John Hancotte's Bass Desires: Platinum at the Georgia Railroad Freight Depot

We were contracted to play the Bean/Spinnelli wedding reception and that's what reunited us - hey, it was a very slow February. The big news is that Winterhalter is leaving the band after being with us for about a year and getting a ll of the tunes together! Rats! Well, his wife has a very nice job offer in the Tampa/Clearwater area and he must follow her down there, where they ultimately wanted to end up anyways. We played in this great Freight Room where I've played and worked many other functions. The Freight Depot is certainly one of the oldest buildings where one can entertain, going back to 1869, I do believe. It's quite a long room but it actually has decent sound considering it's all concrete and glass. Kevin took some interesting shots with his iPhone while we were sound checking/rehearsing. We learned "You Send Me" plus Cee-Lo's "Forget You", which actually sounded good, thanks to Glen handling all those vocals.

For me, the big news really was that, knock on wood, my Hartke amp is fixed! I used it with my Golight cabinet and it sounded loud and proud, with no distorted nasty noises like I've been experiencing this past year. Ouch, right? Anybody who's been with me on a gig with that going on can relate - sounded really ugly. I hate to say it, but I guess it was the pre-amp 12AX7 tube. Such an easy fix. The tech at Northwest Speakers & Equipment told me the tube was microphonic and would generate a loud harsh noise when he tapped it. Sounds like what I was getting at intermittent intervals. What threw me was that I had thought it could be the tube, so I would turn the tube preamp level all of the way off and I would still get that noise. Well, it seems to be fixed so I'm going to have to say that it was the tube and we can move on. James really went over everything and even cleaned the graphic eq switches and faders. He made a custom Speakon cable with a 1/4" phono plug on 1 end so that I can use it with my head. I feel that with all of that taken care of, I should have some well deserved karma with this rig. It should last a while - let's hope.

I played my Ibenez 6-string with freshly boiled strings. Got a new pack of strings at Krazy Al's but I thought I might get a bit more life out of these with a good boiling. It worked and they sounded nice and bright, almost too bright. I also had my NS/Stick since I'm using it St. Patty's day with RWD. It sounds good but the strings sure need to be finessed on that thing. Also brought along the NS Wav EUB for the dinner set and first dances. I think I've had the toggle switch in the pizzicato mode (down) the past several times I've used it. It actually sounds much better in the arco (up) mode, and with a lot fewer squealing feedback issues as well.

The crowd was great and they were dancing from our first tune in the second set (Haven't Met You Yet). They really seemed to enjoy it. It was weird to be at the end of such a long room yet not have an elevated stage. I guess we always expect to have one, but that's certainly a cost cutting move to not have one. Our dinner was boxed lunches from Jason's Deli, which was a sandwich & chips with a pickle & a big cookie. Fortunately, the wedding coordinator was sympathetic to our having to move our cars from the loading zone driveway and offered us a free round of mixed drinks after the show as we were packing up. Gus and I enjoyed a Jack 'n Coke and all was well with the world. My big screw up was going to the 1 in the last A section of "The Nearness of You" when it should go to the 3 - Norah's version. Too bad, 'cause I really enjoyed that tune and wanted to play on it. All also really blew it playing F# on the top of the bridge in "Jenny Jenny" - as many times as I've done that song you'd think I could get it right anytime. I wish we had done "Give It To Me Baby" since I had worked on it - I used to stick in a few too many grace notes, robbing it of its funky on-the -beat charm. Never realized it was recorded in the key of Db, always thought of it being in D (minor). Glen sings it in C to make it a little easier. We grooved well and sounded tight considering it's been a while for us. We play again this Saturday at the Ritz. Read about it here first.

More pics from my camera...