. The room was not nearly as big as we had been lead to believe, and it had quite a lively acoustic. In the end we opted to use both subwoofers, as this would be much easier than trying to get the top cabinets on and off of the stands. Carlos arrived just as we were putting the cabinets in place. We made a few spatial adjustments to accommodate the pool table, plugged everything in, and were ready in no time. Bobby’s system has been refined to the point that it takes more time to move everything into place than it does to connect it; one speaker harness to each side of the stage, plug in the microphones, done.

We started just shortly after 21:00. Other than a few changes here and there, they were essentially the same sets we played a few weeks earlier at Motley’s. The first set felt a bit awkward, though, as everyone just kind of sat there watching us. It was hard for me to gage whether they found us curious or where simply disinterested. This was not a new phenomenon for me. I recalled the days at Granny’s Rocker North in Alton, IL when we would play to what seemed a room full of cadavers, and at the end of the night receive glorious praise from most everyone. Once we got to the first break, however, several people began complimenting us.

Bobby had arranged several 21 minute song files on his iPod to play during breaks. Everything was flowing like clockwork. During the second set, we started to get dancers. I guessed that we weren’t so scary after all. We did start to get a little feedback out of the monitors late in the evening, probably due to their proximity to the front vocal mics. We hadn’t really changed anything, but seemed to have gotten louder. Some quick adjustments to the electronic EQ killed most of it, and we learned to just deal with the remainder. I noted that it seemed to be bouncing off of my face when I got near my mic, and quipped to Carlos that I shouldn’t have shaved that day.

The end of the night turned into something of a free-for-all jam session. We started to ignore the set list and play whatever we wanted. We did a couple of Led Zeppelin songs by request and some off-the-beaten-path Black Sabbath tunes as well. We even did the odd Rush song I Think I’m Going Bald at the end of the night for the “one more song” crowd. They actually liked it.

We tore down the stage, received our compensation for our efforts, and were on our way in no time. Well...almost no time. Bobby’s truck died and needed a jump-start. I stopped at the White Castle in Belleville near the Belleville East High School campus. It’s almost a ritual, you know. I had the second disc from Dream Theater’s Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence in my CD player, and listened to that for the drive home. I need to start picking up some new music again. It’s been awhile.

Condensation of the Year

2008-12-27T20:39:00.002-06:00

One could have come to the conclusion that this Blog would have been titled “Life is Always Interesting, pt. 2.” This would not have seemed unreasonable. However, the following encapsulation of the majority of the year begged for something more fitting. It is the Readers’ Digest condensed version of the remainder of the events of my year as a BarStar.

After April’s short stint with Just Mr. – again – I settled back into the BenWahBob groove for awhile. We played some of the same places we had been playing for years on a regular basis such as Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO, and the summertime “Budweiser Party at The Park” gigs at Fairmount Park in Collinsville, IL. We also played a few places relatively new to the BWB circuit, like Motley’s in O’Fallon, MO, and 21 Rock in Arnold, MO.

The annual gig on the big amphitheater stage at Bearcat Getaway in Lesterville, MO kicked off yet another typical summer for the band. Dawna and I had so much fun this year that we decided to go back again about a month later for a weekend of camping, swimming, and canoeing on the Black River – without having to schlep music gear around. We took her two boys and a cousin, and a great time was had by all. It was nice to sit around a campfire and listen to the band for a change. We also enjoyed the most hellacious thunder storm any of us have ever had the stupidity to endure in a tent. But, we survived the night, and came away with some great stories.

I also had the fine opportunity in July to fill in again for a couple of gigs with my friends from Rock Bottom (I promised Boozie I would quit using the umlauts). Their bass player had a less-than-positive encounter with the local constabulary in Jersey County, Illinois, which left them in need of a bass player for a few weekends. I was happy to oblige once again.

The rest of the year was relatively uneventful until we were told by Jim after the October gig at Baha that the December gig was cancelled, and that we would not be booked for 2009. Apparently, Greg the owner made up some BS about us continuing to play after he told us to quit at the end of the night. Jim was off that night, but knew right away that it probably didn’t happen that way. Greg is essentially a drunken idiot who has had it in for us ever since Dale left the band. We were told that he did this to another band as well. About two weeks later, Jim called to tell us that he, too, had walked out on Greg. After managing his bar for over 10 years, he could no longer abide Greg’s drunken rants. Needless to say, we will not be playing there again as long as it remains under the current ownership. That’s too bad, really, as it has long been one of our favorite places to play, and BWB has been a fixture there since it was called Key West. Oh, well...onward.

Another fun turn of events came in December when I received a call from Eddie Cerny. His wife Brandy’s band Poisoned Apples had fired their bass player, and wanted to know if I could fill in for a couple of gigs until they found a replacement. Since they didn’t seem to interfere with any BWB gigs, I agreed to do it. Eddie had since left as drummer for Just Mr., and had been playing guitar and keyboards with her band. I had just returned from two weeks working in Helena, Montana to install the newly refurbished pipe organ at the Cathedral of St. Helena when I got the call. By the time they were able to get me a setlist, I had about four days to learn a couple dozen songs – most of which I had never played before, and some of which I had never even heard before. For the Sharky’s gig, I was able to bluff my way through pretty much everything (I’m a trained professional, kids...don’t try this at home), with only minor gaffs here and there. Everyone in the band generously guided me through the evening, and I had fun playing stuff I never imagined I would ever play. I believe there is still another gig with them in January, if they haven’t found someone by then.

Dawna and I finally got to see the Trans Siberian Orchestra this year. Of course, there is an entertaining story to go along with this, too. During one of my fill-in gigs at The Phoenix with Just Mr., Eddie introduced me one night to his friend Angus. We talked a bit. When I asked him what he was doing, he told me he was working on a few solo original projects, and was touring with the TSO. My instant reaction was, “yeah...sure you are.” If I had a dollar for every time some idiot tried to convince me that they were somebody... Well...fast-forward to the night before Thanksgiving. Dawna and I went to see Eddie’s last gig with Just Mr./Evolution. Brandy’s band was playing as well. Toward the end of the first set, this same Angus ran up on the stage and grabbed Eddie’s guitar and started jamming with them. At the end of the song, Eddie introduced him as “Angus from the Trans Siberian Orchestra.” When Dawna gave me a curious look, I blew it off and told her he was just one of Eddie’s friends whom I had met before. Two days later, as we sat in the Scott Trade Center watching the afternoon TSO show, I pointed across to the other side of the stage and said to her, “Look...Eddie’s friend Angus really does play with the TSO.” I already called Eddie and related the story. So, I guess this is my public apology to Angus Clark for blowing you off like that. Sorry, dude.

All in all, it was a pretty good musical year for me. I got to play BarStar, not only with my own band but with several others as well. I got to work on some really fantastic pipe organs at the Wicks Shop in Highland, IL, in churches in Denver, CO, and in Helena, MT. I got a considerable amount of work done on my own pipe organ at home. I completed a fair amount of string arrangements. Most importantly, though, I finally settled on a format for my own progrock original project. As soon as the organ wiring is complete and it is assembled, that will be my primary focus until it is done.

Life is Always Interesting, pt. 1

2008-05-11T15:17:00.003-05:00

OK...so, where was I? Oh, yeah...now I remember – I was AWOL from the Blogisphere. Again. It was a combination of life getting in the way (wait, that was another blog) and a shining lack of interest in sharing the details at the time. Sorry if that rubs the wrong way, but it is the simple truth. When I first started this blog many many years ago (2004, I believe...when it was still on AOL even), it was a fun and new experience and I couldn’t wait to write it every Sunday to relate the entertaining experiences of the weekend’s adventures as a BarStar. Of course, I had more time to do it back then, too. I also had more readers who would offer feedback, which helped to spur it along. Here lately, not so much so. I have to say; it’s not so much of a priority anymore.

So, with that said, here is a brief run down of some of the events swirling around me since the last posting in March.

08 March 2008
BenWahBob made its first foray into Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO since becoming a three-piece. This was really the only gig about which I had any worries. I have known for many years that the owner Greg is not a fan of trios, and has pretty much refused to book them. I expressed this concern to the other fellas, who agreed that it might be a problem. This was supposed to remain a BenWahBob gig, to be played by the four-piece band with Dale still singing. Unfortunately, Dale was unable to find a replacement drummer after Bobby quit. He called Carlos one day in disgust and told him that he too was quitting. This left the Baha gig in our laps. We had to play it because we would have felt bad leaving them high and dry on such short notice. Besides, we were certain that they would like us regardless of the number of band members on the stage.

When we got there, we were instantly inundated with questions about the circumstances of Dale leaving the band. Apparently, as we would find out later, Dale had been talking to Jim the whole time and he knew Dale was quitting before we did. To his credit, he didn’t immediately cancel the gig and replace us. He was willing to give us a chance. We took it and ran with it. We put on one of the best shows that night that BWB has ever played there. Everyone seemed to recognize the change in the band’s character, and recognized it as a positive change. We were having more fun on stage, and now had a wider variety of sound with the three of us singing. Karen, the lighting goddess at Baha, was especially happy to see me back in the band. She has been a big supporter for many years, and has always been incredibly gracious to me.

We had a really good night, albeit with a fairly light crowd. The club, unfortunately, took this as a sign that we wouldn’t be able to draw as well without a singer. This is a classic anti-trio argument that is every bit as invalid as the “can’t put on a good show with only three guys” argument. However, we only lost one person all night because of the Dale thing...and she was one of his long-time friends who obviously just came in to make her presence known, then made an even more obvious exit after making some remarks about us being no good without Dale. Funny, she was the only one who seemed to have a negative opinion of us. Everyone else really dug what we were doing. The crowd may have been mediocre, but they stayed all night and had a good time.

At the end of the night, we got the expected lecture from the manager. Some unfortunate angles arose as well. We were given a pay cut (ala Club Richard’s) because we were only three, and told we were on some sort of “probation” until we could prove that we could draw a good crowd.

Huh?

BenWahBob has been playing Baha Rock Club since before it was even called Baha Rock Club (the Key West days). To be told that we are now on “probation” because we made a personnel change makes absolutely no sense at all. Did that happen when I became the new bass player, or when Bobby became the new drummer, or when Chris became the new bass player? No, it didn’t. Frankly, it’s quite an insult. If anything, we should get a pay raise. We have THREE singers now. We didn’t get cuts on an individual basis, but as a band we took a 25% cut. That’s just wrong. Baha has always been considered the premier BWB gig because it’s a big club with a nice stage and a big light show. Now, it’s our lowest paying gig. We get more from the smaller venues we play just across town. I must confess that changes the way you look at a gig.

04 April 2008
Bobby used to play at 21 Rock in Arnold, MO quite a bit when he was with Alibi. He talked to them and got us a few gigs there. I had played there a few times as well, but not in several years. Since then they have moved the stage from that awful position in the corner to a much better location against a side wall. It’s also much bigger now.

I sent emails to all of the people I know who live in that area around South St. Louis/North Jefferson Counties area to let them know that we would be in the area. Many of them have long whined that we never played down there...and rightly so, because we didn’t. Of all the whiners, though, only my former coworker Gina from Findlay Industries actually made it there. It would be tough for her not to, though, as she lives just down the street.

We had a pretty good time at this place. I’ve never really seen it crowded in all the times I’ve been there, but we had a pretty decent crowd this night. It’s kind of an odd crowd in that they really go there to play pool. Thus, the band gets mostly ignored most of the night...until the alcohol kicks in and they remember that we are there. The women danced enough I guess, but the guys just kind of stood in the back leaning on their pool cues and watching. We got a good number of compliments as they were leaving, so I guess they didn’t completely ignore us. House sound and lights makes this a pretty easy gig, too. Carlos even stretched out and played some stuff he doesn’t actually know. He threw a Van Halen riff in the middle of one song, and played and sang a song he’d never done before. I was amazed. I’ve never seen him like that, mostly because he was always afraid of doing something that might distract Dale. I warned him of that dangerous Knucklehead-esque slide, that slippery slope from which there is no return. He just chuckled and said, “That shit was fun.”

Uh...oh...
That’s how it always starts.

11 April 2008
I thought I was to have this weekend off. I thought wrong. My friends from Just Mr. called in need of a bass player for Friday night. Ted had some trouble with his new defibrillator (that apparently involved spending some unintended time on his kitchen floor), and had to go in for some more repairs. The surgery was postponed by a couple of days, and they asked if I could play the whole weekend. How could I not agree to that?

Friday night was at The Phoenix in South St. Louis County. This is always a fun gig for a lot of reasons, all of which have been previously explained. They changed the backstage area considerably. It was now cut in half. While it was much smaller now, it was also much more quiet, as the other end no longer opens into the bar area divided only by a curtain. Some guy approached me at one of the breaks and started waxing on and on about always wanting to go back stage and hang with the band. When I told him that was not possible, he started asking me about what actually went on back there. He wanted to hear about all the incredibly perverted things that bands do to groupies in dressing rooms, and wanted to know if that was going on at that moment. I told him I couldn’t possibly know because I was not back there, and was instead standing there talking to him. He gave me that knowing smile and nodded as he walked away.

During the next break, the door to the dressing room opened and in he walked. He stepped into the middle of the room and looked around all proud of himself because he was backstage with the band. I was leaning against the new wall talking on my phone to my girlfriend, Eddie was sitting at a table smoking a cigarette, and Damon was over in the other corner talking with some friends. This guy just kept looking around the room waiting for something nasty to happen. I started to tell him that he had to leave, but then realized that it would be much more fun to watch the air fizzle out of his balloon that to burst it all at once. He wanted to see porn in action, and all he got was a bunch of guys sitting around relaxing in a space away from idiots like himself. Kirk finally came in and shooed him away with something to the affect of “Who are you? Get the hell out!”

To play this gig, I had to learn about eight new songs in about a day and a half...and I almost did. In spite of that, I made it through without too many flubs, none of which were particularly fatal. At the end of the night, after tearing down my gear and moving it to the edge of the stage toward the door, Damon looked up at me and said, “Paul, I approve of your playing.” I looked at him and laughed as I asked if he had indeed just said that he approved of my playing. He said, “Yes I did, and you can put that in your fucking blog. ‘Damon approves of Paul’s playing.’”

So there it is, Damon...and thanks for your approval.

Oh, oh, oh...I almost forgot; I got a Just Mr. guitar pick!!!

12 April 2008
The return to the scene of the crime; Sharky’s in Collinsville, IL. I vowed I would never fall on that stage again, and I kept my word. In spite of those waiting with baited breath and blinking cameras, I was able to keep my head above my heals all night. Even the Lovely and Gracious Dawna came out for awhile to see the potential spectacle. It was a mostly uneventful evening, though, with the singular exception of the infamous Booger leaving early because the bar refused to serve him anymore. Imagine that. There was one Van Halen song during a section of which I had a complete brain fart. I just threw up my hands, turned to Eddie who was giving me that unmistakable “WTF?” look, and nonchalantly said, “I simply don’t know this song.” I found it again, lurking behind Eddie’s shaking head, and was able to mostly finish it. Oops.

At the end of the night, we all retired to Denny’s for breakfast and had a blast taking shots at one another. The food was really good, but the waitress was truly terrible. She should really consider another line of work.

It was fun playing with these guys again. Ted’s ticker is all good again...again...and he is back in the saddle. Tom has, however, announced that he will be departing the band, and they are currently searching for a new guitar player.

So, at the risk of running this too long, and ruining what’s left of my Sunday, I’ll chop this off here and continue the saga in a few days.

A New Spin

2008-03-04T23:12:00.002-06:00

Friday, 22 February 2008
I got a call from Deron earlier in the week informing me that Rock Bottom’s new bass player Derrick Howard was in New Orleans all week for a job, and would not be back for their gigs at Eddie’s in Granite City, IL on Friday and Saturday. He asked if I could cover them. As it happened, the first BenWahBob-less trio gig was to be that Saturday. When I told him as much he paused momentarily, then asked, “Can you do Friday? I’ll worry about Saturday later.” I agreed to play Friday with them.

We’ve had an actual winter in the St. Louis area this year, complete with snow and ice storms, for the first time in a long time. While it’s nice to see all of that global warming BS fall by the wayside, it’s starting to get old already. I’ve gotten spoiled by the mild winters of the past few years. The days leading up to these gigs saw more of this inclement weather yet again. I had put my 610 speaker cabinet back in the basement after the last gig with RB, figuring I would not need it again. I decided this time to just take the 210 combo and 1-15 cabinet that I keep in the shed for ease of loading. That big SVT cabinet is a bear to get up the steps. Unfortunately, Mother Nature must have felt I needed the workout (and she’s right), because there was about an inch-and-a-half of ice in front of the shed door preventing it from opening. Guess I would be hauling the 610 up after all.

I got the truck loaded after work and headed to Granite City. As I arrived, so did Boozy. I loaded in my gear, then went back out to help him load in his drums. It turned out that this was unnecessary. His large, movable drum riser apparently also serves as a pair of dollies when split in half (half-in-two?). So, he just stacks everything on the two sides and wheels them in the door. Very cool. I set up my rig, played a little to warm up, then sat back with a watered-down cola and did some people watching. Granite City really excels in this arena.

Everyone showed up pretty much on time, and we commenced with the audio onslaught. Deron must have been in a frisky mood, as he whipped out Fly By Night in the first set. Boozy told me later that he leaned over to Deron after that and told him he was quitting (inside joke). One thing that was quite noticeable was the stage volume; we were painfully loud. I had the SVT4PRO head almost cranked, and could barely hear myself. Granted I was only using one side of the power amp, but that’s still nearly 700 watts! Did I mention we were loud? Jeff must have been going nuts at the soundboard.

Most of the night went off pretty well as I recall, of course I’m writing this about a week-and-a-half after the fact. At the end of the night, though, some friends came up to jam, and things went slightly south. While nothing was really a complete train wreck, there were some rough landings. Overall, though, it was a really good night. The Rock Bottom Nation came out in force, in spite of the weather, and everyone seemed to have a really good time. And that, after all, is what it’s all about.

I tore down my stuff, was paid for my presence, and sat around chatting with a few people about completely silly things until about 03:30. I stopped at Jack-in-the-Box for some tacos, and headed back to my tiny little berg to crawl back under my rock. I had the latest Dream Theater CD already in the player, so I just listened to that for the drive home.

23 February 2008
Many moons ago, when I was still playing bass for BenWahBob, we had some issues. One was the singer Dale’s constant coughing fits on stage. The other three of us devised a plan to learn all the lyrics to all the songs so we could jump in and save the day when this happened. Each would learn the songs that we felt we could comfortably sing. It then started to develop into the idea of playing some gigs as a trio. We got together a couple of times in this arrangement and organized the plan, but never really had the time to properly pursue it.

After I left the band, this apparently became an issue once again, and they re-initiated the trio idea with their new bass player. Unfortunately, he could not sing well while playing bass...a rather important necessity in a trio. He confided this to me in an email shortly after they began the pursuit. Not long after that, Carlos and Bobby asked me if I would be interested in doing the trio thing with them. I’ve always been a sucker for a trio, so this appealed to me right away. I didn’t, however, want to jump in and push out the new bass player. This was not to be the case, though, as this project was to remain independent of the original BWB. In the mean time, Bobby and Dale had another clash that caused Bobby to quit the band. BWB was now looking for a drummer to continue on as they had for nearly 15 years, while the three of us continued on our quest to make the trio work.

We got together at Bobby’s house and worked out the plan once again. We divided up the BWB set list by who could sing what, tossed out the songs that we really never liked doing anyway, added some of the cool songs we had long wanting to learn, and set up a rehearsal schedule. Carlos made CDs for everyone with the songs we would be singing, and we learned them. When we got together again and started running through the list, we sounded surprisingly good. It was immediately obvious that we could indeed make this work just fine. There were a few rough spots here and there, and a couple of songs got bumped for various reasons, but over all it was pretty decent. Our ambitious rehearsal schedule got trimmed down quite a bit by busy work schedules and infectious diseases, but we were pretty comfortable going into the first gig.

Which brings us to the first gig. Before I was asked to participate, Carlos had booked some gigs at a new bar in O’Fallon, MO called Motley’s Pub & Grub. These were booked expressly for the trio, as all of the regular BWB gigs would still be played by that band. Several of our friends have played there since it opened, and all had really good things to say about the place. The owner has been a long-time fan of BWB, and had no qualms about booking them.

I arrived just after Bobby, who had pulled his trailer along the front of the building. We loaded in my stuff – the big rig that was still in the truck from last night – and started on the PA just as Carlos arrived. We only needed a small rig, as this is not a very big place. We used a box mixer, two mains on sticks, and two monitors on sticks washing the stage from the sides. We brought in one light tree, and Bobby’s new foot controller. I got the honors of being lightman. Once we got the PA set up and tested, I set up a few scenes that highlighted whoever would be singing, and one that flooded the whole stage. These, along with a blackout, provided the light show. Through the PA we ran the vocals and a little guitar for presence, and that was it. Drums and bass were right off the stage.

Running a PA from the stage can be a tricky ordeal. I got the honor of being soundman as well. We basically guessed at the levels and went with it. Carlos sang the first couple of songs, which allowed me to jump out front and check the mix. It was surprisingly good, and only needed a bit more guitar. After that minor adjustment, we were off and running.

We rolled through the prescribed sets with little trouble; a couple of rough endings here and there, but over all pretty good. The crowd seemed to like what we were doing, and the owner had some kind things to say about us as well. Many of Bobby’s friends came out, as it’s close to home for them. Carlos and his wife brought in a large group of family and friends, too, including my old boss Brad from Findlay Industries and his lovely wife Heather. It was good to see many of the people I hadn’t seen since leaving BWB. Everyone was very kind to us. The maiden voyage appeared to be a success.

At the end of the night, we tore down the small stage and had everything loaded in no time. Next came another part that I remember about playing in a trio; you get paid what you’re actually worth. I hadn’t made that much money in one night since the gigs with Just Mr., and Those1Guys before that. That was nice.

It started to snow unexpectedly as we loaded out the gear. I was razzing Bobby about not having a White Castle nearby, when I looked up and saw what looked like blue and white striped awnings just down the road. When I drove down there, they turned out to be the green and white awnings of a Krispy Kreme doughnut shop. Bummer. I was really looking forward to some Sliders, so much so that I stopped off I-70 at the Whitey’s near Mid Rivers Mall on the way home. Yummy.

The snow got pretty heavy after awhile – hour and 15 minute drive home in good weather – and by the time I got into Illinois, the roads were truly awful and visibility was quite low. I rarely got over 45 or 50 MPH the whole way. On the bright side, I got to listen to a couple of Symphony X CDs. I started with New Mythology Suite, and ended the drive with The Odyssey. Very inspiring stuff.

Beach Birthday

2008-02-06T13:09:00.000-06:00

01 February 2008
Steve Hall, the venerable singer for Röck Böttöm, celebrates his birthday every year on 31 January. I’ve heard this year he is 29...ish. Strange. I would almost swear I recall him having a 29th birthday way back around the initial Knucklehead days. I could be wrong, though.

So, anyway, as this date fell on a Thursday this year, the party was scheduled for the day after. Röck Böttöm was booked at Club 111 in Pontoon Beach, IL, and this was billed as Steve’s Birthday Party. Normally, this would solicit a fairly large turnout. Unfortunately, a big storm blew through the St. Louis area the day before, dropping the temperature 50° in just a few hours and dumping about 8” of snow. Bummer. It’s Steve’s birthday, it’s my last gig with RB, it’s at a club that has been struggling to stay afloat, and now the weather took a dump on it. It was not looking like a promising night.

I arrived around 20:30, much later than I had hoped, but seemingly the standard anymore. I walked in to find the place much different than I had anticipated. I was in there briefly once many years ago, and the band (I don’t even remember who) set up over in one of the corners. Now, a professional stage covered 2/3 of the north wall, and they had a pretty decent house PA system. Deron’s stuff was on the stage but not set up, and Boozy’s kit was nowhere to be seen. Hmmm. Someone came up to me and asked where everyone was at. I had no answer. What I had forgotten was that everyone was at Pop’s lending support to Ivory Tiger, who had a gig there opening for a couple of tribute bands.

I loaded my equipment in and set it up on the stage. I got everything connected and ready to go. I hit the power switch and everything on the stage – in fact everything on that side of the building – went dark. Uh-oh. My gear had been in my truck since the previous weekend. Had condensation inside the amp caused a short? The soundman came up and reset the breaker, and then suggested that I plug into the other side of the 4-way outlet behind my amp, as it was on a different circuit. I did, and with some trepidation, hit the power switch again. Everything powered up just fine. I tuned my bass and after a brief sound check, proceeded to practice for awhile, rolling through some of my favorite Rush tunes that serve as great exercises in self-indulgence.

The rest of the guys rolled in eventually. Noticeably absent was Boozy’s drum kit. It was now 21:30, and there were no drums. This place apparently has a house drum set that they tear down when RB plays there. Boozy was planning on using the house kit, and the house was planning on him bringing his own. Whoops. They whipped out the kit and had it set up in no time. I think we were playing by shortly after 22:00.

It was, for the most part, a fairly normal Röck Böttöm setlist – well, fairly normal while I’m with them, anyway. There were a few departures here and there, like the insertion of Iron Maiden’s Two Minutes to Midnight. Lots of friends came out, too. In fact, lots of RB fans came out in spite of the weather. What a great following. Many of the regular faces from Eddie’s were there, too. One of the regular faces must have had one too many shots of testosterone, and some drama ensued next to the bar. Cooler heads eventually prevailed, and everyone relaxed and remembered how to have fun. It’s truly sad to see this happen time and again, and it’s almost always the same people. It’s not hard to see why people are hesitant to go see a band at an East Side bar.

For the most part, though, it turned out to be a pretty good night. The crowd stayed all night and the band played all night. I was puzzled, though, to see people smoking inside the bar...scarcely one month into the statewide ban. I was a bit disappointed, too. If I were a struggling bar owner, I would probably be unlikely to expose myself to the potentially large fines that this could incur. But, what do I know...I’m just a musician.

I packed up my gear at the end of the night, and headed back to crawl under my little rock. I took a cue from one of my MySpace friends Liz, guitar player for the LA area band Redeemer (formerly Hellsing), who had an Adagio song playing on her page. I hadn’t listened to these guys for some time, so I dug out their Sanctus Ignis CD for the drive. You gotta love symphonic metal.

If this blog seems a bit terse, it may be influenced by my current battle with this upper respiratory thing that seems to be sweeping through everyone I know. Not wanting to be left out, I spent as much time as I could around The Lovely and Gracious (& Infected) Dawna last weekend. If you have yet to contract this vile infection, I would recommend making every effort to avoid it.

Smoke Free in GC

2008-01-28T23:35:00.001-06:00

Sorry I never took the time to write about the New Year’s Eve gig with Röck Böttöm at Rumors in Wood River, IL. Two things happened: I didn’t really have the time, and I didn’t really have the gumption. Not unlike Deron, I seem to occasionally lose the drive to spread these stories. It seems like most of the people who read it on a regular basis were there anyway.

In spite of it all, I had a really good time. I got to play with some great friends, many other friends came by and said “Hi” or sat in with us, and I got to spend some time in public with the Lovely and Gracious Dawna. The night went long, of course, and she ended up succumbing to the unbelievable amount of smoke that accumulated in the bar after they locked the doors at 02:00. So, we had to exit earlier than many would have preferred. I again offer my sincerest apologies to everyone this affected. With the new Illinois indoor smoking ban in place, I’m sure this is no longer an issue for those of us who don’t smoke.

Thus was the entrance of the new calendar year.

Friday, 25 January 2008
Deron contacted me a couple of weeks ago to tell me that they had a gig booked the day after Steve’s birthday, and wanted to know if I would play it with them. “Absolutely” was the only correct answer. That would surely be a blast. He then told me that they also scored some dates at Eddie’s in Granite City, two of them being the weekend before the birthday gig. I agreed to do those as well. I’ve had a lot of fun playing with these guys. As they seem to have now picked a permanent replacement for Chuck, this would soon be coming to an end.

At the first gigs I played with them at Schatze’s just before the Holidays, they had commented that I was not as loud as they had become accustomed to hearing. This came up again at Rumors. So, this time I would have a fix for that. I left the small Ampeg BA500 combo at home and broke out the big rig; the Ampeg SVT4PRO amp and SVT610HLF cabinet. I was going to throw at them 1400 watts of 6-string bass through a speaker enclosure the size of a small refrigerator. They would surely hear that.

I arrived at Eddie’s around 20:30 for setup. Everyone else had their stuff on-stage and ready to go, but all were gone except for Jeff still connecting the PA and lights. I plugged everything in, tuned the bass, and pounced on the thing. New strings, plenty of power to spare, and the always fantastic tone of the Fishbone bass...I was in hog heaven. I stood on the stage for the next half-hour just playing with the volume low, just enjoying the sound. It served as a pretty good warm-up, too.

Everyone else arrived with about 10 minutes ‘til go-time. We chatted a bit while Deron fussed at his guitar. His lovely fiancé Becca asked me where Dawna was. (I love doing this) I told her in quite a manly manner that Dawna was at home cleaning the house and baking cookies, like a good woman should be. She gave me the most priceless incredulous look, not knowing if I was serious. Deron snickered, and I lost my composure, too. I confessed that she had her kids this weekend, and would not be coming. When I later told Dawna about this, she laughed and said to tell Becca that she would indeed make me some “special” chocolate cookies.

Once everything was tuned and checked, we were on our way. The crowd was a bit sparse at first, but picked up quickly after we started playing. We had a major problem with low-frequency feed back that seemed to dog us for most of the night. No one could figure out from whence it came. We dealt with it, but only barely. It was quite annoying.

During the second set, a couple of Casanovas started flirting with the hot band chicks. Normally, there’s really nothing wrong with this. It’s one of the hazards of being on-stage while the hotties are on the dance floor. You learn to deal with it, and so do they. I usually find it quite entertaining to watch Dawna shoot them down like poorly-trained Libyan fighter pilots. This was the normal situation, too, until one of them got a little too touchy-feely with Becca. She eventually shooed him away, though. Deron mentioned at break that he may have to beat the guy. Later, as everyone was standing on the dance floor talking, this guy apparently tried his moves on her again. Deron took a strong exception to his touching her yet again, and went after him. It was broken up quickly, but the skinhead and his buddies got the message: If you’re going to mess with someone in the bar, don’t make it the biggest guy in there...or his girlfriend.

The last set turned into a near free-for-all, as we ventured off the “normal” RB setlist and into more of a Knucklehead moment. We started whipping out stuff like Metallica and White Zombie, and the crowd loved it. I heard a couple people ask for Tool, so I launched into Sober, which was another KH staple. I fully didn’t expect Boozy to jump in on cue, yet there he was, and we actually played the damned song to the end. That was fun. That’s always a fun bass song.

Our friends from Ivory Tiger rolled in at the end of the night. They had finished their gig at Porky’s in Wood River and stopped in to see the circus that is Eddie’s at 02:30. Naturally, they came up and did a few tunes with us. A bunch of people made their way to the stage, and eventually I was delegated to a small corner next to my amp. We finished off with some manner of big rockin’ tunes, and called it a night.

As I stood around socializing (yes, I actually do that sometimes) with Geo from IT, we were approached by a couple of young ladies apparently bent on snaring a man. They started groping on each other and kissing each other, and generally making fools of themselves, all in the name of trying to impress us. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to burst their little bubble, and so I did. As I chuckled and shook my head, one of them asked if we “wanted any of this,” to which I replied, “Not hardly.” They looked at me kind of incredulously and asked again, saying they couldn’t believe I wasn’t interested. I told them that they apparently haven’t seen what I have at home...well, she wasn’t technically at my home, but you get the picture. They went away after that. I have little tolerance for fake lesbians. Go play your silly games somewhere else...I have neither the time nor the inclination to participate in your farcical little ruse.

Rick Schroeder of Just Mr. made an appearance as well. He didn’t come up and sing, but we did get to talk a bit at the end of the night. After convincing him that I have never played with a certain former band of his, he razzed me about the night I went rubber-side up on-stage at Sharky’s in Collinsville, IL while playing with JM (his fault, not mine).

I eventually collected my share of the monetary compensation, put away my bass, and headed for home. As I’ve been on a bit of a Rush kick lately (yeah...surprise, surprise), I opted for my favorite album Hemispheres as my soundtrack for the drive home.

Saturday, 26 January 2008
In slept about half of the day on Saturday...or so it seemed anyway. I arrive at Eddie’s later than I had planned, but still ahead of anyone else. Deron rolled in shortly after me, and the rest followed him. I even teased Steve about not being the last one there, as Boozy was apparently now the late-arriver. We started off the night only a few minutes late. Not long after we started, so did that annoying rumble. Jeff went over and kicked his amp rack or something, and it went away, never to return (actually, he just tapped on his crossover...but that doesn’t sound as cool). He also later asked me if I could turn down a bit. I just smiled, and told him I could turn down or up, whatever he wanted.

The crowd was better at the start of this night, which is usually the case at Eddie’s. I have to note another thing about the crowds. It’s quite interesting to look out and see a virtual sea of Röck Böttöm T-shirts at their gigs. The “Röck Böttöm Nation” really seems to step up and support this band. That’s very cool.

At one of the breaks, I was approached by a woman who looked vaguely familiar. She grabbed my arm and told me that she had seen me play with Just Mr. when I was sitting in for Ted May. She then proceeded to relate the story of seeing me fall down on the stage at Sharky’s, and then she giggled.

Why does everyone think that was so funny?

You see...Rick got his mic stand caught on a drum mic cable and...oh, never mind. When she said she was glad I didn’t get hurt, I told her that I had indeed hurt myself. I went down against Damon’s keyboard stand and on top of my bass guitar stand. I had some seriously sore ribs for a few weeks after that. It didn’t do my back much good either. She giggled some more, and excused herself to go back to her friends. I suppose that is to be my legacy with that band.

The guys from Ivory Tiger came in at the end of the night again, and helped us plow through a bunch of songs that had us playing until almost 03:00. We sat around afterwards chewing the proverbial fat (sorry, Dawna...a little injun lingo there), and I didn’t get my stuff torn down and loaded until after 03:30. I heard Deron mention something about tacos sounding good. Bastard! I stopped at QuikTrip for gas, and ended up two cars back behind him in the Jack-in-the-Box drive-thru. They were slow as molasses, and it was about 04:00 by the time I got my tacos (2 for 99¢) and was headed home. I haven’t had JB tacos in a long time, especially at 4am. I cranked up the Symphony X CD New Mythology Suite for my driving music, and was home and in bed just past 04:30. Needless to say, Sunday was a waste.

Bass Player for Hire

2007-12-26T23:41:00.000-06:00

Friday, 21 December 2007
“It’s been a long time since I wrote a blog.
Can’t count the tears of a life with no blog.”

...indeed.

All Zeppelin bastardizations aside, though, I haven’t written one of these since June of this year. The reason for this is simple: I haven’t actually done anything notably entertaining since then. As the sole purpose of the existence of this blog is to recount the entertaining moments of my musical life for your viewing pleasure, there was really no reason to waste the time or the space for the events of the last six months.

I’ve really just lead my normal, boring life; eat too much, sleep too much, work too much, spend not nearly enough time with my painfully beautiful girlfriend. Even my pursuit of personal musical growth has been severely limited. While I have spent a moderate amount of time with my cello this year and a small amount with my guitar and my keyboards, I did not actually even touch my bass from the first week of June to sometime in early December. After the last gig with Just Mr., I put it in the case and there it stayed. I have done this often over the years, but rarely for this long. I just had no overwhelming desire to play it.

That’s not to say I have been musically dormant. On the contrary, I feel I have accomplished much. My cello playing has grown nicely, I’ve written loads of stuff for my various original music projects, and I’ve completed string arrangements of Antonio Soler’s Keyboard Sonatas #1-7, the first five of which are already available on my website as free PDF downloads.

I have not been slacking, I assure you.

I did start to hear some rumblings a few months ago about some trouble within the ranks of BenWahBob. Their new bass player (well, not really new anymore) Chris Ashley and I had traded some messages on MySpace regarding a growing rift between Dale and Bobby. This was later confirmed for me by Carlos, who also confirmed that they were rehearsing in BenWahBobless-mode once again. We did this once before when I was still with the band on the premise that Dale seemed to be having more and more trouble getting through a whole night without severe coughing fits, and we wanted to be able to cover essentially everything between the remaining three of us. Now they were doing the same thing, but under a different premise; Bobby had refused to do any more shows with Dale. He told them they had to find another drummer.

When I spoke with Carlos, he expressed his concerns that they wouldn’t be able to learn enough of the songs as a trio before their looming gigs at the beginning of the year. Chris apparently doesn’t sing as much as he and Bobby, so he asked if I might be interested in filling in with the ‘Bobless project in the event that Dale was unable to find another drummer. As I have always had a preference for the trio format and was intrigued by the challenge, I agreed that it might be fun to give it a shot. We divided up the BWB songlist and came up with a little over 50 songs that we could do – more that enough to get us through the pending January gig at Baha Rock Club. We’ve rehearsed together a couple of times, and everything looks like it will work just fine. Should be interesting, though.

Another development of interest occurred in the last couple of weeks as well. My good friends in Röck Böttöm encountered a bit of internal strife for themselves. I have very little knowledge of the exact details of what lead up to it (it supposedly involves a Rush song...?), but bass player Chuck Mann apparently became angry enough one night to walk off of the stage during a gig. At break time, he packed his gear and left. He sent out a notice the next day on MySpace announcing his departure from the band. As the rest of the band was uncertain of his long-term intentions, Deron asked if I might help them get through their remaining gigs through the end of the year.

I actually had to think about this one...for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, I had no intentions of stepping in and taking anyone else’s gig. I like Chuck, and didn’t want to give the impression that I was swooping in like a vulture at a moment of weakness. Deron assured me, though, that this definitely was not the case. Chuck had disassociated himself from the band in every way, and appeared to have no intentions of returning. Second, and no less compelling, was my recent re-association with the BWB-less project. I checked the schedules and found no immediate conflicts (here we go with that again), so I agreed to play their remaining gigs with them.

One of the interesting ironies of this is the Knucklehead angle. When Deron, Steve, and I were looking to put together a band in 1993, Robin Crattles (he went by a different name back then) was one of the drummers we considered. We were even leaning towards him until we found that Steve Wenos was available and interested. Such was the founding of the original Knucklehead...version 1.0. Now, it seemed, we would be gigging with that lineup afterall...albeit 14 years later.

As a matter of trivia, the working name for that band in ’93 was Walrus Gumboot (don’t ask).

So, that brings us to the events of this past weekend, as noted by the date way up at the beginning of this novella. I got home after work, loaded my gear, and headed to Belleville, IL to a place called Schatze’s. I played there back in 2002 with Those1Guys, and had been there once since then to see Jägertÿme. I still lived in Granite City then, and found that it is much easier now to get into the east side of Belleville coming from St. Jacob. It’s all highway.

Amazingly, I arrived before anyone else in the band. Jeff was putting the finishing touches on the PA and lights, but that was it. Deron rolled in shortly after me and expressed his surprise that Boozy hadn’t yet set up his massive drum kit. He did arrive shortly thereafter with a smaller kit, though, and we were able to start a mere half-hour late. Not so bad for a Friday night really. In the intervening time, I was able to fix the broken solder joints in Deron’s wah pedal. I like the easy stuff.

One frighteningly familiar aspect of this gig is the notable absence of any written setlists. Not unlike Knucklehead, they have something of a regular show that they play. The setlists, though, as Deron had told me on the phone a few days earlier, were somewhere in his head. He had nothing to give me beyond verbal queues on stage and the occasional wry smile and nod that the next song would indeed be what I thought it might be (some communication is beyond words). This works just fine in this arrangement as, unlike in KH, I didn’t have to plan ahead for keyboard patch changes and MIDI pedal setups.

I just had to play bass and occasionally sing some harmonies. The bass playing part wasn’t so bad, as I knew most of their stuff anyway. The few songs that I didn’t know I have heard enough to bluff my way through. Deron went over a couple of chord changes with me before we started, and we were off. Nothing like playing off the cuff, as it were.

Everything seemed to be going along just swimmingly for the most part. Boozy and I finally locked in together at some point, and I thought we actually started to sound OK...all things considered anyway. They complained that I wasn’t loud enough (read: not as loud as they have become accustomed to), so Jeff pumped a little bass through the monitors and everyone was fine. We did on occasion throw in some old KH stuff just for yucks (or is that nyucks?). Someone even asked for some Iron Maiden, which we eventually obliged. This went against every tenet set out for us, which was to remain a Röck Böttöm show and not become Knucklehead. The people dug it, but we kept that to a bare minimum.

At some point in the last set, my throat started to give. I had been trying to battle off a sore throat/cold since about Wednesday, and thought I was winning. My voice told me otherwise. I eventually just stopped singing completely. At one point, as I was standing there watching the other guys play (that’s sometimes more entertaining than the drunks in the crowd), I felt something brush past my arm and whack me in the side of the face. I flinched quickly enough to see my mic stand thump against the stage floor. I looked over just in time to watch a drunk guy roll up against my right leg. He had apparently fallen backwards over the floor monitor and onto the stage. One of the bouncers helped him go somewhere else, I know not where. I didn’t see him the rest of the night.

We finished the night with some putrid, moldy, cheesy stuff that everyone loved (AC/DC, I think), and called it a night. We made it through, in spite of ourselves. It really wasn’t so bad, I guess. There were a few moments that were obviously lacking in luster, but for the most part it went fine.

I did notice that not playing for six months can affect your technique in a decidedly negative manner. At several points, I found myself playing wrong notes for no apparent reason. G to D was coming out as G to D#. It was silly the first time, and curious the second time. After that, it was becoming somewhat alarming. I started to put some thought into it as we played, and came to the revelation that the fingerings on a bass guitar are not exactly the same as those on a cello. In practicing with my cello and ignoring my bass for six months, I had altered my feel for the fretboard. I spent the rest of the gig that night practicing my bass technique on stage.

Boozy, his lovely wife, and I spent a little time talking in the parking lot before heading home. I stopped at the White Castle on IL-161 on the way out of town, and thoroughly polluted my system. Man, I love those damned things. The drive back to St. Jacob was fairly quiet, as the roads were mostly deserted. I listened to the second Circus Maximus CD Isolate for my musical accompaniment. I certainly hope that the rumors come true of a US tour for them.

Saturday, 22 December 2007
I awoke to the raging sound of telephones ringing Saturday morning. A small but mighty storm had blown through the area Friday night while we played, and I arrived home to find I had no power. I guessed limbs were blown onto power lines somewhere, as half of St. Jacob had power and about half didn’t...my half, of course. I plugged in a corded phone to call Dawna and hadn’t unplugged it when the power was restored right before I fell asleep, so they were ringing all around me when she called. It was a good thing, though, as I needed to get my derriere moving to finish some last minute Xmas shopping. That was an adventure unto itself. It seemed that a certain “spirit of the season” was noticeably absent on this day. I opted to not participate in the smash-em-up derby going on all around me. (I know...it’s easy for a Buddhist to take shots from the outside looking in.) The rest of the day passed relatively uneventfully once I got away from the commerce centers.

Dawna was going to go with me to Schatze’s, but elected at the last minute to stay home. She, too, was a bit under the weather. So, I tossed my bass in the truck and headed to Belleville. I arrived around 20:00, fully an hour before the “scheduled” start time. I had planned to either grab something in town or just eat at the bar. I recalled that they used to have pretty good food, so that became the plan. I was not disappointed. I had one of the best burgers I’ve eaten in a long time.

While I ate, I occasionally chuckled at the loud-mouthed 50-something guy sitting at the bar screaming at the Missouri-Illinois basketball game on one of the TVs. He might as well have been saying, “LOOK AT ME! I’M A DRUNK IDIOT!” Every bar has one. I could tell when the game was over, because his attention turned to me. I had worn my Pittsburgh Steelers jersey the night before, and my Detroit Red Wings sweater this night in honor of both teams having been in town that week. He started out making disparaging comments about the city of Detroit (as if it were any worse than north St. Louis) and all their Russian players. When that didn’t garner my attention, he started in on my hair. The bar employees tried to calm him, but he was on a roll and not to be stopped. Everyone seemed to be awaiting some kind of response from me. I thought about walking over to him and asking him how many Stanley Cup Championship banners hang in the rafters of the Scott Trade Center, or what kind of season the Blues had in 1929, but I figured that would be lost on him. In the end, I simply turned half around on my stool, put my finger to my lips, and gave him a quiet “Shhhhhhhhh.” He wasn’t amused at that either. One of the bouncers came in shortly after that. I don’t know what he said to the guy, but he was pretty quiet after that. Jeff had arrived during the entertainment, and we sat there watching the water dripping off of one of the ceiling tiles and into a dish bucket on the dance floor in front of the stage.

Steve actually arrived before Deron...quite a rarity...and Boozy was the last one in. We started pretty close to on-time. I approached Deron and stated that I hoped they hadn’t hired me for my singing voice...or at least that’s what I attempted to say. What actually squeaked out was altogether different. My voice was almost completely gone, and the cough had become worse. I was eating cough drops like candy. Steve offered me some Mucinex, but I was hesitant. I’m not much on taking medication, especially the over-the-counter variety. They generally do nothing but mask the symptoms, and I’m never sure how they will affect me for the drive home. So, there would be no three-part harmonies this night.

We rolled through the first set with little trouble that I can recall. As Boozy and I were standing on the stage at break discussing the virtues of Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy, we heard a loud WHOOSH followed by a SPLASH. The tile gave up in its battle with the leaking roof and collapsed onto the stage where I was standing and playing just moments before. In the process, it had also dumped a couple gallons of water all over the dance floor. When the bouncer came over to assess the scene, I leaned over and asked him if perchance they didn’t like me there. When he gave me a curious look, I recounted that they had thrown drunks at me the previous night...now they were chucking chunks of the building at me.

After that, the rest of the night seemed relatively uneventful. We made an effort not to stray off the RB path. These guys have a good following, and for good reason. Although there weren’t many of their regulars who made the trip to Belleville, there was a good crowd there and they stayed all night. They even insisted on “ONE MORE!” several times. We finally quit after three of those.

Teardown went pretty quickly at the end of the night. We got paid fairly quickly (by bar standards, anyway), chatted a bit, and went our separate ways. There doesn’t seem to be any RockStar attitude in the band, and the band “wives” are all pleasant women. It’s a pretty good gig. I don’t mind at all helping these guys. They are good friends, and I’m honored that they had the confidence in me to call.

I stopped to pollute myself again on the way home. This night, though, I opted to listen to a disc of Vivaldi string concerti for the drive home. Whiteys and baroque string music...life doesn’t get much better than that, eh?

Catching Up

2007-06-10T23:16:00.000-05:00

10 June 2007
I suppose it would be prudent to start off with an apology regarding the recent incredible lapse in my weekly blog. This seems to be more the norm than not lately. So…sorry about that.

Naturally, way too much has happened in the elapsed time since March to recount it all here in detail now…which is a shame, really, because there were some infinitely entertaining stories that occurred along the way. I’ll just give a general recap and move onward, though, rather than feebly attempt to remember them all and not give them their due justice.

I played my last gig with BenWahBob on 09 March 2007 at the “Budweiser Party at the Park” at Fairmount Park in Collinsville, IL. We didn’t get all teary about it or anything…we just played the gig and moved on our separate ways. BWB has been through a lot of musicians in their nearly 15 years in the STL club scene. This was not a new situation for them. They are working professionals, and as such continued on their journey. If you have not yet seen them with their new bass player Chris Ashley, shame on you. While they are still pretty much the same band as always, a new member always brings with him a new dynamic to any band. Chris is much more active on-stage than I have been in many years (read: “not boring”). If you have the opportunity, you really should see them live.

Next, of course, was the situation with the incredible Ted May and Just Mr. As was recounted in the previous blog (yeah…three months ago…I know), Ted had to endure some medical procedures to repair some heart deficiencies. As it turned out, it was a bit worse than they had initially imagined. He ended up getting two valves replaced, one repaired, and a double bypass. A couple of weeks later, he required a pace maker as well. Ted, of course, took it all in stride. This was his third brush with mortality, and he’s starting to get good at it.

So, while he was out on his little cardiac “vacation”, the band for which he plays bass – Just Mr. – was in need of a replacement bass player. That turned out to be me. The timing of it all also seemed to work out quite well, as the first gigs with them came the weekend after the end of my commitments with BenWahBob. It was a perfect transition.

Just Mr., of course, has been a long-standing fixture in the STL rock scene. I must here admit that I have long wanted to play the kind of music these guys play. Unfortunately, it never really happened in the previous situations. We came pretty close in both incarnations of Knucklehead and in Those1Guys, but always seemed to stray into the bubblegummy/cheesey stuff. Now, that’s not to say that JM doesn’t play that stuff, they just play a lot less of it. They center their sets around bands like Kansas, Styx, Boston, REO Speedwagon, and, of course, Journey. The Journey songs are important because they also do a Journey tribute show called Evolution, which is outstanding.

Needless to say, as these guys have been a staple for over 15 years, it was an honor to play with them. The talent level in that band is quite impressive. I’ve been privileged to play with some fantastic musicians over the years, and these guys fall squarely amongst the best. They made it very easy for me to step in and help…even in a time of internal turmoil, as they were also in the process of changing singers.

I knew guitarist Tom Ackman from his days with Jägertÿme, but apparently didn’t know him quite as well as I thought. Tom’s playing ability far exceeded anything I had seen him do before…probably a function of the level of alcohol imbibed on-stage at a Jägertÿme show. His prowess on the guitar is quite admirable, and he gets some fantastic tones.

Damon Atkinson is one of the most talented keyboard players I’ve met to-date. His command of the instrument is awe-inspiring. Not only does he breeze through some of the tougher passages in what are considered challenging rock songs, but he casually warms up with classical piano repertoire as if it were nothing. Obviously, a well-educated and well-rehearsed musician.

Playing with drummer Eddie Cerny, though, was a pure thrill. Here’s a guy who obviously has an immense amount of talent that has been reinforced with years of healthy practice, studio work, and live performance. I thought that T1G drummer Brian Bayley was a great drummer (and he is), but playing with Eddie was at yet another level. We share a passion for the same kind of progressive rock music (Rush, Dream Theater, Liquid Tension, etc.), and seemed to lock in together quite well. His ventures into odd time signatures and off-beat accents, while perhaps less appreciated by the new singer, were always a fun and challenging ordeal. I don’t believe he ever once failed to come back around to where he needed to be when he needed to be there (“You play in 5/8, I’ll play in 6/8, and I’ll meet you at 30…the rest of the band catches up 2 measures later and we’re all good again!”).

What can I say about their new singer Rick Schroeder? I was a bit apprehensive about him from the time I found out he would be replacing Tony as the new frontman. I’ve known Rick from his days with Ivory Tiger, and the drama that ensued from that. He has enjoyed a less-than-admirable reputation since then…much of it quite deservedly. He seems like a different person with these guys, though. Perhaps it is a function of the new environment, but he seems much less “intense” than he used to be. His voice seems to work well with the Journey stuff, which is quite important in that band. Now, if he can just get past that whole “Lead Singer Disease” thing…

Another fun aspect of my time with JM was singer Wes Stillman (of Ivory Tiger and Maiden America fame). When all of the madness with their previous singer Tony came to a head, Wes was there for them to fill in the dates until they could find an adequate replacement…and he did a great job! Wes is…um…well…unusual on stage. He has more fun than any one entertainer should be allowed to have. As a singer, he doesn’t suck either. It was fun playing shows with him until Rick was ready.

Teddy started “sitting-in” a couple of weeks ago, and slowly worked his way back into his gig. Last weekend he played two sets on Friday night and all but the first five songs of the last set on Saturday night. While still obviously tired from his ordeal, he told me backstage at The Phoenix that it was “spiritually uplifting” to get back out there and play. You could see the difference in his eyes. Ted was back. This, too, worked out pretty well from a timing standpoint, as I could not play this weekend because of some surgeries Dawna was to have (everything came out well for her, too). I called Ted Saturday afternoon, and he tells me everything went fine for him on Friday.

I really did have a blast playing with these guys. As I said before, it really was an honor to be a part of that group, even if only temporarily.

Another interesting twist that occurred while I was shirking my blogging responsibilities was the acquisition of a pipe organ. Try as I might to be a good boy, another opportunity fell into my lap. This one actually worked out, though. I drove to Perryville, MO to inspect the instrument, agreed to purchase it, and returned the following weekend pulling a rented trailer. Dawna and I loaded the organ into the trailer and brought it back to my house, where it is now taking up most of the room formerly known as my living room. I cannot thank her enough for the help…not to mention her sons Derek and Samuel who helped us carry everything into the house the following day. It is still a mess right now, as I have had little time to pursue the refurbishment. However, that is all changing now that I have fulfilled all of my obligations to other people’s music projects and can now endeavor to complete my own. Besides, I have to get the organ parts out of the way so I can get to the rest of my studio equipment, which was previously moved into the former-living-room-now-turned-studio as well. I can’t wait to dive into it this week. There is also a page on my website devoted to this project. I will try to keep it updated as things change. It can be accessed from the link on the main page, or by just going directly there by copying and pasting the following link: (http://www.metalsmithmusik.com/Organ.html).

As for music…the new Spock’s Beard album came out a couple of months ago, the new Rush album came out a couple of weeks ago, and the new Dream Theater album came out a couple of days ago. New albums from Circus Maximus and Symphony X are also due out soon. Needless to say, I’m in prog heaven right now. It’s a very good time to be a music fan.

A Blister & Just Mr.

2007-03-08T22:51:00.000-06:00

With a month off since the last BenWahBob gig, you’d think that I would be well rested and ready to go. You’d be wrong, of course. Perhaps it’s one of those endless bugs going around, or perhaps it’s just the fact that my sorry-derriere is sadly out of shape. Whatever the case may be, I was just plain tired this weekend.

Friday night was the freebee night, so Dawna & I decided to go see Just Mr. playing at Sharky’s in Collinsville, IL. We really were going to see their bass player Ted May. I’ve known him for many years, and Dawna used to work with him at L.S. Electronics. Ted’s been having some medical issues of late, and we wanted to see how he was doing and show some support. More on this a bit later. We didn’t stay too long, departing after listening to the first set. Wes Stillman of Ivory Tiger fame was filling in for their recently departed singer, and did a fine job with the Journey, Styx, and Kansas.

After leaving there, we ambled our way to Eddie’s in Granite City to see Röck Böttöm. We haven’t seen them for some time, and were long overdue. We ran into some other friends whom we haven’t seen in awhile as well. At the conclusion of a slow dance, during which we took the opportunity to taunt RB bass player Chuck Mann (couldn’t help it, Chuck), I was summoned to the stage by Deron and pushed unceremoniously in that direction by my own lovely and gracious Dawna. Hmmm… Wasn’t I going to not sit in with anyone this night? I had successfully refused Ted’s overtures earlier in the evening. Now, here I was being literally pushed onto the stage. OK…whatever.

Deron had mentioned when we came in wanting to do some Stevie Ray Vaughn to get it out of his system. I was certainly OK with that. Suddenly, when I asked which one we were doing, I was told Tom Sawyer. Huh? The Rush song? Without keyboards? It appeared that this was indeed the plan, as Boozie clicked it off and away we went. Deron very capably covered the important keyboard parts on guitar, and we flew through it unscathed. Boozie then teased the intro to YYZ, and we actually ended up doing that one, too. Normally, I would be all for that. One thing about Chuck’s bass, though: its position on the strap leaves it hanging right around the knee area…great for “rockin’”, not so great for the intricate work required to play this song. My left hand was so distended and bent oddly around under the neck that my fingers started to cramp about half way through the song. This was the impetus behind my later comment to Chuck that he would need to sweep up all the notes I dropped before returning to that side of the stage. We also did Zeppelin’s What is and What Should Never Be for their soundman Jeff Newman, and ended the charade with AC/DC’s Highway to Hell…an eclectic mix of tunes, to be sure.

Another note about Chuck’s bass…he plays with a pick, I play with my fingers. His tone is set to his attack style. While I was playing, I had no definition at all. I found myself over-attacking the strings in an attempt to better hear myself. As a result, I ended up with a real nasty blister on the tip of my right hand middle finger. I’d surely pay for that.

Saturday, 03 March 2007
Baha Rock Club, St. Charles, MO – time to pay for that blister.

Dawna and I arrived at the club shortly after 20:00. Yes…that’s right…Dawna actually went to Baha with me…a rare treat. We rolled up to the front of the club just as someone was pulling away from the curb right in front of the door…RockStar parking! I debated with myself momentarily as to whether or not I really wanted to park there. After the last incident, I wasn’t so sure, and considered just parking in the municipal garage as usual. However, since I had the Hottie with me, I decided to capitalize on the opportunity to afford her the RockStar treatment. She even carried in my 40-pound bass for me…best-looking roadie I’ve ever had. She even wore her “My Face Is Up Here” shirt. My shirt was even more inappropriate.

Set-up went through with its usual quickness. Even sound check was fast, which is an unusual feat for John. He captured a few notes for what was essentially a signal check, gave us a quick monitor check, and we were done. I must say, too, that my monitor mix this night was the best one I’ve had there in a long time. There’s something to be said for brevity.

We fired up the BWB circus promptly at 21:00, and surfed through the first set with scarcely a care. It was shaping up early to be a smooth night. At the end of the set, I stopped and spoke briefly with new BWB bassist-elect Chris Ashley, who had come out to play a bit. He took over for the second set, and I gladly sat with my sweetie and watched. Dawna did comment that it seemed odd that Dale had put the bulk of the danceable songs in the first set…when no one really cares to dance yet. I think I commented something to the affect that she would not be at all shocked by this if she were in attendance more often (just kidding, Boo). Many of the harder-edged songs reared up in the second set, and Chris sounded like he was comfortably up to the task.

The third set was the standard dance set, albeit only in the middle this time when we tossed out the funky stuff. For having old strings on my bass, I was getting a pretty good meaty kind of funk tone for the slap-n-pop stuff. It turned out to be a productive set, as the dance floor remained pretty well populated most of the time. We even ended it with me singing Where The River Flows…a sure-fire way to clear a dance floor in a hurry. My blister was screaming at me by this time. Every time I raked it across a string, it felt like I was shaving off the tip of the finger. I eventually semi-trained my ring finger to partially compensate for it, but I was spilling notes all over the stage again.

The last set picked up right where we left off with the third…with me singing. It was all about me now. We started with Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song, then Carlos unexpectedly jumped into Rush’s In The Mood. I’ve not always been so fond of this one, but it is a known tune in St. Louis, and people seem to like singing along with it. We then slammed into What You’re Doing, a much cooler Rush tune as far as I’m concerned. I’ve always liked doing this one. It’s fun to sing, and Carlos and I have a blast staring each other down during the unison guitar/bass runs in the bridge sections (“WEEEEEEE!!!”). We threw in a few other tunes by I-don’t-remember-who-or-what, then ended the night with Ozzy’s I Don’t Know, followed by the ubiquitous War Pigs. Carlos even cut the solos short, as we had clearly run over past 01:00 and were being stared at by Jim in his crossed-arms-looking-at-his-watch pose.

As we tore down the equipment and readied for the trip home, Jim had to sneak in his comments about not paying the bass player…again. Funny guy! He paid me nonetheless, but got in one last jab when I walked back in to make the requisite “idiot check,” with a shout of “QUITTER!” Dawna and I had discussed the possibility of having shirts made to that affect, but time was insufficient to make that happen. Oh, well…perhaps later.

We made the arduous trek back to St. Jacob to the accompanying strains of a CD of Antonio Vivaldi’s String Symphonies performed by Shlomo Mintz. Dawna tried to sleep, but said she couldn’t help staying awake listening to the music. (I really don’t deserve her.) We had listened to the first Infectious Grooves album on the way there, so this was 180° in the other direction. It was a nice way to end the evening, to be sure.

We were bums for most of the day on Sunday. We got up late, went to breakfast at the Cracker Barrel in Troy, IL where we were stared at by the church crowd, then just played around on the internet for a good part of the day. We had planned on attending an organ concert by David Erwin at Ladue Chapel Sunday evening, but couldn’t motivate ourselves to go after the long weekend of partying like we were young again. Besides, I had a slight headache, and an organ concert is no place to be in that situation. I pulled up some streaming organ music on the internet to help assuage the tinge of guilt from not going. I’m sure David’s heart wasn’t broken over our absence, though.

********************************************

I also received a call from the venerable Ted May. He confirmed to me that the rumors of an impending medical procedure are indeed true. He was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in 1991, and during the treatment received a heavy dose of radiation to his chest. This apparently damaged a valve in his heart, and the only way to fix it is via open-heart surgery. Naturally, he will be out of commission for a couple of months while he recovers, and asked if I would cover for him in Just Mr. until his return. I gladly agreed to do so. While it doesn’t seem to fit into my plan of removing myself from the cover band scene to pursue the original projects, it was an opportunity I couldn’t resist. After all of the years that I’ve been playing and learning countless songs along the way, there is finally a tangible benefit to it. I have the honor, and the ability, to step quickly into another band to fill in for a friend in need. There was no way I could have said “no” to this. So, it seems I will be playing with them for the next couple of months starting next Friday at The Stratford Bar & Grill in Fenton, MO. As my last gig with BenWahBob appears to be this Friday at Fairmount Park, the timing of this all seems to be impeccable.

The saga takes yet another unexpected twist.

More Bass Players Than Knucklehead

2007-01-30T21:02:00.000-06:00

20 January 2007
Guess where I played this weekend?

If you guessed Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO, then you win a great big smile from me the next time I see you! (Yes, I do occasionally smile, in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.)

While it may seem like the only place we play any more, a glance at the newly-revised BenWahBob website will correct this obtuseness. Carlos has apparently been a busy little boy in the scheduling department, as there are many more dates on there already with the promise of more to come. Not to worry, kids…BWB is not going away. I, on the other hand, may be going away sooner than even I thought.

As the witching hour approached Saturday afternoon, Dawna called and informed me regretfully that she would not be going with me to Baha as originally planned, as she had familial obligations to fulfill. Bummer. I was really looking forward to spending some time with her. The weather had been taking a turn for the worse, and as much as six inches of snow was expected. Driving to St. Charles in this didn’t exactly tickle my fancy, either. As it happened, though, the snow held off until after I had arrived at the Club.

Upon loading in my gear, I was informed that there were indeed three bass players coming out to sit-in and audition with the band…very cool. They had all three arrived before we began playing at 21:00, and we all stood around in front of the stage yakking like a bunch of musicians. They all seemed like pretty decent guys.

We played the first set through with virtually no interruptions in the flow. That was a nice change of pace from our recent trend of goofing around between songs. There’s nothing wrong with that, unless you consider loosing the crowd’s participation wrong. We even ended the set on time. Wow! Dale must have read my last blog…or, more likely, Chris read it to him (thanks, Chris!). Whatever was happening, or for whatever reason(s), I thought we came off a lot more professional this way.

I snuck outside – as usual – during break to call my sweetie (go ahead and make the whip-cracking noise…I’ll wait until you get it out of your system). It was cold, and the snow was coming down pretty good by that point, so I didn’t stay out there too long. It was when I went back into the Club that I realized there was quite an exceptional crowd there…not too bad for a snowy night in January. They stayed with us most of the night, too.

The second set started out normal for the first two songs, and then the auditions took over. Two of the guys played three songs each during this set. As I walked off of the stage for the first guy, Jim, the Club’s Manager, started immediately giving me grief about not playing, saying he would dock my pay at the end of the night. As the second guy went up to play, Jim feigned disbelief at me still not playing. I was standing next to the sound board talking to the crew, and getting guff from pretty much everyone. It’s nice to be so loved.

The third set went pretty much the same way, except only one bass player was left. Again, I was assaulted with verbal tirades about my alleged sloth. We did, in all of the offensive banter, find time to actually listen to the three bass players, though. The first guy was OK, but apparently mentioned some issue he has requiring a 12-step intervention program. The second guy seemed extremely uneasy on-stage, and his playing was very timid. The last guy seemed like the best of the three to all of us at the sound board. Of course, this will ultimately rest on the three guys in the band to decide.

I finished the third set, and played all of the last one, mostly to alleviate the pressure mounting in Jim’s head as he figured the amount he would be docking me (I think it was at about $20 at this point). We even played War Pigs early in the night for those who always complain about missing it at the end of the night.

During one of the breaks, when I wasn’t outside, I was standing on the stage talking with Carlos. We were approached by a couple of young ladies, one of which handed me a card. Apparently they were playing some sort of bachelorette party game that required them to fulfill the task on the card. I read the card and snickered. It said, “Get a guy to take off his shirt and flex his muscles in front of a crowd.” Now…what made her think I was the one to do this, I have no idea. I tried to engage her in a conversation aimed at revealing the aforementioned thought processes, but was getting nowhere quick. Carlos seemed to be enjoying the show, though. We negotiated back and forth for a bit, and in the end determined that shirts would only need to go up high enough to see nipples. OK…sure…why not. I lifted my Lynn Swann Pittsburgh Steelers jersey, flexed my arms, and said, “There…are you happy now?” She went away with a smile, so I guess she was. I should probably be offended that they were only interested in seeing my body, but, hey…I’m a guy. Besides, at my age, I really just don’t care.

At the end of the night, we broke down the stage, packed up our stuff, got paid (my full amount, no less), and wandered off to our respective homes. We had only received a couple of inches of snow, so the driving wasn’t too bad. My new truck has all-wheel drive, so even the slippery hills of old-town St. Charles were no problem. I did see quite a few accidents on the highway, though. Judging by the way many people were driving, that came as no surprise to me at all. One word of advice…if you drive a rear-wheel drive Mustang on I-270 with freshly packed snow and slush, don’t be so surprised when you end up smashing the front end of it into the concrete median, and don’t blame it on anyone but yourself. Most of the rest of us were doing just fine. The roads got remarkably better once I got into Illinois…which was odd, as it is usually the other way around. I drove on wet pavement from the river to St. Jacob. Even IL-4 was clean.

Unfortunately, as I write this on a Tuesday evening, I am preparing to drive Wednesday morning to the Chicago area to clean and repair an organ. I’m told they’ve had a bit of snow up there this week. Great. I guess it can’t be any worse than the 10°F it will be here in St. Louis tonight, with a wind chill well below 0°F. Thank goodness for global warming, eh?

For the Benefit of Mr. Kite...er...Newman

2007-01-16T23:22:00.000-06:00

Sunday, 14 January 2007
If it seems like it’s been awhile again since I’ve written one of these, your perception is correct. However, this time I actually haven’t been playing anywhere during that absence. BenWahBob has had some holes in the schedule of late, the biggest being this December and January. That was fine by me, though. It’s no secret that I’m a fan of “time off” now and again.

There was suppose to be a benefit show at Eddie’s in Granite City, IL involving a reunion of the original – and only – Knucklehead lineup. That was postponed due to some scheduling issues and the monster ice storm that blanketed the St. Louis area. It was rescheduled for 14 January, and so it remained. The idea was to have a benefit to help raise money for Jeff “Carson” Newman, a STL area soundman who has been twisting the knobs for many area bands since the early 1980s. Jeff has been battling cancer recently, and had a few surgeries on his face to eradicate the problem. Unfortunately, he also didn’t have any health insurance, so the bills were understandably piling up quickly. Musicians to the rescue…or at least to the assistance anyway. What better place to have a benefit than the benefit capital of the world…Eddie’s Bar & Grill in Granite City, IL.

There were about a half dozen or so bands scheduled to contribute their time for the cause. Everyone would play about a 45 minute set, giving it that “bands all day” kind of appeal. Deron Boyd, guitar player extraordinaire for Röck Böttöm, sent out the word that he would like to get the surviving members of Knucklehead (which is all four of us) back together again to do a set that day. Everyone seemed immediately interested, including me. I really enjoyed the time I played with those guys, and looked forward to feeling that magic again. Deron also mentioned that he would like to try to get Mike Ramsey, drummer for the local Rush tribute band Thunderhead, to come out and play a set of Rush with us. I was certainly all for that. The last time Rammer sat in with us in Knucklehead was a magnificent experience. We played several songs, including La Villa Strangiato. It was during that song that I was overwhelmed with goose bumps. I have played Rush songs with quite a few drummers over the years, and all of them were pretty good. But, Mike was different. He knew these songs inside and out…like you would expect from someone in a tribute band. There was a moment when I almost forgot myself as a part of the band. Realizing that I was indeed not in my living room playing along with the CD, but rather on stage playing it live with Deron and Mike gave me chills…it was that good! So, naturally, I jumped at the opportunity to participate in that as well. It was a done deal.

As the weekend rolled along, the weather took a turn for the worse. The week leading up to it had actually been unseasonably mild (an overused weatherman euphemism). Of course, it would have to turn nasty the one weekend in the last month that I would be playing. We got kind of lucky, though, in that the bulk of the bad stuff missed us by a few miles, and all we got was a steady, cold rain…that, I can handle.

I had been informed a few days earlier that Knucklehead and the Rush thing would be going on sometime after 18:00 (that’s 6pm for those of you in Rio Linda), and I planned accordingly. I was figuring on getting there a little earlier to take in some of the other bands, but wasn’t in the mood to spend all day in what is traditionally a very smokey bar. I had been fighting a tough cold for about a week and a half, and my throat was still quite sore. I had also gotten word that Wes Stillman, singer for Ivory Tiger, was having some issues with his throat, too, and would not be performing. Wes was going to be one of the guest singers during the Rush set, as well as singing with his own band, so this changed the plans a bit. As I rolled out of the shower, my phone rang. It was Deron. Apparently his bass player Chuck Mann was having some issues with his bass rig, and Deron asked that I bring something with me…which I had planned to do anyway. I had hoped to just play on someone’s “community bass rig” in an effort to minimize what I had to move. I figured it would have been Chuck’s. Then I thought that he might need to leave early, as I know he has family obligations, and so decided to bring my small 210 combo.

As I arrived around I-know-not-what-time-but-sometime-after-18:00, Rebel Train was just getting ready to take the stage. I hadn’t seen these guys in a long time. I worked for many years with guitarist Steve Kyle, but hadn’t seen much of him since St. Louis Music shut down the STL plant. The new owners finally closed the Service center, so now Steve was working elsewhere, too. His band rocked, as usual. When they played a Skynard song, all of the rest of us standing around talking just shook our heads in defeat. How does one follow that in Granite City? They had clearly already won some nonexistent competition.

The next band up was the aforementioned Röck Böttöm. I threw my little Ampeg up on the stage for Chuck, and away they went. They pelted the crowd with the likes of Poison and Bon Jovi, hoping to sway the crowd to their dark side. It seemed to work, as the dance floor was pretty much packed the whole time they were on the stage. It was a quite effective set. They even played Krokus’ Screamin’ in the Night, which explained why that wasn’t suggested for the Knucklehead set. For about the last half of their set, I was standing against the wall directly in front of Deron’s amp…and it was screaming. He had a really nice tone happening that night. Vacuum tubes…you’ve really got to go out of your way to screw up that sound, and even Crate hadn’t accomplished that. That old Blue Voodoo was glowing…both literally and figuratively.

Next came the Rush tribute set. I jumped into setting up my keyboards and tuning my basses. I had actually brought out the old black Rickenbacker for this one. I figured, “what the heck…if we’re going to play a bunch of Rush, it should be on the Ric, eh?” I hadn’t actually used my entire keyboard setup since the last gig with Knucklehead about a year and a half earlier. Deron had informed me that they now played tuned down a half step, and asked if it would be much trouble to adjust the keyboards, as it would be much better than dealing with the issues tuning up would cause with his guitars. Not a problem, I told him. When I played with Those1Guys (who?) a few years back, we tuned down, too. So, I adjusted the tunings on Saturday when I set everything up in my living room to run through some of the songs. What I hadn’t expected was that the transpose function has only a “local” affect – it adjusts the onboard keyboard, but not any other MIDI devices connected to it…like my foot pedal controller. I didn’t have the pedals with T1G, so I had no idea. I had to go into the internal setup and adjust the master tuning. Again, not a problem.

We started out with The Spirit of Radio…naturally. As I stomped the first note on the pedals for the strings in the background, I noticed immediately that they were, oh, about a half-step too high. @#$&!!! The damned thing had reset itself to A=440 when it was turned off. NOW I remembered why I used to use the Transpose function button instead of the internal master tuning. So, I had to muddle through most of that song without those keyboard parts. We stopped briefly after that, I re-adjusted the tuning, and we were off again. The next song was Freewill, and Steve Hall, who sang Spirit, asked me if I wanted to sing it. I did, in fact, and had expressed such interest when the potential song list was circulated. Unfortunately, considering the condition of my throat that day, I didn’t want to risk it, so I asked him to please continue the fine job he was already doing. That song came off great…another one of those moments that just painted a smile across my face. We also exercised ourselves with YYZ, which is always fun, but even more so with Mike and Deron, as we pretty much nailed that one, too. These guys brought their A-game, and I was digging it. As time was running a bit short, we finished out the set with Fly By Night and Tom Sawyer…perennial crowd favorites. The reaction of those in attendance was really quite pleasing. It was quite a boost for the notoriously fragile egos that we musicians traditionally carry on our sleeves.

After that, Steve Wenos came up and joined us on drums for the much acclaimed Knucklehead reunion. We belted out The Rooster in typical KH fashion. Steve and Deron always sounded great on those harmonies, and this night was no different. Two Minutes To Midnight was always another KH favorite, and it came across with unfaded luster. It was starting to appear that we hadn’t lost that proverbial “touch,” in spite of not having played these songs together in over a year. We played Triumph’s Fight The Good Fight, and I absolutely mangled the keyboard intro (sorry, Leigh). The rest of it came off well, though. Time was running short again, and we ended up not playing several of the really cool songs that were Knucklehead hallmarks…most notably Mr. Crowley. I honestly can’t remember everything we played, but I do remember ending the set with Zebra’s Tell Me What You Want. I thought we would end with Led Zeppelin’s What Is And What Should Never Be in Jeff’s honor, as he used to sing in a Zeppelin tribute band back in the early 1980s. Alas, we did not…hazard of flying without a flight plan, I guess.

The last event of the evening was to be a Danger Kitty reunion with all of the original members (it was reunion day all around, as there was also a Jägertÿme reunion earlier in the day). Unfortunately, Chuck had indeed left early, as had every other bass player. This left, uh, let’s see…that would be me, and, uhhhh, well…me. So, why not, eh? They launched into Pour Some Sugar On Me, which I played on keyboards, then jumped into Nothin’ But A Good Time. After that, knowing full well my great disdain for all things Poison, there was an on-stage discussion concerning what other Poison songs we could do (you guys really are too good to me). We settled instead on a couple of Twisted Sister songs…as if that was any better. And on that note, the show came to a close.

It worked out to be considerably later than I had hoped to stay out on a “school night,” but I wouldn’t have missed that for the world. Besides the obvious primary motivation to help a long-time associate in need, I got to spend some time with some people that I don’t see much any more. It was a very good time, too. I also had the increasingly rare privilege to play with some of the finest musicians that the St. Louis area has to offer. That was special all by itself. My hat (or do-rag) is off to Derrick, Tom, Rob, Floyd, Steve K, Nathan, Craig, Chuck, Mike, Deron, Steve H, Steve W, Jimmy, and Rick for the great time and great music provided for all to enjoy.

Oh…and the sound and lights for the event were provided by…yes, Jeff Newman. The man is battling cancer, and still worked all weekend for Röck Böttöm, and all day Sunday, too. What a guy. I certainly can’t complain about being tired at work on Monday after a feat like that, now can I.

The drive back to St. Jacob was much shorter than I thought it would be. I stopped at McDonald’s and grabbed a burger before leaving Granite City, as I realized that I had not eaten since lunch Sunday and it was now approaching 01:30 Monday morning. I have lately been listening mostly to streaming audio at home via the internet, most notably from ProgRockRadio.com. As a result, I haven’t really been buying any new music. So, I just popped Dream Theater’s Images and Words CD into my CD player for the ride home. That’s still a great album, even 15 years later.

Root of Evil

2006-12-18T00:21:00.000-06:00

Saturday, 11 November 2006
BenWahBob seems to be whittling the schedule down to one gig a month lately. The winner of this month’s lottery was Rusty’s in Edwardsville, IL. I normally wouldn’t complain about this at all. In fact, I still won’t…even now that I have a car payment (have I mentioned that?).

Money, money, money…what a terrible concept. No one ever seems to have enough, and some have even less than that. Most of us have plenty, really, we just spend it unwisely. I am frequently guilty of that myself. I didn’t really need that Cessna 152 for my MS Flight Simulator… I didn’t really need to spend as much as I did on a new vehicle (although it almost seems impossible to spend less on anything halfway decent)… We can always seem to find ways to justify these expenditures, though.

Even Dawna feels the crunch every once in a while. She is normally very frugal about her spending. Not unlike many, however, she is very generous when it comes to helping others in need. She did, in fact, help some friends in need on several occasions about a year ago. Unfortunately, her generosity was rewarded with what basically amounts to contempt and deceit. I referred to them as “friends”; but true friends do not make promises that they have no intentions of keeping, nor do they just flat out lie to you and turn their backs on their debts. A sad result of this is the loss of what she thought was a good friendship. She has also been forced to sell her convertible – the car she was going to give to her son next year when he turns 16 – to help pay off the debts that were soundly ignored by those who were responsible for them. I’ll not mention any names here, as these people know who they are.

Sorry for ranting about that, but it’s been a sore point for about six months now. This has little or nothing to do with the Rusty’s gig. In fact, it’s been so long since then as I write this blog, that I can really remember nothing of any significance regarding that gig. One note of interest was the lack of any bass players sitting in for try-outs in the matter of my replacement. Apparently several were contacted, but none bothered to show.

Saturday, 09 December 2006
Last gig of the year, and it was, of course, at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO. Yet another relatively uneventful gig…with the same exception…no bass player applicants. When this came up in a conversation with Carlos & Bobby, Bobby admitted that he had not yet actually placed the ad in whatever publication. Hmmm…that was a bit disappointing. I suppose I should be patient through the process, as I am aware of how difficult it can be at times to find a replacement. However, it has been six months now since I informed them that I needed to be replaced. Knucklehead made no effort to replace me when I left that band, but they also stopped scheduling gigs. BWB now has gigs scheduled well into 2007. At some point, I suppose I may have to come up with a cut-off date. But for now, we’ll just see how it goes.

We did finally do that Purple Haze/Green Acres thing, though. Just before launching into Immigrant Song, Carlos started into Purple Haze. I sang the first two verses from the Green Acres theme, then the last verse of Purple Haze. Mike Mathews was out to see us and just stood there grinning and shaking his head. I took that as a sign of our success. I must admit that it was difficult to pull off without laughing, but my professionalism willed itself through. I did snicker a few times, though.

We also had the same trouble with set times again. We seem to play right through to the end of the printed set lists with absolutely no regard for the time…even thought there is a clock on the wall right next to the stage. Then, we took the same 20 minute breaks as usual, which just kept pushing us further off schedule. I seemed to be the only one who noticed that the club personnel were visibly irritated by this. WATCH THE CLOCK ON THE WALL, DALE! That’s why it’s there…right next to the printed time schedule for sets and breaks! I guess next time I’ll mark near the bottom of each set in bold red letters, “WHAT TIME IS IT?” (not that time, Derrick)

******************************************************

I did a bit of traveling again this past week. Unfortunately, it was for work. Chris Soer (from the Voicing Department) and I drove to West Dundee, IL (Chicago area) on Sunday afternoon to finish an installation of a Wicks Royal Classic digital organ. This was the fourth trip made to this church. The building was unfinished when it was delivered and installed, but they insisted that we do Tonal Finishing anyway, as they had some event at which they planned to show off the instrument. After finding some problems, another trip was made. Now, Chris and I arrived on Monday morning to find that three large widows between the foyer and the sanctuary were still not in place, and the acoustical treatments they had planned for the back wall were also still not in place. In addition to all of this, there where still workers in the foyer laying the tiles…nothing like trying to voice an organ over the sound of tile saws. We had to install an additional subwoofer, and move some of the main speaker cabinets to new locations. Chris and I had to muscle the 167 lb sub up a ladder to the second floor level. Did I mention that Chris only weighs 135 lbs? It made for an interesting day, to be sure.

We eventually succeeded, and Chris did his best to rough in the voicing…again…in the mostly completed room. It was obvious that he would be making yet another trip to finish it…which will be his fourth time there.

We drove back on Tuesday, and arrived in Highland around 14:30. We both went into the office to pee on a couple of fires, then left for the rest of the day. We had put in long hours at the church, and decided that comp time was in order.

Another reason for the early departure on Tuesday was the early flight out to California on Wednesday morning. We met at the St. Louis airport around 04:45 to get through all of the security stuff for a flight that left at 06:15. We stopped over in Dallas (DFW), then flew on to Orange County/John Wayne International/Santa Ana/insert any other name here. We rented a car and drove to the church in Chino where we were installing yet another Royal Classic digital organ. This time, though, there was one rank of pipes going in, too. Two guys from the Shop had driven the stuff out there over the weekend and were already well into the installation when Chris and I arrived on Wednesday afternoon. We worked late enough into the evening that most of the restaurants were closed when we finished for the day. Chris and I ended up at the drive-through of a local Burger King for dinner.

Thursday turned into another marathon work day. We did break for lunch sometime just after noon, since we seemed to come up short on Speakon© connectors for the speakers. We made a trip over to Ontario to the Sam Ash Music store, then had lunch at – of all places – Chevy’s. It seemed a bit odd to travel all the way to California and eat at a place we could eat at in St. Louis, but there we were nonetheless. We returned after lunch and worked late again. Bill and Bobby went back to their hotel reasonably early, but Chris and I worked until well after midnight. Our efforts seemed to pay off, as the digital portion of the instrument was playing and the voicing was mostly finished when we left. The biggest challenge had been speaker placement. This church is really more of a huge auditorium than a traditional-style church. It seats somewhere in the vicinity of 2000 people. All of the speakers were installed in the ceiling, with the exception of two of the four subwoofers that were located under the stage. Getting the other two subwoofers up in the allotted space was difficult at best, even with a lift. We found a way, but it required us to “alter” the building a bit…like cutting out sections of the metal wall studs.

One unfortunate side of this installation was the strong opposition to it by the church’s music director. They moved to a more contemporary worship when they built the new building, complete with light shows and dual rear-projection video screens. This guy did not want an organ in the proverbial picture, and was not shy about saying so. Every opportunity he got to take a jab at it was willingly seized. It’s obvious that this instrument will not get much use at this church, even though at least half of the congregation seems to be in favor of it. Whatever. A wealthy donor wanted to give us money to install an organ in his church, and so we did. It is theirs to deal with internally now. As my own little jab back at them, and with Chris prodding me, I did give a run through the opening of Mr. Crowley. I sometimes feel a bit guilty playing Ozzy Osbourne in a church, but not this time.

I had to fly back Friday morning, but the other guys stayed to tidy things up and finish with the pipes…a polished copper Trumpet en Chamáde that seems terribly out of place there. Chris was suppose to return with me, but opted to stay behind as well and catch a later flight. I called him when I got to Dallas, and they were voicing the pipes already. Very cool.

I didn’t listen to much music at all during these trips, other than the bits that Chris and I played at the churches. The one in Chino had a really nice Yamaha 6’ grand piano on the stage that we gave some considerable use, including an interesting duet with him on the piano and me on the organ playing Pachelbel’s Canon in D. It was a good-sounding, good-playing instrument that was killed by the dead acoustics of the room. Too bad, really. That place has a lot of potential that they will never realize.

Life Gets in the Way

2006-10-31T21:07:00.000-06:00

Yes, I know…it has been awhile.
Frankly, I’ve just been too busy to sit down and write this bilge. I’ve been swamped at work (a good problem to have, actually), swamped at home, swamped at Dawna’s (another good problem to have), and my mother was in the hospital. I haven’t let it derail the song writing/composing too much, but everything definitely slowed down.

I suppose there is some catching up to do here.

BenWahBob played at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO on Saturday, 23 September. It was a fairly normal gig, with one notable exception: everyone in the band was in a really good mood. We were having a blast on stage, virtually oblivious to the crowd for most of the night. Not only were we picking on Dale (as usual), but he was taking it unusually well all night. He even picked on himself on a few occasions, depriving us of the privilege. It was one of the most fun evenings of playing I’ve had in a long time.

Two weeks later, we played in Wentzville, MO at a wedding reception for some BWB fans. This night was the complete antithesis of the previous Baha gig. I’ve never been a big fan of these gigs to begin with, and this one only served to reinforce that notion. The room was big and wooden, and the acoustics in there were just plain awful. My bass was non-existent. As soon as we started playing, the bride’s mother complained almost immediately that we were too loud. There was no picking on Dale that night either, as he had made it abundantly clear that he was not in the mood for joviality…he took everything as a personal attack. There was a proverbial dark cloud over the whole affair for us. The event seemed to go off very well for the wedding party, but I personally couldn’t wait to finish and leave. On the bright side, we only had to play from 18:00 – 22:00, so the night ended early. We learned a couple of new songs at the groom’s request. Eric Clapton’s Tears from Heaven was practically a train wreck…and it was the “first dance” for the bride and groom. John Mellencamp’s Authority Song was OK, but it’s the same bass line over and over through the whole song. We used a small PA, so load-out was quick and relatively painless.

In the intervening weeks, I had the wonderful fortune of having to replace the starter on my minivan (*sniff*sniff*…one can almost smell the sarcasm). The suspension was almost shot from hauling heavy music equipment, there was an increasingly pungent oil leak from I-don’t-know-where, the windshield had a full-length crack that had started as a rock ding, it was in desperate need of new tires,...I could go on and on. At 216,000+ miles, it was becoming painfully obvious that it would soon need to be replaced. It had been a pretty good vehicle over the five years I drove it, and I put a lot of miles on it. But, I finally bit the proverbial bullet and traded it in for something considerably newer. I had been eying a white 2005 Chevrolet Equinox at a St. Louis County dealership. When I went back to talk seriously about it, though, it was already sold. They had another 2005 with only 12,XXX miles that I actually liked better. I was able to get it for the same price as the white one with 26,XXX miles, and some extra service package stuff thrown in to boot. Oh…and it’s gray! (go figure) Of course, now I have a car payment. I hate car payments.

I also had yet another opportunity to acquire a pipe organ for my home. A small Presbyterian church in St. John, MO was getting rid of an old 3-rank Wicks Fuga model from around 1938 in order to get a new Hammond (?) for their more modern approach to worship. I was told about this by our Service manager, made them a suitable offer, and they accepted. I made an appointment with the minister to see the instrument one night after work, but he never arrived. I tried for several more weeks to contact him with no luck. When I finally did get to talk to him again, he informed me that the organ was no longer available. Whatever. It was probably going to take up half of my living room anyway. Thanks for stringing me along, though. Jerk.

I guess that’s everything worth discussing. Now, you’re all caught up.

Saturday, 28 October 2006
Another BWB gig at Baha Rock Club was the order of the day. We had some apprehension about the potential turnout for several reasons; it was the day after the Cardinals won their 10th World Series Championship, it was just a few days before Halloween, and the weather was absolutely perfect all day. As it happened, attendance was quite brisk all night. I would estimate that nearly half of the people there were in some sort of costume. Some were pretty good, but most were quite lame.

Everyone in the band was in a pretty good mood again on this night. As a result, we had quite a bit of fun again. Dale had lost some of his percussion toys in the past few months, and we had teased him accordingly ever since. Carlos arrived bearing gifts for him; a stuff shelf that he can mount on a stand for his stuff, and a new set of claves. The claves were the best part. He only uses them for one song – Free’s All Right Now – but we had grown so accustomed to hearing them that their absence left a powerful void. He tried other substitutes in the interim, but that only solicited more jabs from us. Bobby tried them, and promptly told Dale that he couldn’t use them…they were in the wrong key. Dale actually thought about this for a moment before making some sarcastic comment back. It was on now! When the song came up in the set and Dale began using them, Bobby shouted at him from behind his drum set, “DALE…WRONG KEY!!!” We thoroughly enjoyed that. As there is no bass part during the verses of this song, I reached over and picked up my tuner, walked over to Dale, put the tuner up to the claves and shook my head, turned the one in his bottom hand about ¼ of a turn clockwise, put the tuner back up to them, nodded and gave Dale the “thumbs-up.” I think Carlos and Bobby may have both actually wet themselves. The rest of the song went off completely in tune. Then Bobby broke his snare drum head (serves us right?) and we had to stop early to repair it. The bar had their costume competition, so that worked out well anyway.

At the close of the night, we dedicated Black Sabbath’s Paranoid and War Pigs to the manager, Jim, who was celebrating a birthday. As part of his celebration, he was promptly punched in the nose. A fight broke out just inside the door, and Jim was into the middle of it immediately, as were several of his quite large bouncers. As we watched from the stage, not breaking our stride (or breaking into Breaking the Law either), I saw the main instigator throw a punch and Jim’s head snap back. The look on his face told everyone that this was a big mistake, and Jim literally beat the guy out into the street. All of this was very entertaining (and very Granite City-like) until I realized that my new truck, which I’ve had for a mere seven days at this point, was parked directly outside the door. Figures. I get a new truck, get that rare “Rock Star Parking” at the front door, and now I might have drunk idiots bouncing off of it or putting their heads through the windows. Fortunately, none of these scenarios came to fruition, and my truck made it through the fight unscathed. When I related this to Jim afterwards, he laughed at me and said, “You should know better than to park there by now!” When I asked him how his face felt, he told me it takes more than that to ruffle him. He then said, “Besides…beating some punk’s @$$ is way better than blowing out a bunch of candles!”

I couldn’t agree more, Jim. Happy Birthday, old man.

We loaded out fairly quickly and hit the road home. I had been listening to the first Infectious Grooves CD during the drive there, but opted for a more traditional soundtrack for the drive home and put in a disc of J.S. Bach cello concerti. After the melee at the end of the night, it made for a very relaxing trip.

Sweet Sauce

2006-09-23T18:13:00.000-05:00

Friday, 15 September 2006
There was not a whole lot of eventfulness in the week leading up to this weekend, unless you count me getting sick. Apparently, Dawna was successful in transferring to me whatever illness had been plaguing her for the previous two weeks. My bout with it wasn’t nearly as rough as hers, though, as I don’t have allergies piling on top of it. Irregardless, that was the most excitement my week had to offer.

BenWahBob played our last Friday night of the season at the Fairmount Park “Budweiser Party at the Park.” I arrived around 17:30-ish, loaded in my equipment, and took in some of the very entertaining stories Carlos had from his two weeks in Vietnam. Imagine a 6’5” long-hair with a Mexican name in a land of tiny Asians… Better yet, imagine that same guy having to fly coach across the Pacific Ocean. We grazed through the buffet just before they opened the doors to the public (job perk), sat by the windows, and enjoyed the narrative.

Too soon, it was time to make the proverbial doughnuts. We launched in with our usual non-reckless abandon…cautious abandon, one might say. Carlos would have been busy most of the first set trying to get his “legs” back, except that he mentioned he had actually played guitar over there more than he does when he’s at home. Go figure.

Everything seemed to go along swimmingly for most of the night. We bounced right through the 20 minute sets. When we reached the “disco” set, though, the wheels fell off of the cart. During Play That Funky Music, Dale had one of his more severe coughing fits. I jumped up to the mic to sing the rest of it about the same time Bobby apparently got his mic swung around in front of him. We fumbled through to the next chorus until Dale got himself together again. After that set, while watching the next race, our soundman Randy approached me and asked if Dale was OK. I assured him that this was a fairly normal occurrence, despite that one being a bit more severe. He said he thought Dale was dying or something, because his face was turning all kinds of different colors. I chuckled, and said I was sorry I missed that. We then watched a guy sitting behind the sound board pack his cigarettes about every two or three minutes. Randy didn’t know what the guy was even doing until I explained it to him. He said he just might have to kill the guy if he keeps doing it all night. I hoped I wouldn’t miss that, too.

We bumped our way through the rest of the night relatively uneventfully. Greg chimed up and told us that we would be quitting after the 8th race instead of the 9th this night. No arguments issued forth from us. We played two more songs for that set, shut it down, and packed it up. Nice.

We did talk a bit after loading out the gear. I stayed just long enough to not be too anti-social, as I had Dawna waiting for me at my house. I jumped onto the highway for the short trip home, listening to Uli Jon Roth’s Metamorphosis CD. This is the one on which he performs Antonio Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons on electric guitar with an orchestra. As this has long been one of my favorite pieces of music, I am still stunned to hear it played note-for-note perfect on a guitar. He even had a special guitar made for it so he would have the same range as a violin. His technical proficiency is nothing short of phenomenal. He makes Yngwie almost sound sloppy by comparison. Unfortunately, guys like him are usually only known by other musicians, and most of them probably haven’t actually heard him play (other than with the Scorpions for awhile). So it seems to go with the truly talented ones.

Whatever.

Saturday, 16 September 2006
Most of the day Saturday was nearly a total loss for me. Still feeling under the weather, I spent most of it in bed drifting in and out of sleep. I did get up eventually when Dawna started hinting about breakfast. I fixed some biscuits & gravy, cheesy eggs, and sausage to fill the voids in our bellies. After we ate, she headed for home…and I headed back to bed. I think she called me later in the day and awoke me. It’s all a bit hazy frankly. I did get up for good after that. A long shower later, and I was starting to feel human again.

BWB was booked at Rusty’s this night. Since it’s a PA gig (albeit for Bobby now), I decided to get there early enough to eat before everyone else was to show up at 20:00 to load in the equipment. I arrived around 19:30, pulled the handle off of the back door, walked around front to let myself in, and finished with my own brief load-in. I walked over to a table near the bar to peruse a menu. There were a few patrons at the bar and a couple more at tables, but nothing earth-shattering. They did have a large banquet of elderly folks in the banquet room celebrating some sort of anniversary, but they had their own wait staff for that. The girl who was servicing the bar area looked at me and smiled as she passed me on her way back to the waitress station. I put the menu back on the table and walked over behind her. She then proceeded to ignore me for about the next 10 minutes. Finally, one of the other waitresses from the banquet passed by and asked if I wanted anything. I told her that I simply wanted to order some food. Blondie number one then turned and acted surprised to see me there. She took my order and asked why I didn’t say anything sooner. I told her it was because I wasn’t working for tips that night. She made some nervous small talk about the band while she entered my order. I have no idea how it ended because I walked away somewhere in the middle of it.

Amazingly, my wait for food was minimal, and the service I received for the rest of the night was nothing short of incredible. Go figure. The food, as always at Rusty’s, was fantastic.

There was one oddity, though. The sweet & sour sauce that came with my crab Rangoon was nothing even approaching sour…it was just sweet sauce. The moment I tasted it, I almost choked in laughter. I was instantly transported back to the story Dawna had related to me over breakfast that morning. She had attended her son’s high school football game Friday night. After the game, while heading back to her truck (it’s not an SUV, or any other silly acronym, it’s a freakin’ truck), a car-load of teenage boys started whooping at her. One of them called her “sweet sauce.” She gets this sort of treatment just about everywhere because…well…she’s a damned good-looking woman. I think I almost choked on breakfast too when she told me. I’m sure she immediately regretted telling me, as I promised to never let her live that down. So, I smiled as I finished my meal, enjoying both the food and the sauce.

The rest of the band started to trickle in shortly after 20:00. Bobby arrived first, and the two of us nearly had the trailer unloaded when Dale and Carlos got there. Carlos had been working at his shop all day, and Dale…well, Dale’s a singer. We got the stage set up and a quick level check done by around 21:30, then relaxed until 22:00. The clock started rolling, and so did we. The place seemed to be filling in nicely as the night progressed. Always a good sign.

We ended the first set a bit later than normal. I think we also took a bit longer of a break. By the time we ended the second set, we were way off schedule. During the first break, Dale was approached by couple who had been there most of the evening. They talked the entire break. Just before the second break, I saw the guy come walking back in carrying a soft violin case similar to the one Dawna uses. I remember looking at Dale and thinking, “What have you done?” The guy comes up to the stage, opens his case, pulls out a rosin-caked violin and a cable, and asks where he should plug in his fiddle. Fiddle?! Dale then explains that he is going to sit in with us on the David Alan Coe song Call Me By My Name. Huh? Uhhh…OK…whatever. We got him connected, and he played a bit for a level check. He actually seemed pretty talented…for a fiddle player. We sat down at their table and started chatting. It turns out he’s a classically-trained violinist who’s been playing since the age of 4, and plays in rock and country bands to rebel against his uptight parents…who apparently hate the very idea of him playing that stuff. He and his wife are both attorneys, and he just plays on the side for fun now.

We started the third set – way late – and were back on our way. This guy came up for the second song, grabbed his instrument (I can’t bring myself to keep calling it a fiddle), and asked what song we were playing. When Dale told him, he said he didn’t know that one. I remember looking hard at Dale and barking “He doesn’t even know the damned song, Dale!” I told him it was a typical country song in C, and to just play along whatever he feels like playing. Once we started the song, it actually went off pretty well. He didn’t overplay, he just inserted little interludes between the vocal lines, and when it was over, he didn’t ask, “What next?” He just put down his instrument and walked back over to his table with his wife. The only bad residual was that he left his instrument in its open case on the stage right behind me. I was painfully aware of it the rest of the night.

At the end of the third set, Dale started to walk off the stage. I had already looked at my watch (I always seem to be the Time Nazi in bands), and knew it was already 01:20. I asked Dale where he thought he was going, and told him what time it was. Not much point taking a break with only 40 minutes until quitting time. He started back to the stage and Carlos mentioned something about some Rush. Uhhh…OK. I’ve been sick for several days, and my right ear is clogged with god-knows-what, but why not, eh? We launched into What You’re Doing. Surprisingly, the vocals came out just fine. During one of the descending-scale unison parts, my ear suddenly popped open and I could hear.

Halleluiah!
Praise be to Geddy Lee!
I was cured by Rush!

I made mention of this at the conclusion of the song, to which Carlos replied, “OK…then we’ll do this, too!” He launched into In The Mood. My intuition told me this might not be a very good idea. I had warbled out Throat Scratch Fever early in the evening, Immigrant Song somewhere in the middle of the current set, and now two Rush tunes back-to-back…while sick. My intuition turned out to be correct. It was all I could do to make it through that song. My throat felt like I was trying to sing the entire first Zebra album or something. No blood spewed forth from my gullet, and my neck didn’t collapse, so I guess there was no harm done.

We finished out the marathon Knucklehead-length set promptly at 02:00, tore down the system, packed it away in Bobby’s trailer, and headed for our respective homes once again. Since I still had that Uli Jon Roth CD in my player, that’s what I listened to for the drive home. Unfortunately, home was considerably emptier this night, as Dawna had her oldest son for the rest of the weekend. Oh, well. You can’t win them all.

Killer Gigs...Psych!

2006-09-08T22:47:00.000-05:00

Friday, 08 September 2006
Well, well…where to begin?
Oh, I know…how about at the beginning?
Naaa…that would be entirely too long a story, and might encroach on Deron’s domain of epic bookstabbings.
(Bummer about Violet’s neck, Dude.)

There’s really been no news worthy to distribute since the last blog. It’s been a pretty quiet month on that front. BenWahBob was supposed to play in Lesterville, MO, as is tradition, on Labor Day weekend. Unfortunately, we had to cancel that gig, as Carlos was going to be in Vietnam for a couple of weeks for the first production run of one of his amp designs. I can’t say that I’m overwhelmingly disappointed with that outcome. I got to actually spend a three-day holiday weekend at home. Dawna and I had dinner Friday night at a nice Italian restaurant (Bella Milano) in Edwardsville to celebrate our third year back together. We got to sleep in late Saturday morning, then spent the rest of the day at the Japanese Festival at the Missouri Botanical Garden. We even ran into Deron’s mother and children; they were waiting in line in a futile attempt to gain access to the ever-popular Tea Ceremony (I’ve never been able to get a ticket for that either, Vicky). Just shortly after we started walking into the Garden, we also encountered Heather Frost – Deron’s former-step-daughter-now-second-cousin-once-removed…or something like that. She was there strolling around with her new baby. We stopped and talked a bit, and Dawna was holding the baby. I must have given her that “don’t-even-think-about-it” look, because she immediately assured me that that was not in the proverbial cards. I spent much of the rest of the weekend either working on various music projects or hanging out with Dawna at her farm.

The ensuing week seemed to just evaporate before my very eyes (not to be confused with my mildly eyes). A function of getting old, I guess, is the seemingly quickened passage of time. When we’re young, there seems to be no limit on the time we have. It’s endless because we’re immortal. Now, there never seems to be enough time for anything of substance. One of the great twists of life, eh?

Another pipe organ offer made its way to me, too. It was another old Wicks Fuga model from 1937 that a college in western Iowa was looking to unload for “very little money.” Tempting as it was, I resisted the urge to drive a rented truck up there that day, rescue it, and install it in my living room. I have other things on which I should be spending my increasingly limited cash reserves; like replacing my tired old minivan, replacing my tired old dead motorcycle, the acquisition of a Chapman Grand Stick, the replication of my CD when it’s finished, and – oh, yeah – that particular piece of women’s jewelry for which I seem to be in the market. Wow. Now that I’ve spelled it out, I think I need another job.

This weekend was supposed to see BWB playing on the front stage at UMB Pavilion before the Styx/Foreigner concert on Saturday night. Our drummer knows some people there for whom he does some printing jobs, and was able to sweet-talk us into the gig. Very nice. Since Carlos would only just be returning from ‘Nam on Saturday, he arranged for Obeid Khan to fill in for him. I worked with Obeid for the 10 years I was at St. Louis Music. Besides being one of the best tube amp designers in the world, he also happens to be a fantastic guitar player. I was looking forward to the opportunity to play on stage with him.

Circumstance once again had its way with our plans. The details of our compensation for this gig were shrouded in a fog of mystery until just a couple of days before the gig. When they started being more forthcoming with the information, it was beginning to look like an extremely sweet package; more bottled water and beer than we could drink, and more tickets than we could give away. The monetary aspect wasn’t revealed until Friday…and it was a joke. It would essentially cover our gas expenses, strings and sticks, and a healthy appetite at White Castle…and that was it. Bobby was incensed, to say the least. He called one of his buddies at the Pavilion and reminded him of our minimum pay requirements, telling him that they must at least meet that or we wouldn’t waste our time. We never heard back from them.

While Bobby’s position was pretty hard-lined, I had mixed emotions about the whole matter. The money, to me was the least important part of the arrangement. This was about mass exposure on a scale that most cover bands never see. I felt it would have been an excellent foot in the door for future seasons. I can understand Bobby’s principle, though.

I must also admit that my stance is more than a bit self-serving. I was looking forward to networking with the powers-that-be at the Pavilion, making myself known to them for my own personal gain. I have designs on that place (amongst others) for showcasing my original music. Oh, well…I’ll just have to exploit other avenues into there. On the bright side, I get another weekend off to work on the various projects without having to spend all afternoon and evening in the Riverport area. (“Always look on the briiiiiiiight side of life…”)

On the new music front, I acquired the first two CDs from a band from Spain called Adagio. Their guitarist was described by Ken Golden at The Laser’s Edge as being Spain’s answer to Symphony X’s Michael Romeo. I didn’t see it that way once I heard them. This guy was obviously an Yngwie Malmsteen clone, who he admitted in the liner notes as being his biggest influence. The singer even sounds like Jeff Scott Soto. The only real difference is that this guy writes better songs (sorry, Wingnut). For some reason, though, it just didn’t click with me. Perhaps my aging ears are growing tired of the flurry-of-notes style that these guys represent. It’s not that it isn’t impressive, because it is. Maybe it’s just not as impressive anymore now that every kid with a guitar can play like that.

I can’t play like that. Then again, I’m no kid anymore either.

Start Your Engines...or not

2006-08-23T23:29:00.000-05:00

19 August 2006
The week leading up to this gig saw a milestone for me: my 40th birthday. Several of my close friends reached this point in the preceding weeks, and now it was my turn. It came and went with little hoopla, though, just as I prefer. I’ve never been one to make a big ordeal of my birthdays. They’re just another day to me. I’m a day older than I was yesterday. Dawna BBQ’d Sunday afternoon to celebrate both mine and her oldest son Derek’s birthdays. She got me some nice keyboard covers for my synthesizers and the sheet music for Chopsticks, which has become something of an inside joke between us. She’s awesome like that. Derek scored some cool new stuff for his guitars and a boat-load of cash, so he did pretty well, too.

Saturday night was back at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO. This is a special gig, as it is the weekend of Festival of the Little Hills. If you’ve never been to one of these, you must plan for it nest year. It’s like Fair St. Louis, but without all the bilge. I used to never miss it. However, the past couple of years have changed that. I never seem to find the time to get there anymore. One of my favorite Chapman Stick players, Bob Culbertson, plays there every year. He sets up a booth on Main Street to sell his CDs and videos, and plays all day long through the whole weekend.

At any rate…the streets are usually packed with people. This year saw exceptionally good weather, and the crowd swelled accordingly. When we started playing, there were still lines of people in the street as far as I could see.

But, I’ve gotten ahead of myself. Saturday went away with a quickness, and before long it was time to start heading toward St. Chuck. As I loaded my stuff and prepared for departure, my van decided it was happier just sitting in the driveway. I turned the key in the ignition and heard only the click of a relay…again, and again, and again with the same result. It had done this to me Thursday morning before work, but started after a couple of tries. Odd. The battery seemed to have plenty of power, as did the starter when it finally started turning. The battery terminals seemed to be tight and corrosion-free. Probably the solenoid. Great. Just what I needed. My neighbor came over to look at it, and then it started as he was walking back to his garage for his tool box. Go figure.

I had little choice but to risk getting stuck in St. Chuck, so I drove it there anyway. I arrived a little after 20:00 and loaded in my stuff with the van still running in the middle of the street. With half a dozen law enforcement personnel less than 50 feet away, I figured this was a fairly safe bet. When I drove it around the block and parked in the Municipal garage, I made sure to back into the space…just in case.

Carlos arrived right behind me, and we were set up in no time. Bobby’s drums were already there, and I assumed that he had wondered off to skim the Festival in its closing hours. We started doing a sound check almost immediately. After the front of the stage was done, only Bobby’s drums were left. “Hey,” I think, “I can play drums…I’ll do the drum check.” This was all well and good until the level check was done and John asked me to play the whole kit. One thing about Bobby’s kit…he’s a left-handed drummer. Trying to coordinate your left foot for the kick drum, right foot for the hi-hats, and everything arranged opposite of what your used to is challenging at the very least. Bobby came in about this time, and I told him a double bass drum pedal would have made that less painful to hear, as it would have provided a pedal for my correct foot. He just chuckled, mentioned something about knowing how he feels when asked to sit in on a right-handed kit, and told me he’s got a new DW7000 on order.

We jumped into the sets with our usual not-so-reckless abandon, and were off and running. We did seem to have a pretty good flow for most of the night. Dale had mixed up the songs a bit from the usual order, which was both strange and nice. Again, like the previous weekend, we didn’t seem to be making too much early progress toward flattening the dance floor. By the end of the second set, though, that was beginning to change, and the dancers were flowing more freely…probably in direct proportion to the amount of adult beverages they had consumed by that point. Irregardless of the motivation, more dancers beget even more dancers. Soon the floor was covered with them. You couldn’t have swung a dead skunk in any direction without hitting at least a couple of them.

Dale’s rearrangement of the sets was not without its pitfalls, though. Time was apparently not a grave consideration in the formulation process, as was evidenced by the excess number of tunes left over when set time was over. He had Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song at the end of the 3rd set, with Rush’s What You’re Doing to start the 4th. Since the 3rd set was about three songs too long, we decided to start the 4th with the Zeppelin, then straight into the Rush. That was fine with me. I got to sing two of my favorite songs back to back. The Rush seems to have caught on with our crowd, too. I saw many people bobbing their heads along with it, and more than a few even singing along. Very cool.

Dale inserted War Pigs into the middle of the last set, citing the complaints of many who don’t stick around until the end of the night and always miss it. OK…whatever. We ended up turning it into about a 15 minute In-a-Gadda-da-Vida kind of thing anyway. After that, we had enough time left to play about two more songs and we were done for the night. We packed up and got out of there pretty quickly. (We’re trained professionals, kids…don’t try this at home.)

Dale didn’t leave the banner on the floor this time either. Bobby had printed a new one that is so big it covers the entire wall behind us with some of the website info not even visible. It’ll look great at the Lesterville gigs next year.

I went to the garage to retrieve my van. When I got in and turned the key…click. The second time, it started right away. I hate these things, necessary as they are. Aren’t we supposed to be traveling by teleporter by now?

For the drive home this night, I opted against silence. I instead slid the Circus Maximus CD The First Chapter into the CD player. Rumor has it they are in the studio finishing their second album even as you read this. I, for one, can’t wait to hear it. I’ve even put my favorite song from their first album on my new MySpace page (http://www.myspace.com/pauljsmith). I had order a couple of new discs from The Laser’s Edge, and they had actually arrived on Saturday. Unfortunately for me, the St. Jacob Post Office keeps odd hours and I was unable to get them. I did go to lunch early the following Tuesday and retrieve them. They are Uli Jon Roth’s Metamorphosis (on which he performs Vivaldi’s Four Seasons arranged for electric guitar and orchestra…with Don Airey on harpsichord, kids!) and Arjen Lucassen’s “Ayreon” double CD The Final Experiment. Both are excellent acquisitions.

Blind & Wingless

2006-08-23T23:26:00.000-05:00

11 August 2006
One of the nice benefits of my salaried position at Wicks Organ Company is the ability to slip out a few minutes early when necessity requires such action. A Friday night gig with BenWahBob at Fairmount Park seemed like a fine opportunity to exercise that option. As I have done my fair share of extra duty from time to time, I had no guilt about this whatsoever.

I rushed home, changed into some comfortable jeans and a goofy T-shirt, loaded my equipment into the van, and was on my way. I arrived at the track around 05:30, loaded in, and headed for the buffet. I was quite disappointed to find no hot wings, my usual Fairmount fare. I instead settled for some other banal choices to fill the void. Carlos and I sat at a table near the windows, eating and catching up on all the things we used to talk about on a regular basis when we worked together.

Jason Hilliard was sitting in on drums with us this night, as Bobby was in Ohio for the weekend visiting relatives. Carlos had prepared a plate for him as well, but he didn’t get a chance to eat until after the first set as he and a friend were too busy finishing the set-up of his drum kit. Jason, for those who don’t know by now, is blind. Not “blind as a bat,” though, as a bat actually has eyes and can see. Jason had his eyes removed a couple years ago and has glass implants that he likes to take out to mess with people. He’s a great guy, and an even better drummer…definitely one of the most talented with whom I’ve ever played. Of course, this can occasionally present its own problems, like trying to communicate during a song. With most drummers, you can simply use visual cues, or talk “big” so they can read your lips. Not so with Jason. As I was given the task of feeding songs to him from the setlist, I was also trying my best to let him know when to end certain songs that can potentially drag on forever. It was a challenge, to say the least.

Overall, though, the night went off pretty well. Dale screwed up some pretty simple lyrics, and we all made fun of him. When Carlos or I did the same with our parts, we were treated to an equal amount of ribbing from the others. We all seemed to have a pretty good time.

The crowd this night was a bit less than we are accustomed to seeing on a Friday night. This was attributed to the incredibly nice weather. Apparently, there was a pretty good crowd outside not willing to surrender the opportunity to be outside. They might have known that there were no hot wings. Greg told me that they had counted somewhere in the neighborhood of about 1000 people mid-way through the evening. Not bad, but, again, about 2/3 of what we’re used to seeing. They were pretty sedate for most of the night, until a few attractive ladies stepped up and started dancing to their favorite songs. After that, the party was in full swing. We even had one dark-tressed dancer in “I Dream of Genie” type attire shaking her attributes around to the amusement of all.

Since I waited over a week and a half to write this, the fog of time and distance has shrouded much of what I’m sure were very amusing little episodes in the evening’s festivities. For that delay, I apologize. This is just one more reason you should attend these things in person, rather than relying on the retelling of their highlights by a musician, of all people…and a bass player at that!

Load out went quickly at the end of the night. Even Jason was done quickly, as his friend had stayed the whole night and helped him tear down his kit. This is usually a problem for him. He can almost always find someone to take him to a gig, but they never seem to stick around to make sure he has a ride home (Duh!?!). We have in the past taken turns getting him home, but that was not necessary this time.

On the short trip home, I opted for a rare situation: no music. I just turned off the CD player and drove back to my little burg in relative silence. It was kind of odd, as there is almost always some kind of music playing in my life. But, not on this night. The tires spinning against the pavement and the air bending around the minivan were my only music.

Distant Admiration

2006-07-22T23:59:00.000-05:00

15 July 2006
BenWahBob found ourselves back at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO for the standard once-about-every-six-weeks gig. I rolled up a bit earlier than normal – which was actually on time for a change, as opposed to running in the door at the last minute and setting up just in time to start playing. I actually got “Rock Star” parking – right at the front door. Sweet. Set up was a breeze, as usual, and I had time to chat a bit with the fellas before we played.

The sets were pretty much the standard fare BWB sets. The crowd was a bit sparse at the beginning of the night, but began to pick up as time wore on. By eleven o’clock or so, there was actually a pretty good crowd in attendance. One table off to the right of the stage was populated by a bachelorette party, who seemed to be letting nothing interfere with their good time. It seemed to be infectious. Any time you have a bunch of attractive young women running to the dance floor all night long, it will tend to have that sort of effect. Everyone seemed to be having a pretty good time, so I guess that’s all that really matters.

When I have time, I usually try to sneak outside in-between sets to call Dawna. She was at home with Samuel only this time, as Derek was with his father all weekend. We had gone to his fortieth birthday party Friday night, and Derek elected to stay with him for most of the weekend to visit with a cousin he doesn’t often see. Anyway…as I was stepping out to make the call, I overheard a group of people arguing just outside the club. I was walking away to get some quiet when I started to get the gist of the conversation. It was a guy – probably in his late 20s or early 30s – yelling at a group of four or five women. I stopped and turned in my tracks when I heard him threaten to beat the (insert expletive here) out of all of them…right there on the spot.

Huh?

Now, if there is one thing I could never tolerate, it is exactly this; a man bullying and threatening violence against women. Naturally, I strolled right back and into the middle of this little party to offer my services. I told the goon that whatever the problem was, he needed to take it somewhere else. Well, alcohol being the fuel of idiocy that it is, he got immediately into my face and started casting expletives toward me. I tried to explain to him that he didn’t appear to understand the situation into which he was now hurling himself, and all he needed to do was to calm down and quietly go away. He continued with his verbal onslaught, citing some garbage about “all his boys” as he pointed to the club door. I was starting to loose my normally demur composure. I actually found myself with my finger in his face, ranting something about “his boys” picking him up at the hospital if he didn’t run like a scared little girl. Fortunately for all involved, Jim came storming out the door and interjected himself into our little budding fracas. Cooler heads eventually prevailed, and I agreed not to hurt him as he agreed to go away and stop threatening women. Jim told me later that the guy was a regular at the club, and had once before been barred for a year because he is an angry drunk. He was also amazed, as he had never seen me so mad about anything. Well…if anything gets me going, that’s it. I am glad, though, that I didn’t have to go to jail over that insignificant slug.

So, I went back inside and finished the night like nothing had happened. That’s one of the beauties of Zen; when it’s over, it’s over. On to the new moment.

At the end of the night, we tore down as usual, got paid as usual, and Dale disappeared as usual. He had taken down the banner, laid in out on the dance floor to roll up, and then left it there while he went to the bar to pay his tab or something. When he finally returned, he found it still on the floor, but now mangled and torn in several places. Ouch! Bobby didn’t appear to be too happy about this, citing the fact that it was a $400 banner and that he must be just made of money. Dale was beside himself. He had left the banner on the floor and it had gotten destroyed. Bummer.

It wasn’t all dark memories from the weekend, though. I discovered I have a secret admirer. Someone sent an email through the BWB website alluding to such affect. Carlos forwarded it to me, and razzed me about it quite a bit. I told Dawna, and she was bordering in being a bit catty about it. I couldn’t tell if she was serious or not, though she claims it was all in jest. Hmmm. Perhaps. I have had plenty of experience with that, unfortunately. Most girlfriends/wives say they can handle the female attention showered upon us, but when it happens they loose their minds over it. My ex-wife used to nip at my heels for weeks over some other woman even talking to me. Virtually every girlfriend has done pretty much the same. I think Dawna knows I would never cheat on her, but I guess only time will really tell how well she handles it.

I thought it was kind of neat (how corny does that sound?). I never really took advantage of the status thrust upon local entertainment celebrities which seems to allow women to cast themselves at us with reckless abandon, so this is kind of new to me. I recalled back in the late 80’s handing out cards for people to fill out for Nassty’s mailing list, and receiving a modest share of female compliments. There were also a few directed through Those1Guys’ website a few years ago. But, for the most part, I seem to have a tendency to scare women off. Everyone seems to think that I look mean and mad all the time, when in reality I’m probably the happiest person you’ll ever meet. I mean, come on…I get paid for music! I get to build pipe organs during the day, and build rock music at night. How much happier could a life possibly be? Anyway…this didn’t seem like one of those band-tart situations, just someone expressing her gratitude for what I do. And I truly appreciate that, Laura.

The drive back to St. Jacob that night was filled with the sounds of the Spock’s Beard CD Day for Night, which is replete with harmony vocals and great songwriting. What a truly great band.

Another Chapter

2006-07-13T22:21:00.000-05:00

Yes…I am leaving BenWahBob. Rumors of this have apparently been running rampant for some time now, not unlike the time leading up to my departure from Knucklehead last Fall. I guess it really wasn’t a great secret. I’ve certainly made no attempt to conceal the fact that I would be spending more time pursuing the myriad original music projects on my extensive collection of back burners. In fact, it was spelled out pretty clearly in the blog explaining my departure from Knucklehead. I notified the other members of the band about a week ago, and the search for a replacement is underway.

They took it pretty much in stride. Not surprising, really, as over their 12 or so year history there have been more bass players in BWB than drummers in Spinal Tap (sorry Deron, had to use that one). Carlos said he was surprised I stayed as long as I did, and Bobby said he knew I was leaving for some time (thanks, Tom). At least there are no animosities over the departure. These guys are way too professional for that kind of baby stuff. I’ve seen many bands over the years lose members in a hail of verbal garbage. That was not the case with Knucklehead, and does not appear to be the case with BWB. It has been a great pleasure and honor to work with true professionals all these years; great musicians and great people.

The book is not closed on my music career, though; quite the contrary, in fact. The past 24 years of playing in smoky bars for drunks has been but a primer for things to come. I will now commit every fiber of my being to composing, recording, and performing all of the music I’ve had swirling around inside my head for all these years. So, visit the website for updates on the progress and availability of the various projects and/or send me an email to get on my email list so I can notify you when things become available.

07 July 2006
I waited entirely too long this week to write this account of the past weekend. Unfortunately, many of the funny/silly/obnoxious things that occurred have probably slipped my mind. We played at the Budweiser “Party at the Park” at Fairmount Park Friday night. I slipped out of work a few minutes early to avoid having to rush to get there on time. It worked out perfectly, and I arrived about 17:45. As I rolled my equipment into the building and up to the stage area, Dale’s lovely wife Chris came walking up to me, threw her arms around me and cried, “Don’t quit!” Wow. “Uhh…OK, I’ll stay…” I think I stammered. As she grinned and started to walk away with her food, I stated that I was quitting again. She ran right back over and we repeated the whole scene. I told the guys that I should have quit this band years ago. They seemed to enjoy that as much as I did…well, almost.

Once we got past all the hugging and crying, and ate some excellent nosh, the doors were opened and the crowd surged through uninhibited. Well, not exactly all that, but they did stream in at a fairly steady rate. Friday nights there are usually pretty well attended. This one, though, was a little less than capacity. I’m told there were about 1500 people in the Park, but they must have opted to stay outside and enjoy the nice weather, as it never really got too crowded in the Black Stallion Room where we play.

Carlos had mentioned that he had a bit of butterflies going on as a result of his not being able to go over some of the songs in the days leading up to the gig. I didn’t really think too much of it until we got well into the first set. He was dropping stuff left and right; notes, chords, phrases…you know, heavy stuff. Wow. It was pretty neat watching him come apart right before my eyes like that. He probably didn’t think so, but I enjoyed it. Of course, it’s not like I didn’t have my share of stuff dropped as well. Frankly, we were just awful that set. Even our sound man Randy was looking at us like he was wondering who we were. It must have been quite a sight.

We got it together shortly after that, and the rest of the night went pretty smooth. I did get to see someone with whom I went to high school, Troy Moore, and the rest of his family. I don’t think I’ve talked to him since, oh, probably May 1984 at graduation. Since he’s been living in Florida, I guess that kind of makes sense.

Tear-down went pretty quickly, and I was off to my solitude in St. Jacob. I listened to Nicolo Paganini’s first violin concerto for the drive home. I know it’s not prog rock, but it was pretty progressive for its time. That’s got to count for something. And actually it wasn’t really solitude to which I arrived at home, as Dawna was there waiting for me; lying in my bed, reading a book I had just finished earlier that week.

Sweeeeet.

08 July 2006
I left home for Rusty’s in Edwardsville, IL with plenty of time to get there at the prescribed time of 20:00. We were to be using Bobby’s system, as well as his new light rig. Excellent. I didn’t have to cart out my lights either this time; just a bass amp and a bass. I stopped at McDelay’s in Troy, IL for a quick burger to scarf on the way. The newbie at the window screwed up my order something awful – a #2 with a Dr. Pepper…not terribly difficult, and certainly not worth $8.32. She finally got it straightened out after a couple of attempts; I got my food and went on my way. Now things would be running a little tighter than I would prefer. As I exited from I-270 onto IL-159, I got behind a line of cars with a gray minivan in the lead. This particular pace car driver decided that the idle speed if 20-25 MPH would be more than sufficient for the duration of the distance to downtown Edwardsville. Now, I am a rather vocal proponent of driving within the limits established by law. One would be hard-pressed to find me exceeding any posted speed limit. It’s just the way I am. This, however, was grating me to no end. I came once again to an all too familiar conclusion: I should be allowed to legally kill certain people. Thin the population. Cull the herd. But, no…my weapons yet sit idle. I’m working on it, though.

Everyone else was running late, too, so I didn’t feel too bad getting there at 20:30. Bobby was just getting his drums set up, and Carlos and Dale arrived shortly after me. Load-in and set-up went pretty smooth. The manager approached us during load-in and commented about how he hoped we were better luck than the previous night (played by a band called “Run Forest Run”), as no one was there all night. Great…another paid practice.

It started out pretty slow, and was looking like a repeat of the previous night for them. Bummer. He had two barmaids and a waitress doing basically nothing. It did start to pick up a bit as the night wore on, though, but never really was jumping. There were a couple of nearly-blue-hairs at a table directly in front of the band who stayed for most of the night. Dale dedicated Last Kiss to them, which seemed to make them just giddy. There were quite a few college-age kids coming and going throughout the night, but no one seemed to stay too long.

During one of the later breaks, as we were sitting at a table talking amongst ourselves, a thirty-something woman walked up to the table, introduced herself to all of us, grabbed Carlos’ hand, and pulled him out to the dance floor. As he was looking back to us for help, we just grinned and waved. She was trying her best to get him to dance with her, being all serious and everything, and all he was doing was silly-dancing. After a few attempts to get him to dance seriously with her, she finally took the hint and walked back to her table. We are such asses sometimes.

The rest of the night was fairly vanilla. We did play a Rush tune, though, so that was all good. We packed up the equipment in pretty good time, and headed to our respective abodes. Mine was actually quiet this time, with no Hottie in my bed. Bummer.

I had been listening to more Paganini on the way there, but opted instead for the Circus Maximus CD The First Chapter for the drive home this night.

Pipe Dreams

2006-06-20T22:26:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 17 June 2006
Once again, the story starts earlier in the week. A long running dream of mine has been to win the lottery and spend the rest of my life just making music. I would build a small castle in the middle of nowhere, and in the middle of that castle would be a great music hall with perfect acoustics. At the back of the stage would stand a magnificant pipe organ. Ahh...to sleep, perchance to dream...

Having an organ in my home would be shear ecstasy for me (& a harpsichord as well, while I'm at it). The church in Granite City I attended in my youth (yes, I've actually been to church other than for weddings and funerals) has a rather nice organ, so I was bitten by that bug at an early age. This past week, I took a giant leap toward that goal...and very nearly attained it.

My job with Wicks Organ Company has allowed me opportunities I could not have fathomed just a few short years ago. A recent visitor to our website inquired about the logistics and cost of removing a small organ from the balcony of his church in Russelton, PA -- just north of Pittsburgh. The Shop Superintendent redirected the inquiry to me for the pricing aspect, but mentioned that I might want to first inquire about it personally, as he knew I was casually looking about for a home organ. So, I exchanged a few emails with the gentleman, asked some questions about it, and told him I might be willing to drive to Pennsylvania and remove the instrument myself if the price was right. It was a Wicks "Fuga" model from 1935, with three ranks (219) of pipes, a 2-manual console built into the casework, and stood only 8'5" tall -- my living room ceiling is 8'9". When he told me to make him a fair offer, I asked him for some pictures and some more details. People all around me at work started offering me advice on how best to remove it, and even their services to help with everything from moving it to tonal regulating it once in my home.

Thursday morning around 08:30, an email arrived from this guy. He explained that apparently the organ didn't want to be sold, for as he was preparing to go take pictures of it that morning, he received a phone call informing him that the church was on fire. He said he drove over there and stood in the street watching it burn, and could even see the organ burning through a window that use to be a stained glass representation of the Transfiguration...which was the name of the church.

I was literally within hours of owning my own pipe organ.

I surfed a few news websites Monday from the Pittsburgh area and found several stories and photos of the fire, which took 75 firefighters to extinguish. One even had several minutes of video from their news helicopter flying over the scene. The 91-year-old church was a total loss, as was the organ in the balcony.

I was literally within hours of owning my own pipe organ!

Oh, well...c'est la vie.

At a completely different point in the musical spectrum, BenWahBob was booked for a return engagement at The Crazy Horse Saloon in Wentzville, MO on Saturday. They had played a freebie the previous Saturday afternoon at a biker benefit in Moscow Mills while I was in Michigan...which reminds me...thanks to Mike Hirsch for sitting in for me again. That was the maiden voyage of Bobby's new PA rig. But this was the first indoor gig, for which it was intended. It seems he's pieced himself together a rather nice little system. I arrived at the bar just as Bobby and Carlos were about to unload the system from Bobby's trailer -- also a nice new addition. We got it in and set up in almost no time at all. They had spent several hours configuring it to be quick and painless, and they succeeded. All of the electronics are in an SKB GigRig, the Carvin subs have large casters on back, and the mains and monitors are all manageable by one person. With everything pre-wired, we just plug in the speakers, plug in the mic cables, power it up, and go. K-I-S-S.

I popped out front for the first couple of songs to check levels, and everything sounded great. I boosted the vocal levels a bit to get them more out-front, flattened out the bass channel EQ (Hirschie plays one of those damned Steinberger basses -- a bowling ball with strings), and left it alone for the rest of the night. Carlos said he preferred to have the PA rack on my side of the stage to avoid the temptation he would surely have to tweak it all night. Good call.

We rolled into the first set with virtually no one in the place. Oh, well...paid practice. Too bad I had to drive 65 miles for this. As the night wore on, though, things started to pick up and more people made there way to the bar. The first set was fairly vanilla, and went without any real glaring hitches. as we turned the page to browse the second set, though, a great opportunity presented itself. Bobby noticed immediately that Dale had written the Romantics song What I Like About You twice back-to-back. He asked me which one we should play, to which I responded, "The first one...it's longer!" -- and so it did extend farther across the page. Bobby suggested we play it twice, just as written. When we presented the idea to Carlos, he whole-heartedly agreed. It was a done-deal. Dale was going to think we were nuts or something.

Unfortunately, he ruined it for us by noticing his error and correcting it just a few songs before the debut of our Romantics medley. Curses! Foiled again! ...and we would have gotten away with it, if it weren't for you meddling kids! We did have more fun with him later in the evening, trying our level best to throw him off during songs we know he struggles with rhythmically. He was unflappable, though, on this night. Carlos and I even tried to throw off Bobby while he was singing the beginning of that acursed Georgia Sattelites song, only to be denied once again.

We had one of those "I used to be somebody" moments in the middle of the evening, too. Some biker-looking chick wearing a leather vest, do-rag, and pig-tails approached Dale during one break and asked him if she could come up and sing the Guns-n-Roses song Sweet Child of Mine. He hemmed and hawed, and siezed the opportunity to drag Bobby and me into it. When she asked us, we both shrugged our shoulders and said that we knew it. This wasn't the support that Dale was seeking. She launched into that old, tired, far-to-familiar sob story about how she used to be a singer, and sang on many people's CDs, but then got throat cancer and had to quit singing professionally. Uhh-huh...yah...sssure you did. I'll bet you played a Rickenbacker, too, right? If I had a dollar for every time I've heard some lame-ass version of that story as a pretense to get up on stage and suck the life right out of the place... She tried for about another 15 or 20 minutes, then got mad and gave up after we convinced her that Carlos really didn't know the song. Where's Deron when you need him?

We managed our way through the rest of the night, occassionally messing things up on purpose toward the end of trying to trying to throw off Dale. Still no luck. At the end of the festivities, tear-down of the new system went pretty quick. We could do better, though. We did stop and chat a bit here and there. I had a nice conversation with Dale's lovely wife Chris about long drives after gigs and playing at the Lake of the Ozarks. I couldn't remember the name of that bar on the lake to save my life (it was The Filling Station & Backwater Jack's, Chris). It's hell getting old.

During load-out, we were stuffing equipment back into Bobby's trailer when I burned the dickens out of my left hand. Bobby and I were lifting the PA rack into the trailer from the sides as Carlos was pushing from behind. As I got the front edge onto the trailer and reached back to steady the top corner, Carlos called out just as I grabbed the cigarette in his hand and mashed it into the rack with the palm of my hand. Ouch! I now have a nice little spot between my first and second fingers that's about the size of a cigarette (Did I STUTTER?). Oh, well...it'll be a nice reminder of my time in Wentzville at The Crazy Horse Saloon.

Yee Haaa!

For the long drive home, I popped in the Enchant CD Tug of War. I had listened to their Juggling 9 or Dropping 10 CD during the drive there, and was thoroughly progified by the time I got home just after 03:30. That kind of made for a mostly-wasted Sunday, but, hey, such is the life of a working musician, eh?

Pipe Organs & Sweet Wine

2006-06-12T23:20:00.000-05:00

Friday, 09 June 2006
One of the nice benefits about playing with BenWahBob is the fact that we don't play every waking moment. Generally, we only book about two gigs a month, with some exceptions during the summer. This past weekend was one of those off weeks. In a stroke of rare opportunity, Dawna didn't have her kids either. As part of the 100th anniversary celebrations at Wicks Organ Company, we had planned a chartered bus to take those interested to Kalamazoo, MI for an organ recital on what has become our premiere instrument at First Congregational Church.

Dawna had taken the day off, and showed up early to get the nickle tour of the pipe organ shop. We boarded the bus in the parking lot at 10:00 and were on our way. We stopped in Effingham, IL for lunch at Ryan's, gorged ourselves at the buffet, then headed up I-57 toward Chicago. We looped around outside of Chicago through some small towns in northern Illinois and Indiana, then back on Interstate Highway to Kalamazoo. An unfortunate occurance left us sitting on the road for about an hour-and-a-half -- a truck had crossed over the median and struck three cars, killing a 7-year-old girl. We called ahead to the church, and they were already aware of the accident and the subsequent traffic nightmare. When we finally started moving again, we were way behind schedule. We had planned on stopping at the hotel in Stevensville, MI to change clothes before going to the church. We were now going straight to the church, as the recital was scheduled to start at 19:30. We arrived about 19:50, and the concert began immediately. It was nice of them to wait for us.

The organist, Colin Howland, did a knock-down job playing a wide variety of music -- some writen for the pipe organ, some transcribed from orchestral music. He played everything from Bach to Mozart to Vierne (the Bach was outstanding), and even tickled us with an encore of a J. P. Sousa march that would have made any Monty Python fan proud. We even joked with him afterwards at the Meet-and-Greet about finding a suitable stop on the instrument for the big fart sound at the end. Everyone was also given the opportunity to crawl around inside the pipe chamber to see what an organ looks like from the inside. Dawna seemed to really enjoy that, as it was her first time inside a large instrument. It is an impressive three-stories tall, and full to the top of pipes and wind lines...including a rather chest-rattling 32' Double Trombone of 12 pipes. It's a nice instrument, to say the least. Wicks' pride in it is aptly justified.

After the concert, we adjourned to The Blue Dolphin, a Greek restaurant just a coupler of blocks from the church, and had dinner...at 22:00. They, too, kept the place open late for us. Very nice. None of us really ate too terribly much, as it was so late, but we did have a great time sitting around picking on each other and sharing "war stories" about Wicks and other places we had worked. We then took the hour-long bus ride back to the hotel in Stevensville. It was nearly 01:00 when we checked in at the front desk.

Saturday, 10 June 2006
Saturday morning rolled around way too soon. I had set the alarm for 07:00. I remember looking over at the clock around 07:04 and wondering why hotel alarm clocks never seem to work. Not that it matters...I can't sleep late even if I want to any more. We got up and showered, and headed down to the lobby for the free continental (as opposed to oceanic, I suppose) breakfast. We indulged in hot waffles and comparisons to other hotels with some of the other friendly travelers. We also found plastered across the front of the morning paper pictures of the gruesome accident from the night before. In a bout of hardcore journalistic sensationalism, I found the writer had not only named the company who owned the trailer (being hauled by another carrier), but had the audacity to even list their website in the story. Trial by media the very next day.

We all borded the bus around 11:00 for the journey home. It was nice to just ride for a change, and be a sightseer. I almost always have to drive when I travel anywhere, which doesn't afford me the opportunity to enjoy the scenery. This time I got to do just that. Dawna and I curled up in our seats and watched the countryside go by as the rest of the crew sat in the back of the bus drinking and laughing. We did occassionaly chortle at some of the stories they were sharing.

Lunch was to be had at a giant red barn known as Amishland, somewhere in the middle of northeastern Illinois. It is an Amish mall, of sorts, with a really good buffet. After we ate, we all went out and browsed the shops that littered the inside of this hug "barn." Once back on the road, we made the final push for home. It was a long ride that I only really remember as a series of naps interupted every so often by the odd outburst of laughter. The bus pulled into the Wicks parking lot sometime late Saturday evening. We all congratulated each other on a fine weekend, said our goodbyes, and headed for our respective homes. Even Dawna and I parted ways, as she said she wanted to sieze the opportunity to practice with her piano and violin. I went home and practiced my cello for awhile, then fell asleep on the couch while watching the lightning from a passing storm.

Sunday, 11 June 2006
Dawna and I rarely get the chance to spend copious amounts of time alone together, so we took full advantage of this weekend. We had decided to spend Sunday taking her convertable out for a spin, and settled on a trip to Mount Pleasant, a winery in Augusta, MO. This is one of those things we have talked about doing in the past, but never found the time to actually do. Of course, it was raining Sunday morning, but we went regardless.

She picked me up around 10:30 and off we went. We stopped for breakfast at the IHOP in North St. Louis County, then continued on to Augusta. During the drive along MO-94 near Defiance, we started to notice a fair amount of storm damage, some of the debris spread across the road at various places. We drove through Augusta admiring the old Missouri town's charm.

The winery was mostly empty when we arrived. There was a wedding reception in one of the far buildings, but little else going on there. I guess the threatening skies had held people back. We bought a bottle of Harvest White and a tray of cheese and sausage, and sat in the back patio area of the "grocery" building looking out over the river valley. There was a group of youngsters at the other end of the patio who kept us readily amused. More people started to filter in as the day wore on, including a group of women having a bachelorette party. They were a hoot, too. There's always good people-watching at these places.

We didn't stay too long for fear of drinking too much wine and having to wind our way back on the two-lane road (neither of us drink much anymore). In fact, we didn't even finish the bottle we bought. I'm enjoying a glass of it even as I write this on Monday night. Dawna stopped at the store in the front on the way out to buy a couple of bottles to take home, and we headed back to the city. She wanted to stop at an antique store we passed on the way there, but it was closed on Sunday. we did end up at an antique mall in Creve Coeur until they closed and threw us out. I resisted the temptation to rescue a couple of instruments I found there -- an old trombone and a nice silver bugle. As it was after 17:00 and dinner was now in order, we stopped at the Olive Garden for some pasta.

To complete our care-free, by-the-seat-of-our-pants Sunday, we decided to go see a movie. We ended up in O'Fallon, IL at their massive theater and went in to watch The daVinci Code. We had both read the book when it came out, and were eager to see the movie version. I must say, for as much as it has been maligned by critics, I thought it was a pretty good movie. It stayed pretty true to the book, and the acting was better than average.

OK...so its not a particularly musical blog. It does, however, point out that even those of us who have devoted our lives to the pursuit of music do occassionally do "normal" things, too. I guess riding a bus to Michigan to listen to a pipe organ is rather peculiar to being a musician, though, so it kind of all comes together around that.

Whatever.

Normal blog coming again next week.

Floatless Float Trip

2006-05-31T22:09:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 27 May 2006
Memorial Day Weekend, for most people it seems, is a three-day weekend to BBQ, drink with friends, open the pool, go on float trips, and just generally play or relax. For most musicians, however, it is a working weekend no different than any other. We load our equipment into a local venue and entertain the masses. At the risk of sounding like I'm whining, trust that I am not. This is not a criticism or complaint, but merely an observation. It's what we do. It's the choice we make when we decide to be working musicians. Rarely do we regret this decision.

For the past 10 years, BenWahBob has been playing Memorial Day Weekend at Bearcat Getaway on the beautiful Black River near Lesterville, Missouri. This was my fourth year playing there, and I must say it is never boring. Last year someone chucked onto the stage at my feet a jar of moonshine with something floating in it that looked like someone's kidneys(-in-the-jar-o). The first two years saw downpours of rain that prevented us from floating on Sunday. Then there's the people-watching...which is always outstanding. Get 1500 hoosiers together in one spot with no limits on how much alcohol they can consume, throw in a live rock band, and you have yourself one serious party. This year was a little different than last year in that there seemed to be better attendance this year. High fuel prices didn't seem to put a damper on plans this time, as it did last year when it was still a new horror. Not only were the campgrounds sold out, but there were quite a few people who drove in to see the band.

But, I seem to have gotten ahead of myself.

The band met up Saturday morning at the usual spot - the Schnuck's market on Butler Hill Road & I-55 in South St. Louis County - before caravanning down to Lesterville. We usually stop in Farmington, as we turn onto Highway W, at Dairy Queen. This has become a point of some contention recently, as the service there has been absolutely deplorable the last few years. When we hit the exit ramp, we noticed immediately that their parking lot was empty. The overhead sign noted that they would be reopening soon. Awww...shucks...really broke my heart. As it turns out, though, someone had the presence of mind to build a McDonald's right across the street. Unfortunately, it seems that they just hired the old DQ employees, as the service there was about the same. Perhaps it's something in the water. They are just a few miles from Doe Run...

We ingested our sustenance, as it were, enjoyed some local people-watching, cracked jokes about the falling-down silhouette guy on the "wet floor" signs, and went on our merry way. We stopped to refuel at the same gas station on Highway 21 in Arcadia as always, but this time no one went inside. Bobby and I went in last year to peruse the boasted 1900 guns in the gun store section - yessir...beer & guns...everything leaves there loaded. They have more guns in that little place than I've seen at some St. Louis area gun shows. It's awe-inspiring and frightening all at the same time.

As we resumed our journey through the Ozark Mountains toward Lesterville, I thoroughly enjoyed the scenery. It is really beautiful country out there ("Mountains come out of the sky / And they stand there"). I also noted that most of the roads have names like "Buck Creek Road." I never once saw one named after a character from classical literature. I'm thinking that is not in the area's mindset. It is an area that is terribly depressed economically. Lest one begins to think that I'm taking ill-mannered shots at the disadvantaged populace, it must be remembered that I was simply entertaining myself while on a three-hour drive. Dawna had opted to forego the trip this year in favor of staying home to get some work done on her farm, so I was alone this time. I was in dire need of mental stimulation. It's not my fault. I'm a victim here. Woe unto me.

We arrived at our destination a little after 14:00 (that's 2pm, for those of you in Rio Linda), and began to unload immediately. Well, almost immediately. Some yahoos had parked in front of the opening in the fence around the stage, so we had to cut a section out of the front fence to back in our vehicles. It didn't seem to take us too long to set up this year, like it seems to most times. Mike Stevenson brings out his monster "festival system" for these gigs (the same one he uses every year for the Sparta Blues Fest, and will be taking to Des Moines for the Cinderella show there), and it takes a little longer to set up than your average club system. He also had some new Radian monitors this year - very nice. I was using the Ampeg SVT6PRO prototype amp from last year, along with my old SVT610HLF prototype cabinet. I was quite pleased with my sound, even with old strings. Carlos brought no less than four amps; three Crate V30 combos, and a V30 head and sealed V212 cabinet. He spread these out across the stage to boost his presence, which allowed him to turn down his overall volume. It was a good idea that worked as planned. We finished with plenty of daylight left, and sat around in lawn chairs enjoying the end of the day. The campgrounds fed us a nice BBQ dinner around 18:00 (it's in our contract - 2 meals for us and crew), and we tuned up one more time just before we started playing around 20:00.

We put out a typical BWB show, complete with every normal faux pas and hiccup. We started out kind of slow, but picked up on the groove after a little while. Dale seemed to make it through that god-awful Georgia Satellites song OK...in spite of my best efforts at pounding my foot to a different tempo right in front of him to throw him off. I was stromping so hard that the stage lights were shaking. But, alas, he was not to be diverted this time. He just gave me that out-of-the-corner-of his-eye look that said, "Fornicate Off!" I'll get him next time.

We always end the night with a barn burning version of Black Sabbath's War Pigs. On this night, though, Dale had seen fit to insert it into the middle of the last set. Whatever. We shrugged at each other and rolled into it nonetheless. Carlos went into his usual mind-somewhere-else solo in the middle of the song, but then just kept going...and going, and going, and... At some point it actually broke down into a semi-funk thing. It had sped up faster and faster, and I was doing some finger-style funk thing in E minor, just barely able to keep up with Bobby's lightning-fast tempo. It was both unorthodox and kind of cool all at the same time. It was definitely unusual. Carlos finally came back in and we wound our way back to the last verse. We don't normally do stuff like that in BWB. That has always been the domain of Knucklehead-type bands. This kind of unpredictability almost caught me off-guard. I must admit...it was a nice departure from the status quo.

I don't really even remember how we ended the night. After War Pigs, I didn't even pay much attention to what we were doing. I do know that we played over about 15 minutes (also a hallmark of Knucklehead). After we played something that we determined was the last song, there were the usual calls for more...that we dutifully ignored, as the people who run the campground like to get the non-campers out as close to midnight as possible so they can shut the gates. One woman in particular was shouting "Moon!" over and over again at the top of her lungs. She apparently got the notion in her head that we were going to play Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon for her, and wasn't leaving until we did. I've seen that look before. Up close. There exists an adequate description of that kind of woman.....complete nutbar. Some of her friends finally succeeded in dragging her away, but she put up a pretty good fight along the way. Alcohol is a dangerous drug.

A rather attractive (and drunk) young lady tried to gain access to the stage during the last set. She called up to me at the side of the stage (which is about 8 feet in off the ground) and asked if she could come up with us for the rest of the night, saying she wanted to hear us from up there. She first tried the blink,blink eye batting method, then resorted to the cross-between-a-sad-puppy-dog-and-naughty-little-girl look while hanging onto the audio snake cable. The whole time she's putting on this show for me, she's flanked by her boyfriend and his buddy who were trying their best to look cool and disinterested in the proceedings. Nice try, honey.

We quickly tore down the equipment. I got my stuff loaded back into my minivan and headed straight for my tent, which I had set up after we finished setting up the stage earlier in the evening. I was not planning on floating on Sunday, opting instead to get home and get some work done over the weekend, and so was planning on leaving early Sunday morning. My brand new air mattress seemed to have lost a bit of its firmness, so I got out the pump and corrected that. I opened my bag to change into something not sweaty and found Dawna's bath robe, which she had snuck in while I was loading my van Saturday morning. She rocks! I buried my face in it and fell fast asleep.

Unfortunately, I awoke about two hours later wondering why I was lying in the ground. Oh, well...tough it out until morning. Not the first time I've slept on the ground. After waking around 07:30 and investigating, I found a 4-5" gaping hole in one of the side seams of the mattress. This was the third one in the last two years that didn't hold air. I'll not buy another of those cheap Ozark Trail pieces of garbage at Wal-Mart again.

After a bit of small talk with those who were also awake early, I left right behind Mike. We didn't even wait for the free breakfast, which really isn't so spectacular to begin with. As I drove, I ate a couple of orange cinnamon rolls Dawna had made for me Saturday before I left home. They were excellent, to say the least. I didn't stop to eat anywhere along the way. I just wanted to get home. I listened to a bunch of different stuff both going there and coming home, mostly the CDs I had recently aquired from LaserCD.com from bands like Hourglass, The Quiet Room, Enchant, and that Circus Maximus album that I can't seem to hear too much. I got back to St. Jacob around 11:00, called Dawna, and promptly took a nap...on my couch, not the ground.

All in all, it turned out to be a pretty good weekend for me. My flight with Mark Wick to North Carolina Thursday was cancelled because of inclement weather, and even though Dawna didn't go with me, the trip to Lesterville was fairly entertaining. I got to drive through the Ozark Mountains, gawk at a bunch of old Ford tractors (for which I've always had an affinity), play for a rather large crowd, listen to a lot of good progrock bands, and spend a fair amount of time with my lovely girlfriend. For what more could a guy ask?

Whining and Dining

2006-05-23T23:26:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 20 May 2006
After the last couple of rather uneventful weeks, I was ready to get to a playing weekend. If nothing else, just for the entertainment factor. And, of course, as is usual, I was not disappointed.

Well...let's say that I was not disappointed on the entertainment front.

(Warning - Whine Alert!)

It's no secret that Yngwie J. Malmsteen has been one of my favorite artists since his first solo album was released in 1984. He was scheduled to play at Pop's Saloon & Music in Sauget, IL on 20 May...same night as the Baha gig with BenWahBob. Bummer. I was going to miss him again. I've missed seeing quite a few artists over the years for this very same reason. Once back in the late 1980's, I was playing on Laclede's Landing in Downtown St. Louis while Cacophony was right across the street. People are surprised when I tell them that I've never had the chance to see a band like Iron Maiden. I finally saw bands like Yes and Kansas for the first time just a few years back. Timing is everything, I guess. I've seen Yngwie before, so it was really not that big of a deal.

BWB's guitar player also owns an electronics repair shop in Florissant, MO. One of his advertising methods is handing out flyers at artists' concerts that draw strong numbers of musicians. It's an effective tool. He had some trouble getting someone to do this show, so the Office Manager volunteered. That would be my girlfriend, Dawna. I wasn't too thrilled about the idea of her going to Pop's without me. I'm all protective like that. I knew I would worry about her all night. To make the situation worse, she was going to have to find a babysitter for her two children. She told me she was going to get either George or Katrina Romer to go with her...probably Katrina. As it turned out, it was George.

I’m not going to delve too deep into the personal aspect of this, as it is not the purpose of this blog. I will say, though, that sending my girlfriend to a concert at Pop’s while I’m playing in St. Charles wouldn’t have been my first choice.

Oh, well...enough of my crying about my personal life.

I spent a fair amount of the day Saturday burning CDs for the BWB Live disc that we are debuting this coming weekend. As a result, I didn't arrive at Baha Rock Club until about 20:45. as we were scheduled to start at 21:00, I was in a bit of a rush. It turns out it was all for naught. I hurried in, after finding "rockstar parking" right in front of the club, set everything up, and noticed that the soundcheck had gotten quiet. Apparently the soundman, John, had gotten sick and needed to leave. He looked awful. He was complaining about sweating and shortness of breath. We all started thinking that he might be having a heart attack. His wife came to pick him up and, we assumed, take him to the hospital. This left us with no soundman. The system at Baha is curious, to say the least. To say the most, its a complete fustercluck. Nothing is plugged in where it is labeled. Carlos did his best to get us a quick level check, and we were playing by about 21:20. Jim, the manager, became the default soundman.

We poured ourselves into the sets. Our efforts seemed to go largely unappreciated, as the small crowd seemed relatively indiferent to our presence. We played on nonetheless. As we started the third set with Mustang Sally, I mentally noted the irony of playing that song while Yngwie was onstage at Pop's playing nothing remotely like it. I also joked that, as late as we started, I probably could have gone to the show anyway. The usual dance songs had people on the dance floor, and the usual "drive-em-off-the-dance-floor" songs did their thing, too. We never did get Bobby's mic working, so Carlos and I did what we could to cover his vocal parts. That made things somewhat more interesting.

Someone from a wedding party requested Mustang Sally again, so we started off the fourth set with it...again. Once again I noted the above stated irony, and wondered how Dawna was doing. I was trying not to worry myself to death over it, and was failing miserably. My playing all night was just atrocious. My mind was obviously somewhere else. Fortunately, we only did half of the song this time and melted it into Hard to Handle by The Black Crows...another song of which I'm not terribly fond. Things evened out for me, though, at the end of the last set, when we ended the night with Rush's What You're Doing, Sabbath's Paranoid, and War Pigs. A pretty noble end to an otherwise dreary evening.

We tore down our stuff, shut down the PA, and stashed the mics. As I started to load out my equipment, there were three highly intoxicated young people sitting on the steps of the building next to the club. There was also a St. Charles Police Officer standing on the sidewalk talking with them. As I came into earshot of the conversation, the drunk guy sitting with two girls was remarking to the police officer about how they make the best breakfasts he's ever had. The cop looked at me and just shook his head. I remarked about how Waffle House seemed like a much better option. The cop asked him why someone was trying to beat him up last night, and the guy looked at him in amazement and asked how he knew about that...to which the cop told him "I know everything about you." I walked out of earshot about that time. However, Carlos came in just behind me to fill in the details. The guy apparently said to the cop, "That dude hit me, and you didn't do anything!" The cop answered, "That's not true. I laughed."

Things you can only experience in the seedy life of a bar musician.

They were all gone by the time I actually left the club. On the way there, I had listened to a CD from a band called The Quiet Room. They are a very talented group, but seem to be missing something that to me seems obvious – vocal harmonies. To exacerbate the issue, there are six guys in this band – two guitars, keyboards, bass, drums, and only one singer. With all of those guys in the band, one would think that the vocals would be huge. Yet, alas, they didn’t go that direction. The singer reminds me of early Geoff Tate…but, not quite. So, I listened to Queensrÿche’s Operation: Mindcrime for the drive home. It is easy to forget just how influential that album really was. It’s still great to this day.

This week’s a busy week again, flying out to the East Coast for a couple of days, then culminating with the trip to Lesterville this weekend. That should make for an interesting blog next week. We’ll see…

Mi Casa, Su Casa

2006-05-08T00:06:00.000-05:00

Friday, 05 May 2006
Cinco de Mayo -- the celebration of the Mexican victory over the overwhelmingly superior forces of Napoleon's invasion forces at the Battle of Puebla. It makes for a great excuse to party...and party they do. The party has gotten so big, that they've even invited Americans to participate along with them...as if we needed a reason to party either.

BenWahBob has been scoring some pretty good gigs for this holiday in the past couple of years. With the leader of the band being a "beaner" himself, this is to be expected I suppose. This year we provided the party soundtrack at the Casa Gallardo Mexican Restaurant at Manchester & I-270 in West St. Louis County. Anyone who has been through this area in the last couple of years knows what a nightmare it can be to get anywhere. Some genius engineers took a perfectly good accident-prone intersection and turned it into a giant fustercluck by making it a divided roadway. The restaurant is located on the south side of Manchester Road, just west of I-270. To get there, though, you must go east. Well...you exit west on Manchester, then north on Des Peres, then east on Manchester again, being careful not to drive right past it, as it is mostly hiden from the road until you are already driving past and about to cross over I-270 to West County Mall.

We decided it was best to set up on Thursday night after happy Hour in an effort to avoid the hassles of trying to load in during the festivities on Friday night. I don't know that I've ever been to this particular Casa before, but I knew where it was, and was able to get there with no problems. Bobby found it easily, too, as he goes there frequently. Dale didn't seem to have any trouble, and was there before me, as I got stuck in the construction traffic on US-40. Carlos, on the other hand, got lost, and ended up at Manchester & 141. After we all got there, and Carlos and Bobby got some appetizers at the bar, we set up my small system in a fairly isolated area just across from the bar. We did a basic (very basic, as I had not brought my bass) signal check, and I got the heck out of there. It was getting late, and I was already having a rather long week. The Chief Pricing Agent at Wick's had announced the previous week that he was leaving for personal pursuits, and I was offered the position. It looks like it will be quite a challenging job, and I spent the whole week being tutored in the fine art of organ pricing by two people with a combined total of 88 years at the company. Needless to say, it was mentally draining and I was tired.

Friday didn't really provide the stress relief that one would like from it either. I was hoping to get out of work a bit early to avoid the rush to get to the gig on time. My new hours are 8-5, and we were supposed to start promptly at 19:30. Unfortunately, I got dragged into a meeting with some visitors from Korea at around 16:00. At around 17:10, I looked at my watch and sighed. I guess Mark Wick heard or saw me, because he quickly wrapped things up with the meeting and cut us loose. It seemed unlikely, but I actually made it to the restaurant by 18:30. We plugged in the mics, turned everything on, and started right on time.

The crowd was exactly what you would expect on a night like this...and yet not. The place was packed, to be sure, but they seemed a bit more distant than we would have liked. Once the dinner crowd dissipated -- around the third set -- the place got pretty thin fairly quick. There were still a good amount of people in the bar area, but that was on the other side of the building. We ended up playing the last two sets to an empty room with a big fountain in the middle. It was a nice fountain, though.

That infernal Georgia Sattelites song popped up at the top of the second set again. I though we had rid ourselves of that pestilence, and yet there it was. Bobby told Dale that he use to sing it all the time, and wanted to give it a shot. Dale seemed a bit put-out, but aquiesced nonetheless. Amazingly, it went off without a hitch this time. Hmmm...

We banged out the rest of the tunes, even throwing in some Zeppelin at the request of a couple of friendly (drunk) young ladies. It is nice to know that some of the kids are still listening to fairly decent stuff like that. I say "kids" because most of them look to me like they are probably breaking some law by even having an alcoholic beverage in their hand, much less consuming it. I know that's mostly a function of the aging process, but I still find it mildly amusing. I feel like Larry Rolens sometimes...minus that whole Gretchen thing, of course.

The tear-down went pretty quickly, and I was on my way home by 01:00. As tired as I was, though, I needed something to keep me awake. That Circus Maximus CD The First Chapter, and a quick diversion to White Castle, seemed to do the trick. I can't seem to get enough of that album. I wish they would hurry up and put out another one.

Tattooed Ladies

2006-04-30T15:52:00.000-05:00

Friday, 28 April 2006
Dale is always hinting that he would like to play more shows closer to him in the Lincoln County Missouri area. Many of his friends make the drive to St. Charles to see us there, and sometimes even to Edwardsville IL to see us at Rusty’s. I can understand the pressure from them asking him to do some local shows, as I have had some of that myself. Most of the BWB stuff centers around the St. Charles and North STL County area, as the majority of its members have traditionally been from that area.

So, Dale decided to take matters into his own hands and booked a gig at a new bar in Moscow Mills MO called The Tattooed Lady. He knows the new owners, or knows some people who go there, or drove past it one day, or something of that ilk. At any rate, we were scheduled to play for their Opening Weekend celebration.

It was originally slotted to be a small PA gig, as the room is slightly smaller that Rusty’s. Bobby’s small system is not yet together, so I was to bring mine. We discovered last week that the band scheduled to play Saturday night was some old SLME friends including Rob Sherman and Tony Hines (both excellent musicians, I might add). They offered to bring in their system for us to use Friday night, which would give them the opportunity to tweak on it without having to be playing at the same time. It sounded like a win-win situation from both sides, so we readily agreed.

I arrived a bit past 19:00, right behind Bobby and his lovely wife Roberta. Load in was a snap, as there is a door at the back of the building just to the side of the stage. Well…I say “stage”, but it’s really nothing more than a drum riser built into one corner of the place. Said door is literally right next to the “stage” and we were told not to block any of the doors, including the most important one just to the left of the back door which is the beer storage room. This made setup a bit trickier than normal, but, being the experienced professionals that we are, we made it work. Rob and Carlos arrived a bit later, as they got caught in accident traffic on I-70. Rob’s system was quite compact (not unlike mine), but also quite powerful (completely unlike mine). Most of it fit in his Jeep Cherokee, the rest stowed in Carlos’ minivan. Setup went very quickly and we were done with about ½ hour to spare.

We jumped into the sets with reckless abandon. Well, actually, it was really nothing out of the ordinary. I just wanted to say that. There’s very little about BWB that qualifies as reckless, unless you consider the second set from this night. For some unknown reason, we seem to have lost complete control over the beginning of that infernal Georgia Satellites song Keep Your Hands To Yourself. It found its way to the top of the second set, where we commenced to butcher it with reckless abandon (or, as Mike Stevenson would say, “You sliced that one deli-thin.”) I don’t know what went wrong, but in the last six months we have lost the ability to hold that one together. I made a mental note to myself to remember to send out an urgent email requesting that we drop this song from the repertoire and erase any record of its ever having existed in the setlist. I never really liked that song anyway, even when I was playing it back in the 80’s with Deron Boyd singing it. He did a fine job – especially the Sam Kinison break-down – I just never cared for it. Unfortunately, everyone seems to like it well enough to always pack the dance floor and sing along. There’s no accounting for taste.

The end of this set was a complete and utter disaster as well. Possum Kingdom is not a song that we have really had any trouble with in the past. Of all the songs we play, this seems like it would be the most likely candidate, as it is replete with odd time signature changes. We’ve never really had any issues with this until this night. Dale seemed to loose it around the beginning of the second verse, and everything went south from there. He simply forgot the words. No problem, right? We’re professionals. We can deal with this. Instead we just idled in the groove, waiting for Dale to find himself – which he never did. Through shear frustration, we lost the groove and the song became a giant fustercluck. This went on for what seemed like an eternity. I finally walked up to my mic and started the second verse myself. This seemed to prompt Dale out of his malaise, and he picked up midway through the verse. When we finally ended that abortion, we thanked the crowd for suffering through that and took a break. I grabbed the setlist and made a B-line to Carlos to express my wish to never ever play that Georgia Satellites song again. He agreed that we should definitely replace it with something that we can still play, and was as perplexed as me about where it all went so wrong…and why. We all have theories, but…

The rest of the night went off pretty much without any more catastrophes. We ran a bit long at the end of the night due to the door prize drawings in between sets, but still managed to squeeze in War Pigs. Carlos didn’t go hog-wild with the solos, and seemed a bit agitated and ready to get out of there. We had a pretty decent crowd most of the night (in fact, the place was packed when we started), but they began filtering out by the middle of the last set…that whole Friday night thing, I guess. It wasn’t the most beautiful crowd I’ve ever seen, but it was much better than I had expected considering the circumstances. Most of the BenWahBabes were there – Carlos’ lovely wife Dawn, Bobby’s lovely wife Roberta, and Dale’s lovely wife Chris. My lovely practically-wife/girlfriend Dawna didn’t make it this time. It’s a long drive, and she had to work Saturday morning. So, she just went to my house after work and was waiting for me there when I got home. Sweet! No diversions to Baltimore this time. My long drive home was accompanied by the debut album from the Utah-based prog band Hourglass. It didn’t last the whole way, so I popped in that Circus Maximus CD to finish the journey.

Baltimore Revisited

2006-04-20T22:40:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 15 April 2006
Tax Day. Enough said about that.

BenWahBob had another one of our seemingly increasing number of gigs at Rusty’s in Edwardsville IL. When we first started playing there, it was dead. We couldn’t buy a crowd. We had pretty much given up on the place and decided not to book any more gigs there…at least, not on purpose. Then, all of a sudden, we had a night with a tremendous crowd. Ever since then, we have had pretty decent attendance every time. It went from “paid practice” to a real gig. No complaints from me, as it’s one of the closest gigs to home for me.

Unfortunately, though, this has turned into a PA gig as well…which means it’s actually work now. Since my system is small and the load-in is easy, though, it’s not too bad. It’s also not too good coming off a week with the last two days spent in Baltimore MD…again. The church seemed to find a way to run 220VAC into their organ relay where it was looking for 14VDC. Not good. They fried just about every electronic board in the thing. Mark Wick called me Thursday morning and told me to run home and grab a change of clothes and whatever tools I would need…we were flying to Baltimore to rebuild their organ on-site. Great. I knew my boss Eric was going, but found out this week that he was the one who recommended that I go, too. Thanks, Eric. I owe you one, buddy.

It wasn’t really a bad trip, all in all. Wick’s owns a small Beechcraft Bonanza airplane, which seats four with a small luggage compartment. Mark flies quite a bit for business, so this was really just another trip for him. I, however, had never been in anything smaller than a Boeing 737. This was quite a pleasant experience for me. I have long harbored the thought of getting a pilot’s license, specifically to fly small planes like this. Of course, that whole musicians-don’t-belong-in-planes thing always stayed any action in that direction (see Randy Rhoads, Stevie Ray Vaughn, etc.). The flight out got a little bumpy when we were going over the mountains, but other than that it was pretty uneventful. Mark laughed and joked with us the whole way, until we got close to Washington DC airspace. Then, all kidding around came to a complete halt. As Mark put it, “You don’t screw around here, and you keep talking to them.” Sounded like good advice to me. I had no desire to see an F-15 from my window. Air traffic control chatter is nonstop there. Eric and I just shut up and listened.

We arrived at the church late in the afternoon on Thursday and worked until almost 23:00, when we gave up for the night and retired to the hotel. We started early the next morning and finished around 15:00. We got a huge amount of work done in the relatively short time that we were there. We drove back to the airport, dropped off the rental car, and climbed back into the plane to head home. The weather was against us, though. A giant, vicious storm was moving toward us through Indiana and Ohio. Mark plotted a course that would take us around it, but we would have to go south through Virginia, across Kentucky and up through southern Indiana into Illinois.

Great.

While I had no desire to fly anywhere near this storm, which apparently contained a few tornados, I also had a great desire to get home as soon as possible. Dawna and I were supposed to have one of our unfortunately few dates Friday night. When I called her from the church to tell her that I would probably not be home before 20:00, she said she would just go to my house and wait for me there. What a sport. She did her best to hide her disappointment, but it was obvious to me. We stopped in Roanoke VA to refuel and I called her again to inform her of what we were doing and where we were, and told her that I would probably not be home until after 22:00. She was driving past St. Jacob as we were speaking…on her way home.

Swell.

We landed at Greenville Airport around 23:00, and I drove home to an empty house.

Solo.

The only real bright spot in all of this, besides the quickness with which we rebuilt an organ, was that I learned how to navigate a flight. I sat up front there and back again. Because Eric was the smallest, he had to sit in the back for proper weight distribution. This put me in the co-pilot seat, giving Mark the opportunity to teach me in-flight. So, that was pretty cool.

Uhhh…what does all of this have to do with BWB playing at Rusty’s Saturday night? Nothing, really…other than that whole thing about setting up and running a PA from the stage after a hard week. (I know…Waaaa!) Most of the rest of the night at Rusty’s was pretty uneventful, though, compared to the two days previous. The crowd filtered out early, leaving us with about five people for the last half of the last set. We jumped over a couple of benign tunes in the middle of the set and opted for Sabbath’s Faeries Wear Boots and Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song to close out the night. We didn’t even bother with War Pigs. We just shut down a few minutes early and went home. I listened to a new CD I had just gotten from LaserCD.com from a Norwegian progmetal band called Circus Maximus. It is their first album titled The 1st Chapter, and is very Dream Theater-ish. It’s definitely worth a listen, if you like that sort if thing.

BTW…inside joke…for those of you who don’t know – and why would you – Great, Swell, and Solo are the names given to some of the manual divisions of an organ (that’s the keyboards, for those of you in Rio Linda). Probably not funny to you, but I had fun writing it…especially the double entendre of the last one. My sick humor. Don’t mind me.

Tornadoes and Old Churches

2006-04-09T16:49:00.000-05:00

It’s not all music-related, but the events of the last week have been significant (to me) and bear transcribing.

Sunday, 02 April 2006
Sunday seemed a fairly normal day. I slept in after the late night of playing followed by a long drive home. I played my cello a bit and did some laundry before heading over to Dawna’s to fix a flat tire on her truck. As I got there, the weather seemed to be getting a bit dicey. There had been predictions of potentially severe storms, but that is par for the course this time of year in the Midwest. After some quick attempts at loosening the Arnold Schwarzenegger-tightened lug nuts on her Kia Sorento, we gave up in favor of running into Highland in my van to pick up some things at the store and grab some carry-out from Farmers (owned by the same people who own Ravanelli’s in Granite City), the local eatery with great pasta dishes. She was skeptical about going out, as we had been hearing reports from Fairview Heights of a fair amount of storm damage. I assured her that we would be fine. (Remember this point…because she does.)

As we left her driveway, I looked at the fast-moving clouds and mumbled something about us getting caught in the rain. We drove north toward Highland along the back roads, remarking about how it looked like Collinsville and Glen Carbon were probably getting hammered. Along the way, we saw a young boy flying a kite in a field about 150 yards from a farm house. I joked about him not learning anything from Benjamin Franklin, and Dawna wondered why his parents would let him remain out there. As we made a turn west to zigzag into town, I noticed that the storm seemed to be following us from behind, as well as along the side of us, and remarked about it.

We turned north again and proceeded into town on Poplar Street. This was a near-fatal decision. It began to rain instantaneously. Hard. Followed quickly with small hail. Then, the wind shifted sideways and the trees and power lines were straining and flapping like I have never seen. This should have been enough to warn us off. But, no…we continued onward. She expressed her doubts about our trek, but I assured her again that we would be fine. It was just a storm, right? About two blocks later, I started to have my own doubts as I couldn’t see well and began worrying about trees and power lines falling on us.

It was just about then that things started to fly past us…by “things” I mean parts of buildings, tree limbs, and who knows what else. We saw no cows, though. Like an idiot I drove onward, weaving around large chunks of insulation, wallboard, and siding…and in some cases driving right over them. About another half of a block later, we stopped in front of a downed power line stretched across the street. End of the road. Dawna, who had been simply sitting there with her hands around her face, finally said, “I want to go home.” That was good enough for me. As we started to turn around, a minivan that had stopped on the other side of the power line pulled out and went around the car in front of it, driving right over the top of the line. He had apparently decided that he was getting out of there at any cost. He made it over OK, and zoomed around us like we weren’t even there.

I didn’t really think about it then, as I was concentrating too much on driving, but the overall cacophony was almost deafening. The wind was whipping the rain against the windows from seemingly every direction, the windshield wipers were screeching and thumping at high speed, and there was hail. All the classic signs were there, but I completely ignored them. When we turned around to head back to her farm and saw some of the devastation, it finally occurred to me that we had just driven into a tornado. We had to drive through a farmer’s circle drive to get around one of his trees that had fallen across the road, and dodge a considerable amount of other debris before we returned to her home. Once there, we started getting regular reports from her grandmother about the damage they had received while we were away. We also started hearing details of the damage in Fairview Heights. We looked at each other and shook our heads in amazement.

There was considerable damage on her property as well. One barn had damage to part of the roof, as did one shed. An old travel trailer that had been sitting on a hill next to the lake was now little more than a scrap pile. She had one of those portable garages for her convertible that had simply disappeared. We found it later in the lake. (Fortunately, the car was in the driveway and not parked inside.) On its way over there, it had apparently taken out the power line to the barn, as we found this lying across the ground and strung up into the orchard trees. It had been ripped right out of the well pump house; the wires there still dangling off the side and the electrical box inside ripped off the wall and hanging by wires.

We all stood around outside after the weather had started to clear marveling at what we had just experienced. Growing up in Granite City I had seen a few tornadoes come through town and wreak their havoc, but I was never closer than several blocks away. My mother had always told us stories about the tornadoes she had experienced as a child growing up on a farm just to the north of Highland. One had even taken the roof off of their barn, which was found in a field several miles away. She told of the tell-tale “freight train” sound associated with the intense wind and vacuum of a tornado. While I don’t really remember that specific sound, it was loud overall, as I mentioned before. Oddly, though, the van was remarkably still during the whole ordeal. Other than having things bouncing off of it…like rain, and hail, and buildings…it never really seemed to be considerably shaken by the wind.

I teased Dawna quite a bit afterwards about being the first to drive her into a tornado. No one can ever say that I don’t know how to show a lady a good time.

Tuesday, 04 April 2006
Since starting at my new job, my boss has occasionally asked me how I feel about traveling. My answer has always been the same; I don’t mind, but I’d rather not. Well, they finally got me off the ground this week.

The very first digital organ shipped after I started went to St. James Evangelical Lutheran Church in Baltimore MD. We didn’t yet have the pipes finished, but they wanted to have an organ by Christmas. So, we sent them the digital part and shipped the pipe work when it was done. Since we didn’t troubleshoot the complete organ before it left the shop, this was done in the church by the installation crew…a couple of women from the Virginia area. They called and told us they were having some trouble getting the pipes to play. When they told us of the “modifications” they had made to the digital serial data lines, it became readily apparent that someone would have to go there to fix it. Everyone immediate looked at me. My turn, I guess.

I hopped on a Southwest flight at 06:25 Tuesday morning and arrived at Baltimore-Washington International right on schedule. One of the ladies from KMK Services met me as I walked off the plane, and after retrieving my luggage (tool bag, laptop, etc.) we drove straight to the church. I was glad they agreed to meet me there, because I didn’t particularly relish the thought of driving a rental car in that area. When we got to the church, we went immediately to work.

This church is about 100 years old, and, accordingly, has that majestic landmark look to it. It is constructed of stone and mortar on the outside, but fairly modern materials on the inside. In a matter of about ½ an hour, I had the pipes playing by replacing a MIDI conversion pc board. My attention then turned to the serial data line that ran from the back of the church through the ceiling to the front organ chambers. Once I climbed into the ceiling area above the altar, I immediately wished that I had brought my camera with me. It wasn’t a pleasant situation in which to work, but the view was priceless. I had my camera in my bag to take pictures of the installation anyway, so I would have to remember to climb back up there later to get some “behind-the-scenes” shots.

After a few non-productive attempts at cutting and re-soldering the data cable, I gave up and just decided to run a new one that I had brought with me. This was when it got interesting. Along the apex of the ceiling was a catwalk running the length of the building. The ceiling itself was some kind of old masonite-type material. Every so often, there were holes in the ceiling that appeared to be about the size of a foot. As the floor of the chapel was some 40 feet below me, I had no intention of being the first to put a body-size hole in it. I dragged the new cable along with me as I traversed the catwalk, which wasn’t as simple as it sounds. The catwalk was really just a 1x8 board mounted on the top of the ceiling, with ropes strung along the sides – unevenly, I might add – for handrails. It is never too difficult to walk in a straight line unless you start thinking about busting through a ceiling and falling 40 feet onto a bunch of church pews. Add a 180-foot cable in one hand, and the rearward tension it is exerting as it is being dragged, and balance is suddenly a precarious thing. After ninja-walking across this thing, ducking under several waist-high cross-beams, I arrived at the other end. The hole in the wall leading into the rear organ chamber was about ¾ of the way down the side from the middle point. When I asked Mary-William how they got down there the first time, she yelled back up to me that Kathy had done this, not her. The best she knew was that she had slid down the ceiling to the wall and caught onto an I-beam to stop herself.

Huh?

Now…besides being a very old building made with materials of questionable rigidity, it is in an old industrial town, which means it is very dirty up there. As there was no way to walk down the edge of the wall against the front of the building, it seemed that this was the only way. So, I placed my left foot as close to the wall as possible, guessed about where the second ceiling support would be (about every two feet, I was thinking) and placed my right foot there. I then let go of the catwalk and promptly slid down the ceiling at about a 45 degree angle. I caught hold of a vertical I-beam and stopped myself about where I needed to be. Success!

Now all I had to do was figure out how to get to the hole with the cables running through them. It was located a couple of feet under a stone wall outcropping. I had just enough room to kneel on a metal I-beam and, crouching down, almost reach the hole. MW had climbed up a ladder in the chamber and could just barely get her fingers into the cable hole. We flipped the cable back and forth for awhile before she finally got a good grip on it and pulled it through. What a nightmare. Surprisingly, I was able to walk back up the ceiling with little trouble. As fun as this was, it was time for me to get down on solid ground for awhile.

We worked together on some other issues with the pipe chest wiring, and before I knew it, it was time for me to head back to the airport. The minister came in and remarked about the time. It was then that I realized that we had worked the whole day through, not even stopping for lunch. I had eaten a granola bar on the plane, but nothing else all day. I wasn’t even hungry until I started thinking about it. As the minister looked me up and down and grinned, I realized that wearing a white shirt had probably been a mistake. I was filthy, to say the least.

I cleaned up a bit, and the minister agreed to drive me back to BWI, as Mary-William had a few more things she wanted to fix before leaving the church. We had a nice conversation about the merits of the Baltimore area, music preferences, their new organ, sports, his connections to St. Louis via the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, and summer festivals. We successfully avoided altogether any discussion of religion.

He got me to the airport with plenty of time to spare. This was a good thing, as I now had a one-track mind steering me towards food. As I walked the concourse browsing the restaurant choices, I opted for the easy way out. McDonald’s. Or, in this case, McMolasses. I have never seen a more poorly run place in my life. After about 10-15 minutes of watching other people come and go with their food, I finally asked the girl at the counter if she had forgotten me. She looked at me, then turned and walked away. A couple of minutes later, I walked over to the manager and thundered in my most type-A mean-man voice about how I didn’t care for being soundly ignored and wanting my damned food. Amazingly, I had it in my hand just mere moments later. Everyone around seemed to get a good chuckle out of this display…well, everyone but me. I was just hungry.

After enjoying my burger on a stale bun, and watered-down Dr. Pepper, I boarded the plane and headed back to St. Louis. About half way home, I realized that I had seen both sunrise and sunset from a plane window. I wasn’t too thrilled about the thought that this might become a common occurrence for me. It was a long day, and I was fighting the urge to sleep during the flight, as I still had a fair drive home from the airport.

I never did get those pictures of the church, though. When I pulled out my camera, just before I left, the batteries went dead almost immediately. Bummer. Oh, well…I’m sure there’ll be a next time. On the bright side, though, I did get to play a Wick’s Royal Classic organ in an old church…and no, I didn’t play Mr. Crowley this time.

Horses and Hotties

2006-04-06T22:28:00.000-05:00

Friday, 31 March 2006
One of the true joys of playing with BenWahBob is the summertime gigs at Fairmount Park. These are sponsored again this year by Anheuser-Busch, who provides the funding, food, and $1 bottles of their adult beverage products. I must admit, the scenery there isn’t too bad either. I arrived there Friday evening for our first one of the year, loaded in the small rig, and sat down with the rest of the band to a nice meal of hot wings and fish nuggets. Yummy.

The place filled up rather quickly. Greg, the guy who runs these events and – more importantly – pays us at the end of the night, was quite agitated by this. The facility officials had apparently decided to not open one of the lower level areas that often catches the overflow crowd. Their reasoning was that it was too early in the season for there to be a big enough crowd to necessitate the availability of that area. Oops. There was already over 1000 people there by 19:30. Add to that the fact that they only had two bartenders who also appeared to be responsible for keeping the bar stocked, and the lines were just plain stagnant.

We kicked into gear around 18:30, played for the first hour, and then stopped for the first race. After that, it was the standard operation of playing between the races (“Every 19 minutes, the band stops playing!”). It is sometimes difficult to find a groove like that, but we’re not really there for that anyway. We are the secondary entertainment in-between the primary entertainment of horse races. It’s a tough job, but…

We put the sets through the usual paces, with no real unusual occurrences of note. Well…except for the healthy-chested young lady who lost her battle with containment while jumping up and down on the dance floor. That must be the first time we’ve ever been flashed (albeit inadvertently) at one of these gigs. Then there was the Georgia Satellites tune on which Dale took off into his own tempo. This has on past occasions been a clusterf**k. This time, rather than try to get back together with him, we all just let him go and continued in our tempo. It was awful. From that point forward, it became Keep Your Timing to Yourself. We had fun with the rest of the song; inserting odd little ditties, playing out-of-key phrases, and breaking down into a drums-and-bass-funk-thing during the last verse. Dale just kept looking at us sideways, as if to say, “What are you guys doing?” I even drank a beer – well, part of a beer – between one of the sets, rather than waiting through the ridiculous lines at the front bar. Just when you think you know what to expect…

As the races seemed to go pretty quickly, with only one photo finish, we finished a little early. I didn’t mind this in the least bit. Dawna had planned on coming out after she got off work, but called to tell me that she had a headache and was instead going straight to my house and to bed. (The jokes about it being from her job were profuse.) Needless to say, I didn’t waste any time hanging around when we were done. I packed my gear and headed for the door.

Another nice bonus of these gigs is that they are close to home for me. Of course this also meant that I didn’t get to listen to too much of the fifth Spock’s Beard CD during the short drive home. Oh, well…a trade-off I am willing to make.

Saturday, 01 April 2006
Baha Rock Club in St. Charles MO was on the docket for this night…about once every six weeks…like clockwork. The weather had been pretty nice over the weekend and we were anticipating a decent turnout. We were not disappointed. The Club had pretty much filled up before we even began at 21:00. We’ve started to institute a revolving set list system to help us keep fresh the songs that sometimes get put on a back burner and forgotten. So, the sets are a bit more interesting now as we pull out stuff we don’t normally play. That Georgia Satellites tune was on there again, but try as we might, we couldn’t purposely throw Dale off tempo. Bobby tossed in some double 16th note kicks, and I stood right next to Dale stomping on the floor in an altogether different tempo and rhythm. No dice. He wasn’t to be shaken on this night. We all had a blast trying, though. Welcome to the world of live music.

I must say that the scenery this night was almost as good as the previous night at Fairmount. One young lady who danced in front of the stage all night had on a white tank top with the saying “F**k Off! I’m with the Band!” She wasn’t, of course, but it’s nice to know that those girls are still out there for the bar stars willing to indulge themselves.

The sets this night were more straight forward. We played from 21:00 to 01:00; four 45-minute sets with 20-minute breaks. As usual, we gave them our standard Baha Rock Club/BenWahBob “Big Rock Ending” at the end of the night. We whipped out Immigrant Song, then What You’re Doing, Paranoid, and War Pigs to close out the evening’s festivities. That was kind of fun.

When I went to the parking garage to retrieve my van, I couldn’t help but notice that the St. Charles Police were in full force on Main Street. They had one guy in a Jeep pulled over at the intersection in front of the bar, and another just a couple of blocks north. By the time I had my gear loaded into the van, the cop cars were gone and the Jeep was up on a tow truck. I didn’t stick around long this night either, as I was tired and just wanted to put behind me the long drive home. As I was sliding in a CD, Dale pulled up and asked if I was listening to Queensryche for the drive home. “Nope…Liquid Tension Experiment tonight,” was my response. Hmmm…I haven’t listened to Queensryche for quite some time. I believe I’m long overdue for a dose of Mindcrime.

Tastes Like Chicken

2006-03-23T04:09:00.000-06:00

Friday, 17 March 2006
One of my co-workers at Wick’s Organ Company is Darin Meskil, guitar player for the Highland IL area band called Double Ds. He has been asking me for some time now to sit in with them for gigs when someone in the band cannot play. All of the dates about which he had previously queried had been already booked as BenWahBob dates, so it hadn’t yet happened. When he told me about a week ago that they needed a bass player for the 17th at Wings To Go in Highland IL, I checked and found that I was not booked that night and would be glad to sit in with them. He and his singer printed out set lists and burned CDs for me, and I was on my way. It is no secret that I have long been not a fan of sitting in with other bands. It is a lot of work to learn a bunch of songs just for one or two nights, and interferes with my grand design to take over the world via progressive rock music. But, what the heck, eh? It might actually be fun.

These guys have a reputation for being a party band, and always garner a large turnout for their gigs. Their set lists are a reflection of that; a nice mix of danceable party tunes ranging from Garth Brooks to Van Halen. One look at the list, though, and I was almost ill. I have always loathed country music – it’s right up there with Rap and Opera – and this list was loaded with it. But, I am a professional, and as such am capable of rising above such pettiness…at least for one night anyway. Besides, this place has some of the best hot wings I’ve ever eaten.

I went home after work, loaded my amp, and dropped it off at the bar about 15:30. They were already there setting up their gear when I arrived. I chatted a bit and left to go run some Friday night errands. Dawna came by after work and we grabbed a couple of cod sammiches from The Dew Drop Inn (no – I’m not kidding) here in St. Jacob. I headed to the gig around 20:30 and she freshened up and met me there later, as she was not planning on staying long. When I got there, the place was already getting crowded. The rest of the band had met at E.L. Flannigan’s for pre-game drinks, and were well on their way for the night.

We coasted into the first set with Take It Easy by the Eagles, and then kicked it up from there. There was definitely a party atmosphere present; we had dancers almost immediately, and they stayed on the dance floor pretty much all night. I have to admit that as much as I hate Country music, it sure does get the tails swaying. It did get a little better from time to time with tunes like SRV’s Tight Rope, Kenny Wayne Shepperd’s Deja Voodoo, the Doobie Brothers’ Long Train, Fleetwood Mac’s Oh, Well (not The Rockets’ version, though), and VH’s Ice Cream Man. I’m not suggesting that everything else was awful. As I said before, I’m just not a fan of this kind of music. That didn’t, however, keep me from having a great time. I finally got to play with Darin, and I finally got to hear his new Mesa Road King guitar amp live. We had gotten together the previous Wednesday for a quick rehearsal, but that really didn’t do it justice. That amp really sings, and he didn’t even push it hard.

We got through the night just fine, with only minor blemishes that most people don’t even notice on some of the songs. Nothing crashed and burned, so that was good. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, as did I. I don’t think I could do that all the time, but it was fun that night. I must here extend my thanks to all the guys in the band for being so kind about my playing. It wasn’t spectacular by any stretch of the imagination, but they made me feel right at home. A special thanks goes to Matt Basler, who decided to take a vacation that weekend, allowing me the opportunity to play (even though he actually showed up that night).

I must also apologize to Jake, who is normally the bass player but decided to play guitar this night instead. I have long thought that Dale, the singer for BenWahBob, would be the first to get smacked upside the head with the giant headstock on my bass. However, Jake beat him to it. As Darin and I were playing rock star with headstocks pointed forward in classic rock star poses, Jake came up on my left to join us. With my hair thrashing around in my face, I didn’t notice him there until I quickly rose up to find the side of his face planted firmly against the back of my headstock. Ouch! That had to hurt. The expression on his face was similar to those still photos of a boxer who has just been punched squarely on the cheek. Sorry, Jake.

Of course, with a name like Double Ds, they are all about the breasts. This night was no exception. Unfortunately, the breasts that were exhibited were, unlike the rest of the night, very forgettable. There were some attractive women present. So why these were the ones offered remains a mystery to me. Oh, well…c’est la vie.

At the end of the night, I tore down my small rig, collected my compensation, thanked the band for the opportunity to play with them, and headed back to my home where Dawna was already sound asleep. I think I was listening to a CD of organ music recorded on a Wick’s instrument for the short drive home, but I cannot be certain at this point.

Saturday, 18 March 2006
This was turning into another one of those really long and busy weekends. Dawna’s youngest son Samuel was having a birthday party at a roller skating rink in Breese IL at 14:00. Since we didn’t even get up until around 10:30 (slackers!), and wanted to get over to Taussig Violin Shop in Chesterfield MO to pick up her newly re-haired violin bow, time was suddenly getting short. We opted to forgo the drive to Missouri in favor of a long late breakfast. It wouldn’t look too good if we were late for her son’s party. So we headed to Denny’s in Collinsville and stuffed ourselves silly.

Rusty’s in Edwardsville IL has become a PA gig for me since the departure Eddie Christ, the latest BWB soundman for smaller gigs like this. So after the skating party, I loaded the van and headed out. I wanted some extra time to change some speaker cable connectors during the set up, so I arrived there around 19:30. Bobby had just finished loading in his drums, and was planning on a meal in the restaurant. I set up most of the PA, with help from Bobby, changed the connectors, and pumped some Spock’s Beard through the system to test it. Surprisingly, everyone seemed to kind of like these guys. They are one of those bands who are legendary in the progressive rock community, but virtually unknown to main stream music fans. That’s too bad – they’re a really great band.

I had also planned on the early to allow myself plenty of time to enjoy some of the bar’s fine offering of chicken strips. So, after I inhaled them (I hadn’t eaten since breakfast), we launched into the standard BenWahBob paid rehearsal. For the first couple of sets, that’s exactly what it was, too. We had a small crowd, but they pretty much stayed back by the bar. After awhile, though, things started to pick up a bit. We had a nice mix of people for the rest of the night, and they seemed to be having fun. There were several groups of younger people who seemed to be “living it up.” One was a table of 20-ish young ladies who seemed to have removed any limitations on how much they would be drinking that night. At one point, they even grabbed an older woman who had been dancing with her husband and gave her the sandwich treatment, much to the enjoyment of a group at another table who were hooting loudly about it. These girls even played like naughty little pretend-lesbians on the dance floor, trying to invoke a response from the band. What they apparently didn’t realize was the fact that we’ve been doing this for a long time, and can tell real from pretend almost instantly. That’s not to say that we didn’t enjoy watching them play around, but I don’t think they got the response they were seeking. We’re hardened professionals, ladies. You’ll have to do better than that.

The night went pretty well, and was over before I knew it. We tore everything down, loaded out to our vehicles, had a productive conversation about direction and new tunes, and then headed to our respective homes. Mine, unfortunately, was empty this night, as Dawna had her eldest son for the weekend. I listened to some Kansas for the drive home, from a double CD of their “greatest hits” that I had been playing between sets, which has some really great stuff on it. After playing songs like Mustang Sally, it was a welcome decompression…kind of a cleansing of the palate.

Toothless Wonders & Paganini

2006-03-06T12:05:00.000-06:00

I’ve been taking a bit of grief lately over my inability to stay current with these blogs. Frankly, I just haven’t had the time. Sometimes, life gets in the way. Of course, the same problem still exists with my home computer modem. That doesn’t help. I think I’ll just replace the whole thing. I need an upgrade anyway. My day job has been monopolizing most of my time in the past few weeks as well. We held a digital organ seminar last week which brought together about 50 sales and service people from across the US, Canada, and even Jamaica. The preparations were grueling and time-consuming, and the seminar itself very often ran late into the evenings, including a concert at St. Paul’s Catholic Church in Highland, IL where we installed one of our Royal Classic III organs to showcase its sound. I usually got home anywhere from 20:30 to 23:00. As I write this on the first Saturday of March, this is the first day off I’ve had in over two weeks. On the bright side, though, the overtime money is probably going to buy me a new computer with which I will be able to get a DSL connection and avoid the recent dial-up issues, which have slowed the process. However, enough of my whining about this.

Saturday, 25 February 2006
BenWahBob had a gig booked at a place in Wentzville, MO called The Painted Pony Saloon (a friend of Dale’s buddy’s friend’s wife’s neighbor’s dog or something - one of those deals). Images of a roadhouse with dirt floors sprang up from my familiar past. As the gig got closer, we were informed that they were in the process of changing their name to The Crazy Horse Saloon. Uhh...yah, that’s a step in the right direction. Our usual soundman Eddie Christ - former frontman for Alibi - suddenly decided that he didn’t want to run sound anymore and sold off all of his equipment. Nice. So in addition to all that was going on at work, I had to cut out early on Saturday to dig my PA out of the shed, make sure everything still worked, load it, leave early enough to set it up and troubleshoot...shades of Knucklehead all over again (at least with them I knew ahead of time and could try to plan accordingly).

I arrived at the newly dubbed Crazy Horse Saloon around 19:30. Just as I was about to begin loading in equipment, my phone rang. It was Bobby wanting to know how in the hell to get there. He had apparently taken the wrong Wentzville exit from I-70, and was somewhere in the middle of town. I tried to talk him through, but didn’t seem to be having much luck. I’m not all that familiar with that area anyway. He eventually made it as I was mostly finished with the load-in. Carlos strolled in shortly thereafter, and Dale did the LSD thing...rolling in just before we started. I had some initial trouble with the system, but nothing that the correct positioning of some mute buttons couldn’t fix. I had only used this system in its new configuration once with Knucklehead before it was shelved (or, shedded, actually), and had never developed any semblance of familiarity with it. Oh, well...live and learn.

The owner advised Dale that we were also supposed to provide music between the sets. Since the only CDs I had in my van were either obscure progressive rock bands or long-dead Baroque and Classical composers, the possibilities seemed somewhat limited. I connected a portable CD player and popped in Enchant Juggling 9 or Dropping 10. No one seemed to really care, as long as there was something playing. This lasted for the time before we started and the first break. Toward the end of the first break, Dale approached me and asked if we had something more mainstream and up-beat. I responded with an offering of either recent Dream Theater or Nicolo Paganini’s 24 Caprices for solo violin (performed by the late Michael Rabin, no less!). Short of that, he would have to find something else himself. Within mere moments, I was handed a large case of CDs that Bobby had retrieved from his truck. After a quick appraisal of the choices - mostly country music - I grudgingly settled on AC/DC (I know, Deron, I don’t want to hear about it), as this seemed the most likely to satisfy this particular crowd and not send me on a three-state killing spree. Again, no one seemed to really notice or even care. We even tried the latest Journey album with the same apathetic results. I could have just stuck with Enchant.

The sets went off without too much in the way of befuddlement. I honestly don’t remember anything really jumping out as completely awful. There were some odd moments with equipment, though. Carlos had trouble with his guitar sound pretty much all night. I think the combination of dirty AC power and unusual room acoustics played havoc with his amp and his ears. He tweaked with it most of the night, but never really found a satisfying tone. During SRV’s Pride & Joy, my bass amp suddenly stopped making any but the faintest of noises. With just a few songs to go in the last set, it had apparently decided it was done for the night. I don’t recall going too crazy with the bass solos in Born to be Wild, so there should have been plenty of notes left in it. I wiggled cables, twisted knobs, turned it off and on a few times, and even kicked it for good measure...no dice. I quickly resorted to plugging my bass directly into a PA channel, goosed a little through the monitors, and made it through the rest of the night. Naturally, at the end of the night when I plugged back into the amp to give it a listen on a quiet stage, it proceeded to work just fine. Go figure. So, I kicked it again.

I would be completely remiss in meeting the entertainment objective of this blog if I didn’t here mention something about the people who were in attendance at the Crazy Horse Saloon on this particular evening. As I was loading in equipment, I was approached by a fairly affable guy who asked what king of music we play. When I described the BWB credo, he asked if we play any country music. As I answered that we indeed would play some country music, I began immediately searching the ceiling and floor for the connection points for the chicken wire that surely must be in some nearby storage room. While everyone did actually seem friendly, there was still that air about that cast us as obviously not from ‘round them there parts. Besides the two minivans driven there by Carlos and myself, every other vehicle in the parking lot was an American made pickup truck...not a BMW or Lexus to be found for miles, I would guess. There were also several of what would have initially passed as attractive young women...initially, I say, until they flashed you a smile. I’m going to go out on a limb here and surmise that they have a bit of a meth problem in that area. You would find healthier teeth in Appalachia or London than at that bar. Some of the male patrons decided to make a play for some of the BenWahBabes, who were having none of that. They disappeared about midway through the festivities. Another really entertaining creature was a young woman who was obviously the local nutbucket, as everyone gave her a pretty wide berth on the dance floor. She must have summoned her inner whirling dervish, and needed as much room as she could get. The near-psycho look on her face when she did look up was painfully familiar to me. I think I dated one of her relatives.

The load out went pretty quickly with the small system. Even Bobby only used a small drum kit, and was out in about 20 minutes. We were paid and on the road by about 02:00. Sweet. Since I had gotten my prog fix earlier in the night, I opted for the aforementioned Paganini CD for the drive home.

An interesting note about this particular recording is the profound influence it has had on me. I stumbled across it in 1986 at the downtown St. Louis Public Library. My then-wife and I lived but two blocks from there and would frequently walk over to peruse their music selections. I found this one buried in a stack of old vinyl on a cart, took it home, and fell immediately in love with the performance. Such a combination of fire and precision in playing I had never heard before. I recorded it onto a cassette tape and returned the album. I subsequently lost the tape over the many years since then, but not before listening to it so many times that it was burned into my very soul. It had been out of print for many years, but was recently re-released on CD. I found it staring up at me out of a bin at Borders Books & Music, and took it home with me again. When I slid it into my CD player, I was immediately reminded of why this was so good. I was also reminded of the reasons for my recent dive into the murky waters of original music. It was while listening to this recording all those years ago that I heard, amidst the flurry of notes that is typical of Paganini’s compositions, the underlying melodies and progressions of these pieces. They struck me as great foundations for rock music, especially in the progressive genre of which I am so fond. So, this is the recording that planted the seeds 20 years ago for what I am doing now. Although I am basing the current project around the music of Antonio Soler, I am not lost on the Paganini influence. In fact, I made some rough multi-track recordings about 10 years ago that were based on the first eight Paganini Caprices. I have not forgotten them, and fully intend to expound upon them in the future.

Submarines and eBay

2006-03-06T12:03:00.000-06:00

Sunday, 12 February 2006
If nothing else, things have been fairly entertaining over the last couple of weeks. Sometimes productive, sometimes frustrating, but always entertaining.

Since moving into this smaller house, I have lost my studio space. It now shares space with my bedroom as it did about 10 years ago. It’s not the best setup, but it works. One of the many things that I no longer have room for is my guitar amp half-stack. As much as I love the sound of that amp, I just simply don’t have the space for it right now. I had been looking for a while on eBay for something smaller, and had pretty much settled on the idea of a small foot pedal preamp. Wanting to stay with a tube sound, I decided on a Digitech RP7. They have some great sounding effects and, most importantly, a 12AX7 preamp vacuum tube. I found several of them over the course of a couple of weeks of looking, but every time I bid on one someone would run the price up beyond what I thought this unit was worth.

I finally got one for $150, which was the maximum I was willing to pay. It came from a place in Syracuse, NY called HugeMikesInc, an online business I assume. Somehow I ended up sending a double payment through PayPal, which they refunded to me almost immediately - like within about 30 minutes. Sweet. I like doing business with honest people, and this was going well. The package arrived about three days later and the unit looked exactly as it did in the auction photos. When I plugged it in later that evening to get a feel for what it could do for me, everything started going south. None of the six foot switches worked. Everything else seemed to work OK, but I couldn’t change channels or effects settings unless I used the small touch switches at the top. This is very difficult to accomplish when you have size 11 feet.

I took it apart a couple of days later and found that the switches were indeed worn out. Having years of experience building and repairing electronics, I knew this would be an easy fix. I went to the Digitech website, found the parts (which were about 34 cents each), and ordered them from LS Electronics in Florissant, MO...along with a new preamp tube for good measure. The next day I sent an email to the seller to let them know what I had found, and that I was not too happy about receiving something that didn’t work as advertised. I never did receive any response from them. After checking their feedback, I found that three other people recently had similar problems with no response from them. Losers. Every eBay experience I’ve had to this point has been positive. I guess it was only a matter of time until I encountered someone like this. They still haven’t left me any feedback for this transaction. Oh, well...enough about them.

On the bright side, I got the unit repaired and it is functioning as it should. I am very happy with the sounds I’m getting out of it and its ease of use. Plus, it only takes up the space of a notebook on the floor next to my recorder and keyboards.

In the midst of the dreariness around the recent death of Dixie Lee Bedoya, mother of BenWahBob guitarist Carlos Bedoya, there was another highly entertaining moment. After the memorial service for her, many people where invited back to the Bedoya home for a party to celebrate her life. They live in a nice suburb in the area of North St. Louis County known as Old Jamestown. As Dawna and I were driving to the house, we were admiring some of the nice homes in the area. One in particular had two massive multi-car garages built just away from the house. In front of one of the garages was parked an old tour bus, which of course elicited some jibes from me...complete with “rock-n-roll” hand gestures. As we passed further along and I got a look at the area between the two garage buildings, I got a glimpse of something that didn’t register in my mind for a couple of seconds. It was a small gray submarine...sitting on a low dry dock...in the yard of an upscale North St. Louis home. I say “small”...but it is actually a little bigger than the bus. I think Dawna didn’t believe me until we saw it again on the way out of the neighborhood. We actually turned around to drive by and look at it again. Amazing what you will see sometimes if you only look.

So now we get to the continuing adventures of BenWahBob. We were scheduled to play Saturday night at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO, and so we did. I arrived around 20:30 already tired. I didn’t get my Saturday afternoon nap because I had spent the day helping Carlos get caught up at LS Electronics. He has a new tech working there now, and the old one left a rather substantial backlog of amps, mixers, and keyboards awaiting repair. So, we were both tired, as he had stayed long after I left and had come to the gig straight from work. Setup and sound check went quickly, and before we knew it we were starting the first set. Within the first couple of songs, we were already taking shots at Dale about his choices for the set list. He took these jests pretty well. Everyone seemed to be in a pretty good mood. We had an exceptionally good crowd for the beginning of the night, and they seemed to like what was pouring out of the PA system. Dale had brought his wireless microphone, for the first time in a long time, and actually went out amongst the natives. The dance floor was packed with attractive ladies most of the night. This is always a good sign.

I wasn’t particularly happy with my overall performance for the evening. It was quite evident that I had not played some of these songs for some time. Judging by the reactions of the other band members, they weren’t having the best night either. I won’t go so far as to say that we were awful - although I think I did use that word when talking with Bobby during teardown - but it definitely wasn’t the best night we’ve ever had. Oh, well...Jim still paid us at the end of the night, so I guess it wasn’t as bad as it seemed to me.

I had a couple of “sightings” at the end of the night as well. One young lady asked me if I played in Knucklehead, and another guy asked me about the future of that band. I wasn’t sure how to answer that one, as I have not talked with them for a while and don’t know where that stands. Another young lady said she knew Rusty Churchman and use to come see Those1Guys when we played at Stevie Ray’s just down the street from Baha. As I was tearing down my equipment, I was approached by a rather attractive young lady who wanted to know if I played in Wyle E. Huh? This is like the guy who years ago said I looked like the bass player for Iron Butterfly. As I started to tell her no, she interrupted by saying that I looked familiar. After I told her that I had been around for a long time, she told me that she was 32 and had been seeing bands in bars for a long time, too. When I remarked that she was probably too young to remember the heydays of Stages and Granny’s Rocker, her face lit up and she started gushing about how much she missed those rock bar days. She then reached over and gave me a big hug and walked away. The guys in the band razzed me a bit about it, but hey - they didn’t get a hug, did they? It’s good to be the king...even if I am getting old.

I loaded my van and headed home. I recently picked up a couple of Enchant CDs from LaserCD.com, and had Tug of War in the CD player. So, that was my soundtrack for the drive home.

Dancing on the Bar

2006-01-24T12:04:00.000-06:00

Friday, 20 January 2006
BenWahBob has been itching for some time now to score some of the premium gigs around town. For whatever reason, we are generally ignored in these circles...despite having been a staple of the St. Louis club scene for over 10 years. It can be frustrating to see some bands who are either no better than, or sometimes not as good as, we are, who are regulars at these high-profile high-paying clubs. This is not a criticism of any other bands who have made it in those doors, it’s just an observation of the way things are. Occasionally, though, we have the opportunity to slip through a crack in the proverbial wall that seems to separate us “rock” bands from the “show” bands. This weekend was one of those occasions. The agency that books some of the BWB gigs slipped us into the Phoenix Super Bar in South St. Louis County. It was a Friday night, but what the heck.

I had to wait for Dawna to get off work at 18:00, come to my house to change, and then head to SoCoMo (that’s “South County, Missouri” - for those of you in Rio Linda). Accordingly, I wasn’t there until about 20:30, and we were scheduled to start at 21:00. Just as we were pulling out of the Arby’s across Lemay Ferry Road from the club, both mine and Dawna’s cell phones began to ring. Carlos and his wife Dawn were trying to call us both to find out where we were. We hurried over to the club - there’s no direct route from across the street thanks to the wonderful infrastructure engineers in this town - and I quickly loaded in my equipment as Dawna sat in the van and ate her sammich (“I got that kinda cash!”). After I went in, the stage door was closed, and she was consequently locked out...in the back parking lot...in the cold rain that had just started. She called Dawn, who went over and let her in. I never did get to eat my sammich. Have I mentioned lately how much I hate Friday night gigs?

We ran through a quick sound check and had a few minutes to spare, then started promptly at 21:00. This was the first time I had been in the place, and I must say it is a pretty nice club. It is a nice layout, it has a nice house system and light show, it’s big, and it’s filled with beautiful people. All of that notwithstanding, I didn’t care much for the stage. There is a wall jutting out from stage right that cuts right into the middle of that side of the stage. Behind it is a nice green room/dressing room area with a door right onto the stage, which is a nice touch. Unfortunately, this didn’t help the sound on the stage. If I stood directly in front of my amp, I could hear it just fine. If I walked a couple of steps in any direction, my sound just evaporated. Carlos apparently had trouble finding a good tone as well. My microphone was a good 12 feet away, which also had me almost completely separated from my amp by the aforementioned wall. The PA mains were flown from the ceiling...right over the front corners of the stage...right were my mic was placed. When standing at the mic, I had about 2-3” clearance from the top of my head to the bottom of the lowest cabinet. Needles to say, I did a rather thorough inspection of the suspension system.

Dale had put together three one-hour sets from what are usually four 45-minute sets. He took out all of the “harder” stuff like Sabbath, Rush, and Zeppelin in an effort to placate the anticipated dance crowd. We did have a fair amount of dancers most of the night, but not what I had come to expect from everything I had heard about this place. I think we may have neglected to take fully into account the cartographical placement of this facility. It is South County, after all. We seemed to get a pretty good response from just about everything we played, though. We got quite a few compliments from the patrons, and the bar staff seemed to really enjoy us. History has shown that this means we will probably never play there again (Helen Fitzgerald’s come quickly to mind).

Another interesting note about the place is the encouragement of dancing on the bar. They apparently set aside times to let daring young women up onto the bar to dance, with the promise of free shots for those who do. I pointed this out to Carlos when we had just finished the first set, and we both agreed that this was not a bad thing. At the end of the second set, I pointed to the bar again to draw Carlos’ attention to the fact that it was now his wife and my girlfriend up there grinding on each other. We agreed again that this still was not a bad thing (yah, I know, I’m a pig, so what). They seemed to attract a rather significant and boisterous crowd. The barmaids must have agreed that this was not a bad thing, too, as Dawn and Dawna were both offered two shots each for their efforts.

So there we were...a couple of long-hairs in a rock band watching our women dancing on a bar in front of an ogling and appreciative crowd, then going home with us to the dismay of others. How decadent is that? “Ahhh, Stimpy, this is the life!” I should be ashamed...
But, I’m not...

We ended the night promptly at 01:00 as requested. The bar doesn’t play around with that pansy asking of people to please leave. When the bar is closed, the people must leave. It is just that simple. The place cleared out rather quickly. Some drunken idiot did apparently succeed in putting his head through someone else’s car window in the parking lot. By the time we had begun moving stuff out the door, the parking lot was swarming with about a dozen police cars, a fire truck (?), and an ambulance. Must have been a slow night in the Lemay area.

On the way home, we had to make a bladder relief stop in Fairview Heights. I think my van doesn’t ride as smooth as it once did. The drive was an unusually quiet one. I normally have some progressive rock CD blaring through my speakers to help keep me awake for the drive. However, since she had to work Saturday, Dawna wanted to sleep during the drive home. I really didn’t mind the quiet either. Plus, I had gotten a pretty good prog fix listening to the second Ice Age CD Liberation on the drive to the club.

Electronic Sweat

2006-01-17T14:33:00.000-06:00

Friday, 13 January 2006
First gig of the year...and it has to fall on Friday the 13th. That figures. As it happens, it had been a pretty uneventful day. Work went along OK, I came home and ate dinner, loaded the equipment, and waited for Dawna. She was supposed to be stopping by after she picked up the kids. She was bringing me an electronic muscle stimulator for Carlos. Apparently, his Friday wasn’t as smooth as mine, and he had a crick in his neck. She didn’t arrive until almost 20:30, so we had little time together. I quickly rode off into the already-set sun.

About halfway there, my phone rang...it was Bobby...his mixer was making some funny popping and crackling noises and he wanted to know if I could bring mine. I explained that by the time I turned around and drove back to St. Jacob, dug it out of the back of my shed where it had gotten buried after I stopped using it with Knucklehead, removed it from the rack and loaded everything else back in the shed, then drove to Rusty’s in Edwardsville, it would probably be 23:00 or later. He said he would make some phone calls to see what else he could track down.

While thinking about this situation, on top of the myriad of other things that are constantly flitting through my head, I missed my exit off of I-270. So, I had to go on to the IL-157 exit and weave my way through the construction mess going through Glen Carbon and into Edwardsville. It was well after 21:00 when I finally arrived at Rusty’s.

While I was loading my stuff into the club, both Bobby and Eddie were explaining to me in more detail what the mixer had been doing. Bobby thought it might be condensation from sitting outside in a garage. After Eddie told me the problem stopped when he turned off the board’s phantom power, I agreed. I figured once the equipment warmed up sufficiently, it would happen no more. I guessed correctly. After I had set up my amp and the lights, I went over and un-muted the troublesome channel, cranked the gain, level, and high EQ, and it was quiet as a mouse. Eddie said he wasn’t going to use the condenser mics for cymbals, so he wouldn’t need the phantom power anyway. He said that the Presonus compressor was acting funny for a while as well, but had unbent itself after it warmed up. Tragedy seemed to have been averted.

We had decided some weeks ago that this Rusty’s gig was to be something of a tune-up for our first time in at the Phoenix Super Club the following week. Since we never have the time to practice any more, this was a good idea. We hadn’t played since before the middle of December, and were a bit rusty (pun intended) in the first set. I can usually brush it off after the first few songs, but I couldn’t seem to find the groove with Bobby at all in that set. I seemed to always be just slightly off in one direction or the other. It wasn’t awful or anything, but it was aggravating me to no end.

The rest of the night seemed to go more smoothly, though. Once we got back into the proverbial swing of things, it was the same BenWahBob from last year. Dale had removed the heavier-hitting stuff from the set list to focus more on the danceable rock stuff we would be playing at Phoenix. That meant no Rush, or Zeppelin, or Sabbath, or Ozzy. Oh...the sacrifices I make sometimes. I guess Deron would refer to this as BenWahWhore – akin to his references to the Knucklehead version known as Knucklewhore – this lightening of the set list to attract dancers, mostly female of course. But then, compared to Knucklehead, the regular BWB set list is relatively light. Different bands with different missions, I guess. We did end up doing Ozzy’s I Don’t Know by request, and later did Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song, too. Hopefully, that was enough of a fix to get me by for a while. We’ll see.

The crowd was nice early in the evening, but thinned quickly as midnight approached. Around 01:00 it seemed to pick up again with a new crowd. They stayed at the back near the bar, though, and never really got into what we were doing – which was fine, because we were suppose to be rehearsing anyway. We ended the night without the usual grandeur of War Pigs, packed up our stuff, and went home. I listened to the Ice Age CD The Great Divide for the drive home, and didn’t miss any of my exits this time.

Hotels and Leather Vests

2005-12-20T12:12:00.000-06:00

Saturday, 10 December 2005
This weekend started with a bit of a fizzle. Dawna and I were supposed to go see her violin teacher in a string concert at SIU Edwardsville. With the weather that had rolled through the area just a few days earlier, and the logistics of her not getting off work until 18:00, there was little chance we would be making that concert. A last minute change of plans for her ex-husband unexpectedly handed over her oldest son for that night as well. We had also planned to go to Eddie’s in Granite City to see Ivory Tiger. Katrina, the wife of their bass player Geo, had apparently planned a little birthday bash for her. So, we were able to drop off Derek at Geo & Katrina’s home while we went to Eddie’s. All of the usual suspects were in attendance, including Deron Boyd and Steve Wenos of Knucklehead infamy. Dawna seemed to have a pretty good time (everyone in the bar sang Happy Birthday to her), and I didn’t at all mind seeing some people I haven’t seen for some time. Towards the end of the evening’s festivities, it became obvious that we would be having a small KH reunion. Since Steve Hall didn’t make it out that night, Wes from Ivory Tiger would be filling the vocal void. We went to the stage and I warbled out Hendrix’s Purple Haze, then Wes joined us for Rush’s Red Barchetta, and Krokus’ Screaming in the Night. Geo even came up and joined in on the Krokus vocals. We left around 01:30, picked up Derek, and headed back to my house.

Dawna had to work Saturday morning, so I was to take Derek home when he awoke. After we had coffee and sent here off on her way, I fired up the computer and began working on a couple of string quartets. I got tired after awhile (my computer locked up and I lost everything I had written over about an hour - doh! - save early, save often) and decided to take a little nap. I didn’t wake up until almost 16:00, and Derek was still asleep. I woke him and told him I needed to take him home before his mom got there. She called while we were sitting at the kitchen table chatting about the layout of the city of Troy, IL (don’t ask), and said she would just stop by and pick him up on her way home. I had mentioned to her that I had to make a call to Idaho earlier this week, but wouldn’t tell her what it was for as it concerned her Christmas present. Consequently, she has been bugging me about it ever since, hoping I will slip and tell her what is in Idaho. I just told her potatoes. (“What’s taters, Precious?” “PO-TA-TOES!”).

After they left, I began getting ready to go play at Jacques’ in the downtown St. Louis Sheraton Hotel. It is across the street from the Savvis Center and the Blues were playing the NY Rangers that night, so we were expecting a better crowd than we had gotten on previous occasions. We were not disappointed. The game ended as we were nearing the end of the first set, and people started filing in at an extremely acceptable rate. It was a good crowd, despite the Blues’ OT loss just moments earlier. There were several couples there who were engaged to be married, and they seemed to be having the best time. One group had driven in from Jefferson City, and another from Kansas City. We felt obliged to play there requests, and they seemed quite grateful.

Dale had removed the heavier stuff from the set list for this gig in order to insert the more danceable stuff. So, there would be no Sabbath, or Rush, or Zeppelin this night. Oh, well - so it goes some nights. We had dancers all night, so I guess it worked. Even when we broke the flow by fumbling around and changing songs in the middle of the sets, the dancers still came right back. Someone actually asked for some Led Zeppelin as we were shutting down for the night. We kind of looked at each other, but decided not to push our luck, as we have been trying to get this as a regular gig. The pay is good, it’s fairly high profile, and the house sound system is very good. The stage has a nice, dead sound, too, which makes for a more enjoyable time for us with little or no feedback and a good stage mix. Both the manager and the soundman told us at the end of the night that they liked us and would be telling the agent to book us some more dates this year. Very cool.

One semi-odd occurrence did take place at the end of the night. I say semi-odd, because at this point in my career nothing really surprises me anymore. We actually had two requests to play at weddings. The first was relatively benign. The couple from Jefferson City came up to the stage to talk and request songs a couple of different times. At the end of the night, the girl came back up by herself and started asking me about how much we charge for weddings. I told her that we will do weddings, but she needed to talk to Carlos for the financial arrangements. She seemed to really like us. The other occurred with me when I went to the bar to take care of the band tab. I was approached by a fairly “normal” looking young lady who asked if we play weddings. When I said yes, she asked if I would mind wearing a leather vest. Huh? She repeated her question. When I asked if there was some sort of reasoning behind this request, she proceeded to explain that she had a certain “idea” about how she thought we should look; Carlos would dress as a hippie, Dale would dress as a geek with a bowtie and pocket protector, Bobby would play without a shirt, and I would dress like a biker with a leather vest. Uhhh...OK. I repeated that we do indeed do weddings, but special requests such as this would probably come at an additional cost. She noted that she had one of our business cards and would be in touch. I can’t wait until Carlos gets that phone call.

Teardown was fairly quick, and we were out the door by 01:45. We found out at the last minute that the club would not validate our parking garage tickets on nights that there is a Savvis event, but this turned out to only be $5. Not too painful at all. I listened to the King’s X CD Dogman during the uneventful drive home. All in all, a pretty good night.

An Apology from Tryptophan Heaven

2005-12-13T12:10:00.000-06:00

A quick foreword/apology - I have been remiss in the timely maintenance of my weblog as of late. Trouble with my modem on my home computer, and limited access time at my new job has slowed the process a bit. Couple that with the temporary financial strains brought on by the inappropriate fiscal policies of my former employer, and I still don’t have it fixed. With any luck, though, I should be able to remedy this situation in the next week or so. I have written blogs for many of the intervening weeks, I just wasn’t able to post them until now. Feel free to go back and read them with the links on the left of this page. For the delays, I apologize.

So, without further ado...

Saturday, 26 November 2005
Thanksgiving weekend is probably my favorite holiday. I love turkey, and could probably eat it every day. In fact, I usually eat either turkey or chicken just about every day for lunch. So, I do eat it almost every day now that I think about it. However, the sliced stuff in plastic packages simply isn’t the same as fresh-off-the-bone fowl. Throw in all of the standard sides, and I’m in tryptophan heaven. I indulged myself with Dawna’s family this year, and the meal was outstanding to say the least. She and I spent the rest of the day putting up plastic barriers around her outside windows to help alleviate the incursion of cold air into her enclosed porch.

Friday was pretty much a music day for me. It started with Dawna asking me to go with her to her piano lesson. Her teacher is a riot. She is someone who obviously enjoys what she is doing. This is really nice to see in a music teacher. After I returned home, I practiced my cello like a good boy, practice my bass in one of those rare moments, and spent the rest of the day working on a couple of original string quartets. I had picked up new notation software by Finale to replace the old Sibelius 2 software I had been using. It was a pirated copy I received from a friend, and was not registered, so the save option was disabled. It has been quite a pain to re-enter everything when I wanted to make changes, and then reprint the new copy. The new software is registered and functioning properly, making the writing process fly right along. The playback sounds are more realistic as well. It doesn’t have as many bells and whistles as Sibelius (which I didn’t really need anyway), but it also didn’t cost $400. Dawna and I had dinner that evening at the Olive Garden and went to see the new Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire movie, then headed home for bed, as she wasn’t feeling too well.

Saturday didn’t see her health improve much. In fact, it had gotten worse as the day wore on. She had planned on accompanying me to Baha Rock Club that night, but decided late in the day that it would be best if she stayed behind. Baha is not known for its efficient ventilation system, and she was sure the incredible amount of smoke would only increase her inability to breathe. She did, however, agree to stay at my house while I was gone. Knowing that she was there didn’t exactly make it easy to concentrate on the task at hand, but I somehow managed.

Once again, BenWahBob put the sets through their usual paces. Dale had inserted several of the new songs into the set list, but this time had interspersed them throughout the sets. The night started off pretty slow. There were very few people there when I arrived, and we all discussed how we thought the Saturday after Thanksgiving would yield a better turnout. Of course, we didn’t have to wait too long for that to happen. By the time we had gotten into the first set, the place was starting to buzz, and very soon was as packed to the rafters as would be expected. Everyone seemed to be having a good time.

Throughout most of the night, we had people coming up to the stage and requesting somewhat odd songs. We always get requests, but these were off the beaten path stuff like Brian Adams, The Cars, Iggy Pop, and some others of whom I had never even heard. We got several requests for some heavier stuff like Ozzy and Sabbath. I am not sure if people really just like that stuff more lately, or if it is starting to become known that we do more of it lately. Whatever the case, we accommodated them in the fourth set. Whatever benign song Dale had put at the top of that set was summarily passed over to get to the meat-and-potatoes of the rock stuff. We launched directly into Bobby singing Love Removal Machine by The Cult, then into me singing Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin and What You’re Doing by Rush. Dale came up to sing Moxy’s Sail On, Sail Away, then retreated again for Carlos to sing Faeries Wear Boots to begin our Sabbath onslaught. We rolled into Paranoid, but suddenly ran out of time. As Jim was at the door tapping his watch, we had time for one more. So, we made as short as possible a version of War Pigs, and shut everything down for the night. As much fun as this was for us to play all of these killer tunes, it apparently did less for those still in attendance. As we wound our way through this great set, more and more people got up to leave. By the time we arrived at the end of the last song, the place was empty but for a few hardcore Sabbath fans. Oh well...at least Jim and his staff didn’t have a bar full of people to throw out at the end of the night.

We packed our stuff, loaded out, received our compensation for services rendered, and I headed for home and my lovely-yet-ill girlfriend. My drive was accompanied by the strains of Exit; Stage Right - The String Quartet Tribute to Rush put out by Vitamin A Records...very cool stuff. I had long thought about doing something like this. I guess I thought about it too long. Now that someone else has done it, I can check it off the list.

Dueling Soundmen & Prototype Amps

2005-12-13T12:08:00.000-06:00

Saturday, 19 November 2005
The last time BenWahBob played at Rusty’s in Edwardsville, IL saw the best crowd since we started playing there. We had come to consider it a “paid practice” because of the consistently low turnout. Our last visit was so well attended that it was actually like a real gig. This time was pretty good as well.

My setup this time was even easier than usual, as I didn’t have to bring a bass amp. Carlos has been working on a new Ampeg B200R combo amp. I had used it at rehearsal the previous week with good results. The sound was pretty good, and it seemed like it would have enough muscle for a small venue like Rusty’s where volume is an issue with the management. Carlos agreed to let me try it there. I brought along the BA500 combo that I usually use just in case there were any issues with this prototype. So, I only had to load in the lights and my bass. Sweet.

As I arrived, I noticed several trucks in the back parking lot with trailers attached. Once inside, I found that we had dueling soundmen. Mike Stevenson had told us he could not work this gig because of a sudden family illness. Carlos had called Bobby and arranged for Eddie Christ to bring out Bobby’s system. In the interim, Mike had called Jeff at J&J Sound to cover it for us. Somehow no one called Jeff back to tell him we already had sound, so he drove to Edwardsville from O’Fallon MO for nothing. We decided to give him gas money for the misunderstanding, and he stuck around for a while to make the trip somewhat worth it. Jeff’s a good guy, and was very understanding about the situation.

Carlos arrived shortly after I finished setting up the lights and rolled in the B200R prototype. I set it up and started playing around with it. It has a nice fat tone for a 200-watt amp, probably due to the 12AU7 vacuum tube in the preamp section. I punched in the three boost buttons for Ultra-low, Ultra-mid, and Ultra-high, and left the four EQ knobs flat. I was pleased with the tone.

As I was standing in front of the stage talking with the guys in the band, someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned to find one of my co-workers from Wick’s, Darin Meskil, standing behind me. Darin is a guitar/bass player for the Double D band, who plays around the Highland/Trenton area. Dawna and I had gone to see them the previous week at a bar in Trenton. They were a fun band - very in-tune with the crowd. When we walked in the door there to some interesting looks, Darin charged over from the stage, handed me a Fender Jazz Bass, grabbed Dawna and headed for the dance floor. They were playing Brown Eyed Girl, which Darin had told me he absolutely hates playing. I remember thinking that I already have a Jazz Bass, and was getting the raw end of that trade. I returned the bass to him after the song and reclaimed my girlfriend. He promised to come see BWB, and appears to be a man of his word. He didn’t stay long, though, as he said he had babysitter issues. I guess I’ll have to return the favor another time.

We actually played a bunch of not-usually-in-the-set-list songs that we had been dusting off in the previous few weeks. Of course, Dale put them all in the first set, about which we teased him endlessly (Gotta hurry up and do them in the first set before we forget them?). Most of them came off pretty well, with the distinct exception of Soul Man, which I flubbed by not remembering that there are three verses before the modulation, not two. Oops. Besides that goof, I also locked myself out of the back door when I went outside on break to call Dawna. Bobby seemed quite amused by this when he looked out the window and saw me standing there with that “please-come-open-the-door-because-it’s-freakin’-cold-out-here” look.

The rest of the night was pretty standard fare. I did notice that as the night wore on, we got louder and louder. This became an issue with the B200R - it just didn’t seem to have the cajones to keep up with a louder stage volume. Carlos mentioned that he was thinking of opening up the limiter a bit to get more out of the power amp section. I agreed that this would be a good idea. Other than that, it seems like it will be a pretty good amp. I’ve always liked the Ampeg Diamond Blue bass amp series. This one should be a nice addition. We tore down, loaded out, and stood in the still very cold parking lot talking for entirely too long before heading for home. I listened to Wounded, an Enchant release from the mid 1990’s, for the drive home.

Greetings from Exile

2005-12-13T12:07:00.000-06:00

07 November 2005
Greetings from exile - self-imposed, of course. I didn’t move out to a small town just to escape the big town life; it has been both relaxing and stimulating. The original projects are coming along nicely in the new relaxed atmosphere.

The progrock stuff has born the brunt of the effort to date. I had formulated some initial ideas several years ago, and actually recorded some of the basic tracks about two years ago. While this has served as a nice foundation on which to build, I have somewhat turned it on its head in the last few weeks...and I like the way it’s now heading. I must now be careful to not get too carried away with the ideas. It has to fit on a single CD...or would it not be too pompous of me to release a double CD...hmmm...things to ponder.

I have also spent a fair amount of time with the synthesizers on the digital ambient stuff. While this may seem to some to be a bit uncharacteristic of me, I’m really having a blast with it. I’ve had several new ideas of late for layering, mostly in the strings area. I’m thinking right now that I might do these with my cello instead of on the synth, to give it more of a human feel. We’ll see.

My new job with Wick’s Pipe Organ Company is rolling along much smoother than I had anticipated. When you get right down to it, electronics is electronics no matter what the application. It is also inspiring me to push forward with the original string music. Being around people all day long who not only know of obscure Baroque-era composers but also are familiar with their works is inspiring as well. Just today I had a really nice chat with Barbara Wick about the music of Antonio Soler and his passion for organ designing. I think I like this job. The opportunity to play pipe organs all day doesn’t suck either.

Sometimes, life is good.

Conquering Frenchtown

2005-12-13T12:04:00.000-06:00

Friday, 14 October 2005
I was under the impression that the gig last month at Club 501 was to be the last for Knucklehead. As it turns out, this was not the case. We had two more unconfirmed dates at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles, MO. This Friday was one of them. I had taken a half-day vacation from my day job, so there would be little rushing around to get there on time (have I mentioned how much I hate Friday gigs?).

The week had been fairly eventful for me leading up to the weekend. I was offered a new job with a company that is about five minutes from my home - as opposed to the hour-long drive I am currently making every day. I had used Deron as one of my personal references, and they called him earlier in the week. He sent me an email to inform me that if I got the job I would owe him a six-pack of Labatt Blue. I responded by telling him if I got the job he would get a case. So, warn your liver, D...the Blue is coming your way. And thanks.

I arrived at the club around 20:00 before anyone else was there, set up my equipment, and was pretty much done when Deron and Steve rolled in around 20:15. We chatted a bit, and I realized that I hadn’t had anything to eat since lunch. As it was now a little past 20:30, and we were to start at 21:00, I knew there was no way to get something across the street at Big A’s and still have time to eat it. I was hosed. It would be a long night.

I had rehearsed some old, rusty tunes with BenWahBob on Tuesday night. Other than that, I hadn’t touched my bass since the last gig with KH at Club 501...over a month ago. The crowd at Baha was a bit thin when we started, and Deron decided to launch straight into Iron Maiden’s Two Minutes to Midnight. Yikes! My hands were starting to cramp halfway through the second verse. Not a good portent for the night, to be sure, but I managed to get through it without too many flubs.

There was a bit of an odd feel on the stage that night...a sense of uneasy direction that would manifest itself later in the night. I couldn’t hear my keyboards in the monitors at all during the first set, which was probably a tragedy during the bridge section of Mr. Crowley. I couldn’t hear, so I have no idea. The keys finally showed up again during the last two sets - when I use them the least. Oh, well...c’est la vie, eh?

During the third set, someone grabbed the talkback microphone at the soundboard and asked for some Skid Row. We rolled successively through every Skid Row song we knew, and even one we didn’t know. Then someone asked for Queensryche, so we did I Don’t Believe in Love followed immediately by Operation: Mindcrime. Very cool stuff, but I think we lost some of the crowd during this self-indulgence.

Not to be outdone in the last set, Deron started off with Seven Seas by TNT. I saw several more people get up and head for the door. It’s hard to fathom, but there are apparently some people in St. Charles who don’t fully appreciate a band that can do stuff like that. If they were looking for Mustang Sally, they came on the wrong night. This last set went by so quickly that we were at the end of the night before we knew it. Things seemed to end without much ado. We tore down the gear, loaded our vehicles, and headed for home.

I listened to the Spiral Architect album A Skeptic’s Universe on the ride home, which seemed to take forever. The insane level of musicianship of that group kept me awake, but just barely. The lack of any food in the previous 15 hours, and the fact that I had been up since 04:30, was taking its toll. If I hadn’t known that Dawna was waiting for me at my house, I would have pulled over and slept awhile before I left Missouri...a flashback of the old days driving the We-Haul truck back from The Speakeasy in Breese, IL. “Plus ce change, plus c’est la meme chose!”

Saturday, 15 October 2005
It’s all Paul J. Smith, all weekend. Baha Rock Club just couldn’t get enough of me this weekend, as Saturday night I was back there again...this time with BenWahBob. I was able to leave the bass amp there after Friday night, so I had absolutely nothing to set up. I just showed up around 20:30, tuned my bass, and hung out until it was time to play. The BenWahBabes all showed up, too, minus Bobby’s wife Roberta.

The crowd was kind of sparse in the early going, which was probably all well and good. Dale had decided to inject all of the odd songs we had rehearsed earlier in the week into the first set, so we were a bit skittish about them. Everything seemed to turn out OK, though. April Wine’s Just Between You and Me actually sounded pretty good to me, as did the others. Most of the night went pretty much that way. We had our share of duffs, I guess, but we made it through the night without any really awful moments. There were three guys running around all night wearing mullet wigs, who seemed to actually enjoy the classic rock stuff we offered. Joe Dirt, eat your heart out.

At the end of the night, after we had disassembled the stage equipment and were awaiting payment for services rendered, I had my second rock star moment of the night. A woman had approached us all earlier in the night and asked for all of our autographs on a couple of our flyers. Now, as I sat at the front edge of the stage carrying on a literary conversation with Dale’s lovely wife Chris (who is a teacher in Troy, MO) about Aldous Huxley, Ayn Rand, George Orwell, and other writers of that ilk, I was approached by a young gentleman with a camera in hand and two attractive young ladies in tow. He asked if I would mind having my picture taken with the two ladies. Huh? What a silly question, Dude. They sandwiched in on either side of me like I was somebody, and we waited for the guy to figure out how to use a camera. The flash finally blinded us, and they giggled off toward the door. These things still amuse me to no end, even after all these years.

I listened to the Gordian Knot CD on the drive home this time. There’s something about music with Chapman Stick and Warr Guitar that is both inspiring and relaxing at the same time. Call me silly, but I like it.

A New (old) Direction

2005-12-13T12:01:00.000-06:00

Sunday, 25 September 2005
Where to start...

There have been many rumors over the course of the last couple of years regarding my status with Knucklehead, the hard-rocking cover band based on the East side of the St. Louis area with whom I play bass and keyboards. Up until recently, they have all been off the mark. They seem to have been based on the scheduling conflicts created by my playing in two bands. So, let me first address how that came to be.

I have been a part of many St. Louis area cover bands over the last 23-or-so years. Most of them have also included Deron Boyd on guitar (and sometimes keys). This will come as no surprise to anyone who knows us. Deron has long been not only my best friend, but also the guy who convinced me to trade my unused cornet for a bass guitar so we could start a band in high school. The rest, as they say...

Around 2000 or 2001, after an extended period of not playing live, I started to get the itch to play out again. I had mentioned this to a few select people in the hopes of soliciting enough interest to make it a reality. Unfortunately, no one else seemed interested at the time. There were many reasons for this, the hassles of bar-band life being chief among them. At a Zebra concert, I ran into guitarist Rusty Churchman, with whom I had played briefly in an ‘80s hair-band tribute. He called me shortly after that and asked me to come and jam with him and a studio drummer he knew (Brian Bayley). With some trepidation, I was convinced to give it a try. That band became Those1Guys, which, in its short lifespan, became wildly popular. During that time, there was some interest expressed by Deron and Steve Hall about putting something together. As I was already in a band, I dismissed the idea outright.

After T1G split up during the Labor Day 2002 weekend, I began to again put out the feelers for another band. After the success of T1G, I was bent on continuing in the trio format. I had always wanted to do this, but was always shot down by those who believed that a trio sound would be too sparse. Even T1G ran into this attitude on several occasions, until we proved that it could indeed be done effectively. However, once again I had trouble finding anyone sufficiently interested in my ideas.

With my day-job at the time being at St. Louis Music, I was always surrounded by musicians. One of them happened to be a new design engineer named Carlos Bedoya. Someone in the R&D department alerted me to the fact that his band BenWahBob was looking for a bass player. We traded emails, hooked up for an audition, and I got the job.

Once again, shortly after I began playing with BWB, Deron and Steve started prodding me about playing with them. This time they held up as bait Steve Wenos on drums. This would make it a reunion of the original Knucklehead from 1994, a band that, as Deron often and accurately stated, “could turn goat-piss into gasoline”...and very often did. While that was a period of personal lows in my life, I had to entertain the idea of reviving a musical high point. After some conversations about it concerning the potential for scheduling conflicts, we worked out a deal that would do its best to avoid that. Of course, it didn’t work out that way. It never does. The conflicts became many and often, frustrating both bands as they competed for scheduling slots. Knucklehead was trying to re-establish a name and a following, and BenWahBob was trying to establish a presence at new venues to replace the ones that were no longer viable. It was bordering on a nightmare.

After a few years of this scheduling madness and trying to find replacement players on both sides, it just became too much. I had been rekindling my desire to pursue some original ideas that had been simmering on the back burner for some time, but couldn’t seem to find the time to adequately develop them as I was seemingly playing all the time. I had known for some time that I would eventually be bowing out of the cover band scene in order to properly pursue the originals, as it just wouldn’t be fair to the others to frequently drop out of cover gigs for my own pursuits. The inability to find any time for development simply accelerated this. I had to make a decision. I was not getting any younger, and I didn’t want this to become one of those things that later in life I would wish I had followed through to completion...or at least tried. As it was Knucklehead that was scheduling what seemed like every available gig - even some that where not available - it seemed like the obvious choice to cut there first. As I have mentioned elsewhere, this was not an easy decision. These guys, besides being outstanding and well-respected musicians, are long-time friends. My departure would affect them, too. I know what a hassle it is to replace someone. I’ve been on both sides of that task. I am also aware of the change in the band’s chemistry when there is a personnel change. I’ve been through that on many occasions as well. I had confidence, though, that they would be inundated with bass players willing to fill the spot. If they wanted to continue, I was certain they would have many opportunities to do so. With that, I informed them that I needed to be replaced at the nearest possible convenience. Of course, they were not happy about this, but I think they were also not surprised by it.

I am still playing with BenWahBob. This, too, has been a source of some contention - perhaps even resentment. One reason is that BWB generally only plays about twice a month. It is a part-time band, and everyone seems to want to keep it that way. In fact, the recent venture into multiple monthly dates has created a bit of stress in the band. Carlos has expressed his desire to get back to the twice-a-month schedule, as he doesn’t have the time or desire to play all the time either. As it happens, we will only be playing about once a month through the rest of this year. Another reason is that I only play bass with BWB, as opposed to also playing keyboards and supplying PA and lights for many of the KH gigs. Much of the writing and developing of the originals is being done in the sequencer of my Roland XP-80 keyboard/workstation. Having it always set up and available makes it much easier to facilitate the writing process. It is similar to the idea of having your instrument sitting out on a stand to make it easier to pick it up and practice, as opposed to having to get it out of a case and set everything up every time. So, for now, I will continue to play with BWB.

I recently played what seemed at the time to be the last gig with Knucklehead (this turned out not to be the case). We played a weekend at Club 501 in Wood River, IL. It was billed as the annual birthday bash of DJs Tommy and T-Bone, who put together a band to play on Saturday night. This is all accounted in the last blog, but I wanted to again address the reception I received from everyone who came out that weekend. I honestly expected to get some ribbing about quitting (and did later in the night). I was therefore somewhat surprised to receive so many well-wishes from so many people. Many of the areas more respected musicians (yes - bass players are musicians, too) made appearances and offered me their support, as did many of the people who became Knucklehead regulars. I cannot begin to tell you how heart-warming that was for me. So, without getting too sappy over it, I will just say, “Thank you” to everyone kind enough to offer support for my venture. I hope you are not disappointed with the fruits it will bear.

I would also like to ask everyone interested to check frequently at the MetalSmith website for updates on the progress of the various projects. I will try to keep this weblog updated as well. You can also send me an email from the website link, and I will gladly include you in any email updates, especially when the projects are finished. Hopefully, that will be very soon.

As to the nature of those projects, I can only really give the general concepts at this time, as they are still in development. The primary focus is on a progressive rock/metal project based around themes from the 120 keyboard sonatas of Padre Antonio Soler, a Spanish monk and composer of the Baroque era. Due to the massive volume of these works, this is something that could continue for quite a long time...and probably will. Running concurrent with this seems to be the development of some ambient digital music, probably inspired by my affinity for the Echoes syndicated radio program I listen to every weeknight on WSIE 88.7FM. The basics for this seem to be writing themselves as I search through my synthesizer for sounds. Another passion of mine since high school has been baroque string music, so naturally there is some of that on the way, too. I’ve thus far composed the foundations for a string quartet, but haven’t yet ornamented the melodies and counter-melodies. It is coming along nicely, though. There is also a funk thing with which I keep toying every now and again. I haven’t really put too much effort into this for a couple of years now, but the basics are still there and it will eventually be explored, too.

The recent break from the constant gigging has proven very fruitful towards those goals. I also have a bit of time off coming up during the day, as I am rolling into a job change. I will be leaving the old job (auto industry - yuck) several days before I start the new one (developing & building pipe organs - how cool is that!), and plan to use that time to its full potential. Since the new job is close to my home, I will also be losing over two hours of drive time each day, which should provide even more creative time. With any luck, and a bunch of hard work on my part, these projects should finish themselves much quicker than they started. Then we can all hear the cacophony of music that flits around inside my head every day.

Until then...be sure to check out the other STL area rock bands such as Ivory Tiger, Jagertyme, Rock Bottom (featuring Steve Hall on vocals!), The Stand, Just Mr., London Calling, and any of the many others who deserve and appreciate your patronage.

~PJS~

End of an Era...(?)

2005-09-28T06:52:00.000-05:00

Thursday, 08 September 2005
Gigs at Fairmount Park have always been, for me, both a blessing and a curse. They are a blessing because they are fun to play, they feed us well, we finish earlier than other gigs, and the pay is pretty good. They are a curse because they are difficult to get to so quickly after work. Fortunately, I only need to bring my bass and a small combo amp, so the load-in is minimal.

This one was scheduled to be Thursday and Friday. As there was yet another scheduling conflict for me, I was only able to play the Thursday portion. It is here that I will take the time to offer a special thanks to Mike Hirsch, bass player and design engineer at SLM Electronics, for filling in for me on many occasions including this Friday at Fairmount Park and the coming Saturday night at Rusty’s in Edwardsville IL for which there was originally a conflict as well. Thanks, Mike.

I was able to slip out of work a few minutes early on Thursday, which allowed me a bit more time to get home, load my stuff, shower, and drive back to the track with time to load in and indulge in some wonderful hot wings and pizza. It was nice to not be so rushed for a change.

Again, we put the set list through its usual paces, with no real surprises. It was honestly a pretty vanilla show, which is not necessarily a bad thing on a Thursday night. The crowd was pretty sparse this particular evening, and not exceptionally interested in what we were doing. We kind of fell into that “background music” mode right from the very beginning and pretty much stayed there. There were a few people who seemed to be actively enjoying our offerings, though. One group in particular had a woman celebrating her 80th birthday. She seemed thrilled when we dedicated Last Kiss to her. I thought it was kind of odd and a little sick to dedicate a song about dying in a car accident, but this seemed to escape the notice of just about everyone else. To each their own, I guess.

Greg, the guy to whom we answer at these gigs, told us late in the evening to go ahead and take an extra long break. It was a bit warmer than normal due to one of the air conditioning units not working at that end of the building, so we went outside and watched the race from some chairs at the side of the track. When the winning horse made its way to the winner’s circle for photos, we made our way back upstairs to resume our production of background music. Very cool. Greg has always treated us very well, and this was a fine example of that. Another fine example occurred when he told us before the eighth race that we would play one last song after that race, then be on our way home by 10:35. Sweet. We settled on Inside Out, played it, unplugged our equipment and headed for the door.

I actually ended up staying a bit later, though, as the husband-and-wife sound crew we had began asking me about the rumors that I was leaving Knucklehead. We talked a bit about that and my new stated musical direction for awhile as they were tearing down their PA, then I headed for home. I enjoyed an earlier King’s X release (Dogman) during the short trip home, as it was already in my CD player.

Friday, 09 September 2005
Knucklehead at Club 501 in Wood River IL was on the slate for this evening – and the next. It was a PA gig for me, so I had little time to dawdle after work Friday afternoon. As I still had the monster Ampeg SVT-810 Ultra speaker cabinet I had borrowed from SLME for the previous weekend at Lesterville, and the newest prototype of the SVT6PRO bass amp from Carlos, I decided to use them instead of the BA-500 combo. Of course, loading them into my minivan along with the new, larger PA rack was a trick that took some magic. It became immediately obvious that the suspension on these vans was not made for this load level either. It also became abundantly clear that the right rear tire, which I thought might be a little low on air pressure, was indeed very low. After finishing the equipment loading and requisite shower, I limped across the highway to the gas station, corrected the air pressure in all of my tires, pumped in some of that extremely overpriced fuel ($3.19/gallon), and ambled on my way.

I arrived at the club before anyone else. This is a good thing, as there would be no one else to work around as I was setting up the PA. Scrappy’s drums were already there and set up when I walked in, as he had obviously done this in advance. The load-in and set-up went pretty quickly. Deron arrived as I was testing the new mixer’s mic inputs – something I should have done weeks ago when I got it – over the strains of the aforementioned King’s X CD Dogman. He made a comment about my currently being in a King’s X mood, and I thought about the fact that I had been listening to their various CDs for a couple of weeks now. Normally, I would use a Dream Theater CD for the PA check, so I guess I could see his point. It was something of a departure. Since these guys are one of the coolest bands on the planet (if not the coolest), I didn’t mind the departure at all.

Steve showed up a little late, just as we were about to start without him. Bar time, Steve, is 10 to 15 minutes ahead of the rest of the world. For whatever reason, after discussing the option of starting out with Two Minutes to Midnight, Deron launched into Cumbersome instead...the “safe” alternative. Why, I cannot say...but there it was, and we were off. We rolled through various other moderately unobtrusive tunes until Steve announced that we were supposed to play a Skynard song for his boss. “Ill news is an ill guest!” After my dry heaves subsided, we careened into Sweet Home Alabama. I quickly noted that Steve did not have to participate in this wretched sonic soiling, as Deron sang this song. Coward. We did, however, quickly cleanse our collective palates with the aforementioned Iron Maiden tune.

The rest of the night seemed to go off with the usual Knucklehead plan – no plan at all. Oh, sure, there’s a rough outline of something that used to be known as the set list, but that is a loose guide at best. We slalom in and out of it at will throughout the night. This doesn’t make it easy to anticipate the upcoming keyboard songs, which allows me to have the settings ready, but that’s just the way it is...gives it something of an edge, I guess.

At the end of the evening’s follies, I had to tear down my PA system. Saturday night was being billed as the big annual birthday bash for DJs Tommy and T-Bone. They decided that they wanted a big PA and light show, and so hired Derrick from Jagertyme to bring in his system for the party. Normally, Steve Hall would be out of there by the time Dean Martin was finished singing the outro song. Steve Wenos usually sticks around and helps with the PA. This Friday night turned out to be “Freaky Friday” for me. Steve Wenos had school the next morning, and left for home immediately after we finished. As I was starting to tear down, Steve Hall and Deron walked by and Steve commented about how Deron had always told them that I didn’t want anyone’s help with the PA...that they would just be in the way. I replied that these had indeed been my words, more or less. Deron rolled out and Steve decided to stick around and help anyway. After several times reminding him that he didn’t have to do this, he asked me if I didn’t like the way he was wrapping my cables. Rather than saying, “well, no, actually I don’t” (everyone has their own way of wrapping cables), I decided to just let him help. I’ve always appreciated the help given by others, but I don’t expect it from anyone. His help was even more appreciated, considering his past record of bolting immediately. It was kind of odd having him there and Scrappy gone, but also rather amusing to me. He helped me load it out to my van, and even made a bit of small talk afterwards. I won’t question his motivation for doing all of this...I will only say, “Thanks, Steve.”

Saturday, 10 September 2005
This was supposed to be the big birthday bash about which I had been hearing so much lately. Tommy and T-Bone had put together a band to play the first set. I didn’t know until recently that our own Deron and Floyd the Jagertyme Drumminmachine were a part of this ensemble, too, along with the mysterious EvilAngel (more commonly known as Shana Wankel) on keyboards. Shana had asked about using my keyboards, since they were already going to be there. Sitting in on bass was Brian Tinnon, who had filled in for me with Knucklehead a few months ago, and is apparently now playing with Jagertyme. This was the first time we had met. As it turns out, Brian is every bit of the nice guy I had gleaned him to be from the emails we had exchanged in the past...not to mention a solid bass player.

Tommy approached me at the stage around 21:30 and noted that Floyd was not there yet. He asked if we could play the first set, then they would do the second set. I quickly reminded him that Steve Hall was not expecting to play the first set and would possibly not be there until 23:00 or later. When he asked if Steve would really be late like that, I replied, “Nope, he’ll be right on time!” I gathered right away that this was not the answer he was seeking. Floyd did arrive shortly after that, as did Steve. It was about that time that I noticed the lack of any keyboard player...specifically Shana. Tommy told me that she would not be playing with them, as she had some medical issues with which she was dealing. Sorry to hear that, Shana. We missed you.

The band had dubbed themselves “Push Down & Turn.” Tommy and T-Bone took turns at center stage with the various tunes. Floyd even jumped out there to sing a KISS song while Tommy took his turn behind the drums. Brian sang a few tunes as well, and they all seemed to have a good time at it. Brian seemed to dig the Ampeg bass rig, too.

Knucklehead took over for the second and third sets as scheduled. We started off with the standard Rush tune The Spirit of Radio and went from there. We rolled through a Triumph song, after which little Leigh came up to the stage and gave us all a hug...well, all except Scrappy, who complained later about his exclusion. We did a bunch of the cool songs and far too many of the less-than-cool-but-money-nonetheless songs to fill out the evening. We even had more than a few people dancing to Zebra’s Tell Me What You Want...very cool...and many singing along with Kansas’ Carry On Wayward Son...also very cool. It’s nice to see people appreciating the good stuff, too.

The end of the night saw a somewhat awkward moment. Rumors of my departure from Knucklehead had been recently confirmed by Deron on the KH website, as well as through some in-person conversations. (I will address this more fully in an upcoming blog.) As the night came to a close, we started choosing the ending songs. After the standard AC/DC You Shook Me, Deron launched into Poison’s Talk Dirty to Me. My immediate reaction – after the second bout with the dry heaves – was, “No! Not this for a last song!” Apparently Deron couldn’t abide the thought either. He commented to the audience that this would probably be it for Knucklehead, and that he wanted us to go out in style. With that he announced Black Sabbath’s War Pigs as the last song. I realize that I have lambasted this song in many past blogs...well, really the reaction to this song more than the song itself. This was different, though. About 11 years ago, during the first go-around of Knucklehead, Deron was in the middle of the guitar solo when he suddenly realized that the solo for Rush’s Working Man would fit neatly into this song. We did it, came back out into the last verse of War Pigs, then ended with the end of Working Man. It worked out flawlessly. It has been dubbed Working Pigs ever since, and has kind of been a trademark of the Knucklehead mentality (we can turn just about anything into a Rush song...or Yes...or Stanley Clarke...or...well, you get the picture). We all deemed this an acceptable end, as far as ends go anyway.

After tearing down the keyboards and bass rig, I hung around and talked awhile with Deron and Scrappy and Derrick and a few people from the bar. They were all heading over to Floyd’s house for an after-party, and I was heading home (I’m a hermit, remember). I slid into the minivan, popped King’s X into the CD player, and drove off as Deron was pulling out his “when-the-fat-lady-sings” cigar.

I realize that this signals the end of an era. I don’t want to get too sentimental about it. It is what it is. Knucklehead was the original band that, as Deron so succinctly put it all those years ago, “could turn goat-piss into gasoline”...and that was certainly true. However, the end of one thing is always the beginning of something else. What that means for the other three KnuckleDraggers, I cannot say. What that means for me, you can read all about in my next blog. I would like to extend my personal thanks to everyone who took the time to enjoy the Knucklehead experience with us. You all made it worth it to us. I also wish to thank everyone who came out this weekend and approached me with warm regards for the future...Julie, Kelly, Angie, Brad, Scott, Rob, Jeff, Roy & Carol (from the attic) and everyone else. You really are too kind. I hope you are not disappointed with the fruits it will bear.

Thanks.

Moonshine and Kidneys

2005-09-28T06:49:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 03 September 2005
Every year for about the past seven or eight, BenWahBob has played Memorial Day Weekend at Bearcats Getaway on the Black River in Lesterville MO. This year was no exception, and in addition played Labor Day weekend as well. We play on the big stage on Saturday night, camp over night, then float on Sunday. It’s a long drive down there from St. Louis, but is usually worth the trip. The stage is enormous, Mike brings out his big system, and there are always large crowds.

Dawna and I had decided after Memorial Day that we would rent a small trailer the next time, and so we did. We picked up the little 4x8 U-Haul trailer first thing Saturday morning, packed all of the necessary gear (she had to remind me to grab the stage lights...again), and headed out. We all met at the usual spot in South County just off the highway, picked up a few more items at the Schnuck’s Market there, and caravanned down the road. I must say, it was nice for all four of us to all ride in one vehicle this time. With all of the equipment and camping gear in the trailer, we had plenty of room in her truck (oh, wait...sorry...it’s an SUV).

We made the traditional stop in Farmington at the Dairy Queen where we exit MO-67 onto Highway W. The service there has been less than inspiring the last few times, but we eat there anyway as it is pretty much the halfway point. We then continue on to Highway V, cut through Pilot Knob to Highway 21, and take that the rest of the way to Lesterville. We always stop at the same gas station in Pilot Knob, too, for Mike to refill his van. Since he’s hauling a trailer full of PA gear, he uses a stupid amount of gas on this trip. We decided to refill as well while we were there. The rest of the trip is winding roads through the rolling hills that are the beginnings of the Ozark Mountains. I think Dawna really enjoyed this as her first time hauling a trailer. It is a beautiful drive, though.

We arrived at the campgrounds earlier than usual and began to instantly unload and set up the equipment. Bobby was the last to arrive, as he had stopped off at a store along the way. He told us that the people at the front office were upset because none of us had stopped to check in when we arrived. We always do it this way. After eight years, you’d think they’d know us by now. It turned out that they had some new people there who didn’t know us. The women (unofficially dubbed the “BenWahBabes”) usually go to the office to check in and gather the necessary armbands and meal tickets while we finish the set-up. Not this time. They came back and told us that we had to go there in person and have them put on our armbands. There was also some issue about the number and availability of meal tickets for Dawna’s son and nephew, but we worked that out with little effort...and a little money. This was a bit aggravating, but nothing really serious.

The campgrounds were less crowded than we had expected. Apparently they had had quite a few cancellations by people who didn’t want to spend the money for gas to get there. Those who were there were no less rowdy because of it, though. We started playing around 20:00, and the party was already in full swing. Right from the start, though, we had a couple of guys trying to get around the barricade to the back of the stage to try to come up on stage. This resulted in a small disagreement between us, the two drunks, and the camp’s security personnel. An effort to close one of the openings in the fence resulted in Carlos’ wife Dawn acquiring a rather nasty cut on her leg from the edge of the fencing. She lived, though, and eventually got the bleeding to stop with the help of the other BenWahBabes.

We rolled through our sets in the usual way, and everyone seemed to be enjoying the show...in spite of some of the atrocities that we were emitting from our speakers. Carlos had brought along an updated version of the new Ampeg SVT-6PRO for me to try, and I had picked up a monster 8x10 cabinet from SLME Friday. This cabinet alone weighs about 210 pounds, but will handle the 1100 watts from this amp much easier than my 2 4x10 cabinets that we tried to use (and blew up) Memorial Day. The sound was fantastic, and I was loud as..... well, I was loud. It’s too bad this rig weighs so much. I would hate to have to haul something like that around all of the time.

At some point during the last set, some guy came up to the front of the stage – which is about eight feet high – holding a mason jar full of some odd liquid and telling me that I had to try it, all the while pointing at his head. Huh? He repeated himself several times, then chucked the jar up onto the stage right at the foot of my mic stand. It was then that I heard him say “moonshine.” Uhh...yah...right, dude. When I looked down at it a little later, I could have sworn I saw something floating in it. Upon closer examination, there were what appeared to me to be two internal organs of unknown origin (kidneys maybe?) floating in this reddish-brown liquid. Nice. At the end of the night, the guy had disappeared. So, I politely requested over the PA that whomever had tossed their kidneys up on the stage, please come back and retrieve them. I never saw him come back, but somehow the jar disappeared during teardown. I did get a picture of it lying there, though.

We tore down the equipment, moved it all to the sides of the stage, and carried our tents up to camp on the stage again. This seems to be much better than the ground. Dawna had inflated the air mattress when she set up the tent earlier, but it was now a bit flatter. We aired it up again before crashing and hoped for the best. Around 06:30, we awoke lying on the plywood floor. Ouch. We both got up, made the walk to the necessary facilities, then she whipped out her coffee machine and made fresh coffee. Soon the rest of the camp was starting to wake and was buzzing again. Some guy across the road from us was already playing a tambourine when we got up. Apparently, if the band is awake, it’s OK to party again, because the moment they saw us stirring, the loud music came on again.

We loaded the equipment off of the stage, ate breakfast, changed clothes, loaded the coolers onto the bus, and prepared for the bus-ride-from-hell to the drop point on the river. Honestly, it wasn’t that bad this time, as we had a different driver. The engine on this bus runs a bit rich, though, and every time he would let off of the accelerator, it would emit a loud backfire. Several jokes about Baghdad and hillbillies were bandied about. Dale’s lovely wife Chris chimed in with “Hey, I think we just broke the sound barrier!” and we all lost it. I thought we were just kicking up dust from the road, but I guess it was actually a vapor ring.

We arrived at the drop point completely intact this time, and put the canoes into the river. What a beautiful day it turned out to be for a float. I got to pair up with Dawna from the start this time, as the boys took a canoe to themselves. The river was in pretty good shape. Some of the people at the campgrounds had warned us that the river was low, but we really only had a few spots where we had to actually get out and drag it through. Dawna threw a couple of looks back at me each time. Yes, I know I need to loose a few pounds, and this was not the time to be reminding me of that. So that became a running gag. Every time we scraped along a shallow spot, I would apologize, saying, “sorry...that’s me.” It sucks getting fat...especially when your girlfriend is wafer-thin. We didn’t have too much trouble, though. Dawna is an excellent navigator (it’s the Cherokee in her, I’m sure). We all stopped a couple of times along the way, had lunch on a beach around the half-way point, stopped again later and played in the river for awhile, saw some incredibly huge carp in one of the deeper pools, and wound up back at the take-out point around 16:00. Everyone had a great time, and I got sunburned again.

After some parting words back at the camp, we all headed back toward our respective homes. Dawna and I decided to stop again at Dairy Queen in Farmington for dinner. If we thought the service was bad the day before, we were in for a real treat. The girl taking our order simply couldn’t get it right, the manager had to get involved and refund some of our money, the order was still wrong when we finally got it, and I was soundly ignored when I went back to the counter to advise them that the ketchup dispenser was empty. Dawna went off on the manager and got some packets of ketchup right before someone came out and filled the dispenser. None of the employees would even make eye contact with us after that. Perhaps we need to rethink this BWB tradition.

Other than that, though, it was a pretty good weekend overall. We got to play, camp, float, swim, and tease all weekend. By the time we got back to St. Jacob, I was tired and crabby and just wanted to unload the equipment and go to bed. We cleaned out the trailer, dropped it off in Highland, and went home to our real beds. I spent the day Monday back out in the sun helping Dawna mow at her farm. What can I say...I’m a glutton for punishment.

Little Hills and Small Minds

2005-08-22T00:31:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 20 August 2005
As seems to be the trend lately, I had another gig with BenWahBob. This time we were booked at Baha Rock Club in St. Charles MO. It’s kind of a home-away-from-home for this band, which has been playing there for nearly 10 years now – way back to when it was called Key West and under different management. They have always treated us well there. Likewise, we have always had a good response when playing there. This week was right in that vein.

One of the nice things about being a favorite band is getting the premium dates. This weekend was the “Festival of the Little Hills” (Fete de Petite Cotes, for all of you Francophiles), St. Charles’ biggest party weekend. For those who have never been, they shut down Old Town St. Charles and the riverfront, block off the streets, set up vendors in the streets and on the sidewalks and in the Riverfront Park, and the party is on. They try to keep it clean and family-oriented, but that’s really just on the surface. There is a bit of everything for just about everyone. Even a picky, fickle musician like myself can find adequate entertainment there. I usually try to go every year, if nothing else just to see one guy who is always there. Bob Culbertson is one of the preeminent Chapman Stick players in the world. Many of his books and videos are sold on Emmett Chapman’s own website, and he holds a large invitational clinic every year in his hometown of San Francisco CA. He sets up a booth on Main Street and plays all day long, for both days of the Festival. I’ve bought a couple of his CDs there, and had several opportunities to converse with him about the Stick and music in general. He’s a really great guy and a virtual cornucopia of knowledge. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make it over there during the day this weekend, so I missed him for now the second year in a row. Bummer.

Anyway...with this being the Festival weekend, we were expecting a large crowd at Baha. We were not disappointed. It started out a bit slow, but by the end of the first set the place was jumping. Everyone seemed wound up and bent on having fun. Carlos’ wife’s sister’s husband (did you follow that?) was entertaining everyone in the place with his completely goofy antics on the dance floor. The place seemed to be crawling with attractive people. All of the BenWahBabes made it out for the first time in quite awhile. That was nice to see, too.

The set list was at its usual mix, with a few stumpers thrown in here and here. I say stumpers because some of these songs we haven’t played much since I have been in the band (or Bobby, for that matter). I couldn’t remember how a Candlebox song started until Bobby reminded me; for the life of me I couldn’t remember Bad Company’s Movin’ On until we actually started playing it; we were all concerned about the odd-meter diddy that goes into the solo section of Sail On, Sail Away by Moxy, and it came off just fine. We did Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song at the end of one of the sets, and things started to get kind of weird. John got a bit heavy on the vocal delay and it started feeding back into itself. The result was a big garble of unintelligible noise that buried most of the song. Too bad, because I actually felt pretty good about the way I sang it this time. Oh, well...c’est la vie, eh?

We ended the night with the usual foray into War Pigs. All the “rock guys” in the place immediately rushed the stage, fists pumping in the air. I am still at a loss to explain this phenomenon, yet there it is every time. It does give one some semblance of rockstardom, so I guess I shouldn’t question it. Whatever.

Everyone in the band was bent on breakfast after we had evacuated the stage. Unfortunately, Dawna and I could not participate. We had dropped off her son Derek with some friends in Granite City – Geo and Katrina Romer of Ivory Tiger – and had to pick him up on our way home. We did end up going to the Denny’s in Pontoon Beach after we got him, as neither one of us had eaten since early in the day Saturday. Derek slept in the back of my van while we went in and ate. We found out on Sunday that Geo and Katrina’s car had been broken into shortly after we had left them. I feel for them, as that has happened to me on several occasions. My free advice to them: get out of Granite City and move to a small town. It’s working for me.

An interesting note: I listened to absolutely no music all day Sunday. Sometimes, quiet is good.

Horses and Hotwings

2005-08-16T13:51:00.000-05:00

Thursday, 11 August 2005
BenWahBob had another gig at Fairmount Park for the Michelob Ultra Thursday version of Party at the Park. Food buffet, dollar bottles, live music, attractive women, the sport of kings…what’s not to like here?

I arrived later than I had hoped – as usual – so I had to rush through the load-in, set-up, and make a B-line for the buffet before it got too crowded and all of the hot-wings got scarffed. This is one of those tough gigs to get to because of my day-job being in Chesterfield MO. It’s an hour’s drive home to St. Jacob, load equipment, shave/shower, then back-track to Collinsville to the track – all between 15:30 when I get off at work and 18:00 when the doors open to let people into the Black Stallion Room. It’s always tight timewise. People were already rushing the front window seats when the service elevator opened on the second floor and I rolled out my stuff.

So, I buried my face, quite literally, into a tray of various flavors of hot-wings, wiped the goo from my face, tuned my bass, and we were playing at 18:30. Have I ever mentioned how much I love rushing into a gig?

We put the songs through their usual paces, being mostly ignored by those whose turn it now was to stuff wings and pizza into their faces while perusing the race schedule for the horse that would lose them their money. We got the occasional odd request for stuff we simply don’t play, but for the most part we were just background music. So it goes there in the early stages. As the evening goes on, we get more attention – possibly due to the increasing influence of the cheap beer. At one point around the middle of the evening, the dance tunes rolled into the set list. As someone had actually requested Mustang Sally right before we played it, it worked in fairly nicely. This apparently turned out to be a distraction for Dale (go figure), because he launched into the Reader’s Digest condensed version of the song, opting to go straight into the sing-a-long section right away. We all exchanged humored glances and played along. Dale caught this immediately and actually took some jabs at himself over it. I hate it when he beats us to it.

There were a couple of fellas who spent most of the night staring at us, watching every move. You can always spot the musicians from a mile away. We were slightly tickled over that, too. It doesn’t take too much to amuse us…we’re simple people with simple needs.

At the end of the night, we were regaled with a great story of how our husband-and-wife sound crew went to see Jagertyme at Club Richards in Alton IL (mistakenly thinking it was Knucklehead) and were run out in under two minutes because of the near-deafening volume level. They said it actually hurt to be in the club – even on the other side. The Jagerdrunks would be proud.

I packed my stuff, which takes all of about five minutes, and headed for the door. Bobby and I stood around and talked for a bit, exchanged some gear and some money when we got outside (he’s selling off some of his PA gear), and headed for home. I think I had one of the early Dream Theater CDs in my player – Falling Into Infinity, maybe – for the short trip up the highway…reminding me of my desire to acquire a Chapman Stick.

Another one in the proverbial can. We only did the Thursday night this time, as they decided to split them up for awhile. I had the rest of the weekend off for a change. I didn’t even have to work at my day job on Saturday, so it was like having a real weekend. Dawna invited me over Sunday night for dinner/birthday party for her oldest son Derek and me. Since we had watched most of the T1G bootleg DVD the previous weekend – which was very cool – we curled up on the couch and watched Last Samurai again. All in all, a pretty good weekend.

Spaghetti Wrestling and Lakeside Park

2005-08-04T09:57:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 30 July 2005
Knucklehead already had a gig booked for this date when the guys from Thunderhead: A Tribute to Rush called Deron and asked if we would be interested in opening for them at Frogs in East Carondelet, IL. Well, duh! The logistics of this changed a few times, but the skinny was that it was going to be a tight squeeze for us to make it to our night gig with travel time to St. Charles, MO and set-up time. We agreed to do it nonetheless.

I got a late start (of course) and arrived around 14:45. We were suppose to start at 15:30. As I arrived, I noticed that no one was there yet except Shaun Steele, Knucklehead’s default soundman, who apparently is now working with Thunderhead. Very cool. Shaun knows our stuff and is quite professional. I also noted with regret on the way there that I had forgotten my small keyboard mixer. Shaun solved this with a Y-connector and a direct box. He’s the man. The rest of the Knucklegang pulled in just behind me. We were set up and ready to play around 16:00. I found the sign hanging on the back of the stage said “Third Annual Frog Fest” and altered it with duct tape to say “Third Annual Prog Fest.” The owner didn’t seem to mind this little play, and in fact snickered at the idea.

Since we were only suppose to do two sets, Deron had decided on the “Fuck Yeah!” songs from the various sets, which meant most of the second set. We always start this one off with The Spirit of Radio. However, since we were playing in front of a Rush tribute band, that one was considered off-limits for obvious reasons. So, we did the cool Iron Maiden and Ozzy stuff, rolled through some Triumph, and other various and sundry tunes. As the guys from Thunderhead started arriving, we couldn’t help but to tease the beginnings of more than a few Rush tunes. As our portion of the event came to a close, we teased with the beginning of Lakeside Park, as Scrappy usually does. George Whitlow jumped at the opportunity to warm up his voice and came up to sing it with us, so we actually played it. Big mistake. Obviously our heads were all somewhere else, because we gaffed it big time. Deron forgot the chord progression in the break-down section, I lost the bass counter-melody somewhere in there, Scrappy lost some of the transition fills…it was aweful. George kept with it, though, and we somehow muddled through the rest of the song. We slinked away with our collective tails between our legs.

Shane Calhoun was there to tape the Thunderhead show, as he usually is. He use to come out to the Those1Guys shows and occasionally taped us, too. He also tapes national touring acts, but you didn’t hear that from me. He had told me several years ago that he had taped a 2002 Yes show at UMB Pavilion at which I was in attendance. I gave him some CDs and he said he would make copies for me. He brought these up to me, as well as three DVDs of a T1G show he had recorded at Scotty’s in Alton, IL. Very cool indeed. Since I don’t own a DVD player – or a TV, for that matter – I have not yet seen them. Judging from the excellent sound quality of the Yes CDs, though, I’m sure it will be quite good…performances notwithstanding.

While we were tearing down our equipment, the bar had arranged for spaghetti wrestling to entertain the guests. This involved two young women in bikinis, oiled up, standing in an inflatable pool filled with spaghetti noodles. You can picture the rest on your own. The referee was another woman in a striped skirt outfit with a wireless microphone to call the event. She was not as…ummm…lady-like with her dialog as she probably should have been for an outdoor event. I had, unfortunately, forgotten my new digital camera as well.

After we left for St. Charles, Steve’s girlfriend Teresa had to turn around to go back for her glasses. I stopped for gas and then continued to St. Charles. As I arrived there, Deron said, “You’re not going to believe what happened!” Apparently right after we left, five police cars and the town’s mayor arrived and shut down the whole event. They removed the owner, pulled his liquor license, and told everyone that they had to leave immediately or face arrest. I can only guess that the spaghetti wrestling got a bit out of hand for conservative tastes (pun intended), as no reason was given for this intrusion. A truly unfortunate side of this is that no one got paid for their troubles…..except us. Go figure.

After setting up the gear once again at Baha Rock Club, Deron, Scrappy, and myself adjourned across the street to Big A’s for dinner. This had been Deron’s idea, as opposed to just showing up and playing and then going home; punching the clock, as he called it. We sat and talked about fishing, Cancun, spaghetti wrestling, renting boats from Mexicans who speak no English, getting sea-sick, where they found five cops in East Carondelet IL, and burgers. I think we successfully avoided the topic of that abortion of a Rush song we butchered. Pride can be a painful thing.

We eventually went back across the street and played a fairly standard KH show there. The crowd wasn’t very big, but they were quite into the music, so it wasn’t too bad. Scott Speck made it there for awhile and we talked about hockey. Jim, the bar’s manager, approached me late in the evening with a cymbal on which he had painted BenWahBob in neon colors. He asked me to sign the back of it so he could go over that, too, with neon paint. He does this quite a bit with bands that have been playing there a long time. It is his own artwork, usually on broken cymbals or guitars donated by the bands; this one was from Bobby Deskins, the current BWB drummer. He then hangs them in various places around the club. I’ve never before been asked by a club manager for an autograph, so that was interesting.

The drive home was eventful as well this time. Somewhere on I-270 in Hazelwood, MO my “Service Engine Soon” idiot light came on for whatever reason. While looking dumbfounded at that, I looked up just in time to see the tire laying in the middle of my lane that I was about to hit. It made some hideous thumping noises on its way under my van, and actually bounced me up a couple of times before it was through. Nice. Needless to say, I was wide awake after that. I even had to turn off the live Yes in my CD player so I could listen for the changes in the sounds of my motor or undercarriage…that never came, of course. What a day.

BenWahBob Revisited

2005-07-28T07:12:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 23 July 2005
BenWahBob was booked for yet another gig at Rusty’s in Edwardsville, IL. This has been more like a paid rehearsal for us in the past, as no one seems to go there anymore. I have heard many opinions offered as to the reason for this, but I just chalk it up to the wavering ways of the bar business. Another thing about this gig is that the owner wants us to dress nice – dark pants and a nice shirt – as we are considered “employees” while we are playing there. Jeans and T-shirts are discouraged. I arrived in a nice red and black button-up shirt and dark gray slacks. As the rest of the band began to arrive, I quickly noticed the abundance of shorts and T-shirts. It had been near 100 degrees all week, so I guess they decided that the dress code would be suspended this time.

Bobby had tickets and back-stage passes to the Journey concert that night, so our old drummer Scott Ballenger was sitting in with us. It had been quite a while since we had played with Scott, but the old groove caught on pretty quickly. Everyone plays a little differently, and Scott’s style is definitely different than Bobby’s. It’s funny how you get use to playing with one guy, yet the others never really get out of your system. Scott did a great job remembering all of the stuff he hasn’t played for the last year or so since he left BWB.

Another bright spot of the night was the crowd – the fact that there actually was one! The place was packed all night. I think I’ve only seen it this way once before, and that has been awhile ago. Not only was there a plethora of bodies in the building, they were actually into the music. It was a fun night for a change. Jeff of J&J Sound was moving the knobs for us this night, as I guess Mike was unavailable. He did a great job, too, and is always the consummate sound professional.

We had several surprise guests as well. During one of the third set songs with a drum/bass breakdown in the middle, Dale walked over to me and said into the microphone “Greg!” I gave him a puzzled look and said, “Were the (expletive) did that come from?” He quickly said, “Oh…I mean Paul!” After we retired to break before the last set, I was introduced to former drummer and bass player Adam and ….. Greg. OK, now it made a little more sense. We had ourselves a mini BenWahBob reunion happening…and at Rusty’s of all places.

There really wasn’t anything that stands out in my memory as highly entertaining. It was pretty much a steak-and-potatoes gig. We played songs, women danced, men stood around with beers in hand rocking their heads…pretty much standard fare. We did happen into an extremely fast version of Rush’s What You’re Doing, which became a bit of a challenge during the unison guitar/bass runs in the bridge section, but we made it through with some nervous grins and flying fingers. Speed-metal Rush. Dear God, where have we gone wrong?

Next weekend, Knucklehead is double-dipping. We start out in the afternoon on an outdoor stage at Frogs in Dupo, IL opening up for Thunderhead – A Tribute to Rush, then head over to St. Charles, MO for our regularly scheduled gig at Baha Rock Club. There should be plenty to blog about from that one, so be sure to check back here next week.

South of the Border (...or is it the East Side?)

2005-07-21T09:40:00.000-05:00

Friday, 15 July 2005
BenWahBob doesn’t usually venture too far from the St. Charles, MO area for gigs, as most of the members are from that general area. We occasionally do pick up some gigs in Illinois. This weekend we had the “pleasure” of playing at Club Richards in Alton, IL. It was the first time in there for this band. I have played there several times before in other bands, and it was always a great stage on which to play. Unfortunately, I have also had several gigs cancelled there in just about every band. The owner is somewhat fickle, to say the least. Since the last time I was there, he had apparently lost the house PA and lights to better paying places. No surprise there. This was what made it worth playing there, though. If nothing else, you could get some really good live photos while you were there.

This club does not have a reliable regular crowd. If you don’t bring in your own friends and fans, you play to empty seats – plain and simple. Being basically from another state, this was the case for BWB. We kept hearing from people that a crowd would probably come in late in the night. It didn’t happen. Having Jagertyme playing just across town didn’t help us either. We did see some familiar faces, though. The Marshall girls – Julie and her sister Jeanette – showed up late in the night. A couple of Dale’s friends drove over from Missouri. And, I got yet another Those1Guys sighting.

Bobby had his old Alibi singer Eddie Christ (the jokes were hard to suppress, believe me) running sound for us with Bobby’s system. We had used a partial set-up of this system at a country club gig a few weeks ago, but this was the first time I got to hear the full system in action. It was sweet…a very nice and easy-to-set-up PA system. I should aspire to such a system myself. Eddie did a great job and everyone agreed we sounded good.

On a different note… as long as I’ve been playing in the Alton area, there has been “The Fajita Guy” trolling around from bar to bar at the end of the night cooking fajitas and burritos out of the back of his truck. They are awesome. Apparently he is now pretty much camping out in Richards’ parking lot on the weekends, and cooking inside during the week. After all of these years of eating his food, I finally had the opportunity to talk with the man. What a great guy. His name is Jesus Ayala, he is from Mexico, and he is one of the best short-order Mexican food cooks I have ever encountered. He makes his own habanero sauce, and it will make you sweat with a quickness. His food made the whole weekend worth any accompanying aggravations.

Saturday, 16 July 2005
Part two of the Club Richards gig was Saturday night. As I arrived, Jesus was already in the parking lot serving up the chow. Had I known that he would be there this early in the evening, I wouldn’t have stopped at Sonic for dinner. However, I can’t complain about their cherry limeade.

Once on stage, we put the sets through the usual paces. One of the songs that Dale usually has the lyrics available for turned into a comedy routine. He just flat out forgot the words. I looked at him, craned my neck toward the lyrics sitting right at his feet, then shrugged as if to say, “What the…” Carlos chuckled and suggested that perhaps they were written in Chinese. Toward the end of the night, we did all of the songs that Dale doesn’t sing, as he isn’t use to doing two nights in a row. This meant Carlos singing Inside Out, which we don’t do too often anymore. He fudged the beginning bad. He immediately stopped and joked about it. After he started again, I started giving him the same look I had given Dale earlier. He started laughing – not too easy to sing that way – and commented that at least his wasn’t in Chinese. I almost wet myself. We did a Rush song, which Julie hates, and it was all good again.

Julie had showed up again at the end of the night, despite having told me the night before that she had other plans. When I asked her about this, she told me that she just brought her date along with her. When I turned around, I was shocked to see Kevin Kalka standing there grinning at me. This was turning into a very entertaining evening. Some woman came up to me before the start of the last set and asked if I wanted to dance with her. I politely told her that I had to go back up and play soon and wasn’t interested, but thanked her anyway. She looked right at me and said that I was lying. Huh? She then asked Carlos if he was interested, to which he replied that he was simply too tired. She said, “Another lie!” Huh? She then asked the soundman if he was interested, to which he simply replied, “No.” I looked at her and asked if that was a lie, too. She got all irate and started mumbling something about not having to lie to her. She then asked if there was something wrong with her or the way she looked. I said, “No” (now, I might have been lying!). I then lit into her about why she was still standing there talking to me if I was just lying to her. She apologized for the accusations and said that her feelings were hurt. I told her that I couldn’t imagine why – it’s not like I called her a liar or anything. After she finally went away, Eddie laughed and noted that the only guy on the stage that had actually been dancing (Dale) was the only guy she didn’t ask to dance. Entertainment value, I tell you.

I stopped and talked a bit with Julie and Kevin after tear-down, then made my way to Jesus’ truck for some fajitas for the drive home. Unfortunately, I forgot to tell him to make me sweat, so they weren’t hot at all. They were still excellent nonetheless. I enjoyed them along with the first Liquid Tension Experiment CD on the way home. Another one in the books.

Alcohol is a Dangerous Drug

2005-07-11T14:33:00.000-05:00

Friday, 08 July 2005
It was a slow week at my day job, so I was able to leave early on Friday. This allowed me the leisure of not having to hurry home, load the equipment, and make it to the club with barely enough time to set up, let alone actually eat something. Since it was Knucklehead at Club 501 in Wood River, IL, this was a PA gig, so there was a fair amount of work involved. As Deron rolled in near 20:00, I had most everything set up already. He commented about my profuse sweating. Funny thing about moving all that equipment…

I did seem a bit warm in the place, after hearing his comment. It didn’t seem so bad when I had come in, but as the evening wore on it seemed to get considerably less cool. Several people had also commented to me about the heat later in the night. It seems to be a trend with club owners; don’t turn the a/c down to a comfortable level until someone complains. Cost savings, I guess.

We had the normal Knucklehead Experience that night; much of the same stuff we usually play, and way too much stuff we don’t really know. We did Van Halen for Scott, Styx for god-knows-who, a butt-load of Guns-N-Roses for some attractive young lady who seemed to catch Deron at just the right moment (she was working the room like a pro, and loving the attention). It was a pretty typical night.

Saturday, 09 July 2005
This night started off with an order of the fine chicken strips served by the kitchen at the club. There seemed to me to be an exceptional amount of odd people in the place when I arrived. One older guy asked if he could dance to our music. I said, “Be my guest!” (yep…being a jerk again) Another introduced himself to me as someone other than the name on his shirt, then proceeded to punch himself in the stomach over and over again. I believe I mumbled the word “nice” as I walked away. It was going to be one of those nights. I sat on the other side of the bar to avoid any further oddities. Deron joined me there when he came in, as did Dave Stover who showed up, too. Unfortunately, the oddities soon found us and put on their show for Dave. There is no escape.

Dawna showed up during the first set, which was nice for me of course. She was sporting her new T-shirt with the phrase “My Face is Up Here” with an arrow pointing up. It seemed to be a big hit with the other patrons as well. She didn’t stay long, though, as she had promised Katrina she would come to Eddie’s in Granite City to see Ivory Tiger and to help celebrate Geo’s birthday.

Many other friends stopped by during the course of the night, including Kevin Kalka who sat in with us a couple of weeks ago at Eddie’s. During a Metallica song, Deron was doing the pee-pee dance, and at the end of the last chorus he made a B-line for the men’s room. I motioned to Scrappy to just continue dragging out the end of the song…just for yuks. Deron – from the men’s room remember – launched suddenly into Sweet Child of Mine. At this point, Steve decided it would be a good idea to bring up Kevin for a couple of songs. Bad idea. The delay between us and Deron on the other side of the building caused a severe time problem that only got worse as we went on. Deciding not to contribute to it any longer, I just stopped playing. Deron made it back around the end of the first chorus, and I started playing once again. What a disaster. Kevin ended up playing the rest of the set with us.

When I thought we were done, as Deron had begun the Dean Martin outtro music, Steve kept egging the crowd on for one more song. I was less than amused. No one seemed to want one more song except him, but he kept it up irregardless. I made some snide comment about it, to which he began taunting me about it. Now I was really not amused. Deron and Scrappy started into another song – I don’t even remember what it was – and it was on. I had already removed my bass, but put it back on. I really didn’t feel like doing this tonight. So, I just played the bass lines on my foot pedals, including the "Cheech & Chong" ending of which we are so fond. That was at least somewhat amusing.

I began to tear down the equipment immediately after we finished…again. Deron didn’t have his truck that night, so he was going to leave his equipment for Sunday. Off to Eddie’s he went. Steve disappeared early, but then came back for the banner. Scrappy stuck around and tore down his drums, then helped me with the load-out. I’ve told him several times that he doesn’t have to, but he insists anyway. It was about 02:30 by the time I left for home.

I had called Dawna and left a message on her cell phone to call me when she got home. She called back a few minutes later to tell me that she was still at Eddie’s, and that the alcohol she had imbibed had made her sick on top of the medication she had taken earlier. She wasn’t sure she could drive home. This, on top of my own events at the end of the night, rather aggravated me. I was already in a pretty bad mood, and this didn’t help. She said she was going to Katrina’s to drink some coffee until she felt better, then drive home. She called me from home around 06:00. Needless to say, my Sunday was pretty much shot, since I didn’t get to bed until about 06:30.

Oh, well…such is the life of a bar star, eh? Now I remember why I quit drinking.

Citations and Bach

2005-07-08T10:24:00.000-05:00

Saturday, 02 July 2005
Independence Day weekend was a nice, slow one for me this year. No gig on Friday night, and Saturday was BenWahBob at Baha Rock Club on Main Street in St. Charles, MO. As I rolled in with my equipment, everyone else was already there and set up. I hadn’t realized that I was running a bit late. This is not a problem, though, since my set-up takes about 5 minutes. I only play bass and sing with this band, so no keyboards to set up, too. John wasn’t there, and in his place was another guy to run sound for us. We’ve used him before, but I can never recall his name. Carlos was in the process of warming up both his fingers and his amp tubes when the soundman, who was micing the drum set, turned around quickly and asked him to please hold off for just a moment. Now tipped off that he was in a crabby mood, I proceeded to take my time with my set-up and tuning my bass…just to tick him off even more. Sometimes, I’m just a jerk like that.

Shortly after we finished the sound check, Jim, the manager, walked by and mimicked playing keyboards with raised eyebrows. He then dismissed it with, “Oh, wait…that’s the other band.” He always picks on me about that, suggesting that I should play keys with BWB as well. Too much hassle, I always explain to him, for what amounts to just a couple of songs that would benefit from them. Not likely to happen.

As we plowed through the fairly standard set list, I started to notice that we had a persistent problem with feedback from the stage monitors. It was a high-pitched squeal somewhere in the 6.3KHz range, I was guessing. Of course, my guessing was for naught. Apparently this went unnoticed by our crabby soundman throughout the evening. I eventually had to turn the side-shot monitor on my side of the stage away from me…I just couldn’t tolerate it anymore. Carlos told me later that he was a guitar player who’s hearing had been shot for many years now, so he mixes with a lot more high end to compensate for the fact that he can’t hear it. He probably didn’t even hear the feedback that was curdling our milk on stage.

Other than that, the night went pretty well. I had mentioned in a previous blog that I would prefer that Dale put Cat Scratch Fever later in the set list because it kind of hurts my throat to sing it early in the evening. I guess he reads my blogs, because it was near the beginning of the fourth set this night. Thanks, Dale. I don’t recall any really awful gaffs in the music that night, other than the miscommunication over skipping a song. Carlos and I started into a Rush song and Bobby started into an Aerosmith song. Woops! It all worked out, and we ended up doing both songs anyway.

A friend of Carlos’ named Scott Lyle came out to see us. Apparently his band was off for a change. I had met him initially at Carlos’ wedding a couple of years ago and found him quite fascinating. We discovered that we both share a passion for baroque-era music, especially J. S. Bach. During the course of our several conversations, we had both expressed an interest in doing something in pursuit of that interest. I had heard awhile back that he was trying something with the bass player from Mr. Yuk, but apparently that didn’t pan out. He told me that guy didn’t have the same passion for the music as he did. We talked awhile longer at the end of the night about it, and discussed the idea of a duo with classical guitar and either an acoustic bass or cello playing transcriptions of the Bach Two Part Inventions. Now he had my full attention. I have wanted to do something with those pieces for some time now. This seemed like an appropriate idea. I am looking for the music this week. I’ll let you know if/when anything comes of it.

At the end of the night, I went to the parking garage to pull my van around to the front of the club for load-out. After this was accomplished and a few of us were standing around in the street talking – as we often seem want to do – Carlos motioned to the front of my van and said, “Huh, looks like you got a ticket, Paul.” Sure enough, there was a yellow ticket under the windshield wiper. He pulled it off and handed it to me. A parking ticket from the St. Charles Police. I had parked in a space in the garage that was marked for vehicles taller than 6’7”. This was not the first time I had parked in that spot, but it was certainly the first time I had been cited for it. I guessed that they were doing extra patrols for the holiday weekend. Either that, or they took offense to my teasing them earlier in the night about actually coming inside of the club for a change. The ticket was written shortly after said incident. Hmmm… Now I have never, in my adult life, had to pay a ticket. I have always gone to court and successfully argued in favor of my case. Even as recently as a year-and-a-half ago when I got a parking ticket outside of the Broadway Bistro, I was able to convince a judge that I was in the right and not guilty (there are pictures on the Knucklehead website concerning this). Unfortunately for me this time, I was clearly in the wrong, as my van is not the requisite 6’7” tall. So, I paid the $10 fine rather than take another day off from my job to go to court only to get another court date for which I must take off yet another day to go again to court to argue against something which I know I did wrong and probably end up paying considerably more in the end.

Speaking of the end…
See you next weekend at Club 501 in Wood River, IL with Knucklehead. If not, check back here sometime next week for all the gory details.

My First (and last) Pony Bet

2005-07-01T07:51:00.000-05:00

Thursday, 23 June 2005
Another couple of Fairmount Park gigs with BenWahBob were to start off this weekend. The Michelob Ultra Thursdays had not been too great in the past, but this year seemed to be catching on quite well. As always, there was food aplenty at the free buffet and the dollar AB bottles were as popular as ever (with those who drink). There was a group of wild young ladies who planted themselves in the first three tables in front of the stage and had a grand time amongst themselves. This is always infectious with others around them. They were spreading good cheer.

We drove our sets through the usual paces. I even did that screeching thing at the end of Cat Scratch Fever, which I should call Throat Scratch Fever because of the affect it has on my throat. I’ve got to get Dale to start putting that later in the evening, especially if he wants me to keep singing Rush songs. I even broke my own tradition and bet on a horse. One of my co-workers at my day job owns several race horses and had one in the 8th race this night. I had seen one of his horses run away from the field the last time we played there, so I took his word for it this time when he spent the whole week talking this one up. At 6-1 odds, I thought I might cash in on this one. Unfortunately, 5th out of 6 doesn’t pay very much on a $20-to-win bet. He still hasn’t said another word to me about that horse.

We found through the course of the evening that there was a young lady there celebrating her birthday who’s name was Nicole. Well, that naturally lead us to suggest playing the song of the same name. Not only have we never played this song together, I haven’t played it at all since I was in high school in the 1980s. Throwing caution to the wind, ala Knucklehead, we jumped right into it nonetheless. It actually came off pretty well. Who says you always get the same show with BWB?

Friday, 24 June 2005
Part two of the Fairmount Park gig is the Budweiser Party at the Park on Friday. Again the same deal with the food buffet and drinks, but the food buffet has a much larger selection on Fridays and there are usually about twice as many people there. This Friday didn’t seem quite as crowded to me, though. There was actually room to walk through the place without squeezing past everyone.

The women of BWB showed up in force, too. Although Dawna didn’t stay long because of her family obligations, she was there long enough to go after Dale for spending way too much time flirting with an attractive young lady in-between sets. As she approached him, she realized it was his wife Chris with her hair unusually straight. Everyone got a kick out of that. We can’t get away with anything – they’re looking out for each other at every turn.

We played that Nicole song again to wrap up the night. It went quite a bit smoother this time, as we had all had time to give it a whirl in our heads since the night before. Another fun night drew to a close, and I rambled back up the highway to my new hole under my new rock.

Saturday, 25 June 2005
Knucklehead played at Ten Pin in Alton, IL this night. I am not so fond of this gig for several reasons, not the least of which are the sparse crowds and the fact that I have to lug in a PA. At least I didn’t have to work that day and then hurry to the gig.

We offered up the standard KH fare to those who were willing to listen. I don’t honestly recall delving into any uncharted territory that night – a very unusual thing for this band at this bar. I do recall dancing with two left feet on the new MIDI controller during Fight the Good Fight, though. I really need to practice that one. It needs to be a Zen moment, and it’s not even close to that yet. I just need to practice (other than my cello) in general. Since I don’t play everyday like I use to at St. Louis Music, my playing has taken a serious down-hill slide. I’ll work on that…I promise.

There were no real odd happenings that night (another unusual thing for this bar) other than the guy who decided that a chair was his best choice for a dance partner. He was quickly removed from the premises before he hurt himself. I did get a couple of "Hey, didn't you use to play in Those1Guys" comments. Odd that people still remember that band, since it was around less than a year. Other than that, it was a pretty uneventful night. We did end early (?), though…before 02:30! Apparently the local constabulary has been cracking down on the bars staying open late in the city. Bummer. Does that mean we can’t play until 04:00 in the morning any more? That really breaks my heart (ahem…sniff, sniff).

Making Memories...again

2005-06-29T11:06:00.000-05:00

Friday, 17 June 2005
Knucklehead was booked at Eddie’s in Granite City, IL for what was possibly the last time. There has been some squabbling between us and the management there about the pay rate we receive. As one of the best drawing bands, we are also the lowest paid. We pay our soundman more for one night than the individual band cuts are for the entire weekend. So, this time we decided to go in with my small PA and give them the same thing we give smaller bars that only pay this low rate. As it turned out, we got quite a few compliments on our sound. It turns out that people liked it better when we weren’t as loud. They said it sounded clearer, even over near the bar area. Hmmm…guess we should have been doing this the whole time.

Another difference this weekend was the lack of Scrappy on drums. He had planned a fishing trip up north for this weekend, so we had substitute drummers for this gig. Friday was Kevin Kalka. We had played with him while still in high school and a few years beyond, but it had been about 16 years since we had played together in Kulprit, Nassty, and then Kid Curious – the precursor to Saturn Cats. We were all a little unsteady at first, but as the night wore on we started to catch a groove. It was, admittedly, a bit odd playing with Kevin again. We are all different players now, and the old chemistry was altered by time. But, it worked out just fine. He had done a stand-up job learning many of the harder tunes in less than a week. Thanks, Kev.

Saturday, 18 June 2005
Round two of the Eddie’s-going-away-party was to feature Mike Ramsey on drums. Mike is the former drummer for Ivory Tiger and, more importantly, the Rush tribute band Thunderhead. He brought out his “big” kit, which made it a challenge to mic everything with my small setup. But we found a way to do it, and it worked out exceptionally well. Needless to say, Deron and I were really looking forward to this night. I had bought a MIDI foot controller for my keyboards a few weeks earlier, but hadn’t really had the time to work it into my routine. I decided to bring it out anyway, if nothing else than for the Rush that we were sure to do. I also broke out the old ’73 Rickenbacker that I hadn’t played in almost 2 years since I got the Fishbone 6-string bass. After playing that bass exclusively for about 20 years, playing it again was like putting on an old pair of jeans.

We started the night with Rush’s La Villa Strangiato as our sound check. What a way to start! Mike, too, had done an outstanding job learning some of our “cool” songs like the Iron Maiden, Kansas, and Zebra stuff. Of course, we started off the second set with the usual Spirit of Radio, then launched into a bunch of other Rush songs like Freewill, Tom Sawyer, and Limelight. It’s spine-tingling to play that stuff with guys who really know it. My personal thanks to Mike and Deron for the thrills that night (Steve did a great job on the vocals, too).

I think I may have set a new record tearing down and loading the equipment that night. It wasn’t so bad coming back for it the next day when I lived just five blocks away. 20 miles is a different story altogether. Plus, Deron had been talking about Waffle House. Inspirations abounded. By the time we arrived at Aweful House, Roy and Carol (from the attic) were already there, as was Wes from Ivory Tiger. Mike and his lovely wife joined us, too. The laughs were nonstop as we all took turns ripping into each other. Carol even made the comment that she had never seen me so animated. Oops…..busted having fun in public. Sorry, Carol…I promise not to let it happen again. Just forget you saw that.

I didn’t get home until after the first light of day Sunday morning. Just as I got on the highway to head back to St. Jacob, my phone rang. It was Deron – he had run out of gas just down the street from Aweful House. What a retro weekend this was! Kevin Kalka on drums, Deron running out of gas on Chain of Rocks Road…all I needed was a bottle of Jack and a psycho girlfriend and it would have been complete. I think I’ll take a pass on that last part.