St. Patrick's Day with Running With Desire (x2!)

 With St. Patrick's Day here, we rose to the supreme challenge of being Running With Desire, a band of dual identities: 1 part Van Halen (Running With...) & 1 part U2 (Desire).  Being an Irish themed holiday, we of course, were hired initially as a U2 tribute act for the Buckhead Saloon St. Patrick's Day party.  I had never visited the BS before this day, and was rather confused about its location.  Nonetheless, I found it soon enough & got there with plenty of load-in time.  Even had anorder of chicken fingers to wolf down before the big hit.  We had a few sound issues.  One of them centered around the bass amp I was privileged to use on the gig.  It turned out to be Shane's, and it suffered from a faulty DI/XLR output.  The sound men scrambled on the 3rd tune to remedy the situation and mic up the Ampeg combo.  They later complained that my NS/Stick had a badly distorted signal.  Um, well, I don't think it was badly distorted coming through the amp, so we were most likely hearing the same thing since the DI wasn't functioning.  Not sure what to make of those cats, other than that they fit the "If it ain't a Fender then I don't wanna have nuthin' to do with it" stereotype.  They didn't know much of what to make of my Mesa top end signal either.  Too bad. 

I thought we did a decent job.  We had a rough start with "Streets".  I think the only way this one will be smooth is to use some recorded tracks for the intro, which my buddy Walt has done but we didin't get a chance to practice with the tracks.  To have the guitar play the intro only to drop out for the delayed line is a bit confusing.  I was ultimately hoping to learn the intro on the NS/Stick, and perhaps I still will get that under my fingers.  Once we're into the song we seem to find our groove.  I always like "Mysterious Ways", "Get on Your Boots", and "Vertigo".  These being more recent tunes of theirs, I think we do them justice and bring a certain swagger to the table.  I will go on record here as saying that in general, this type of band would excel in playing some deeper (read: much deeper) cuts.  At the very least, I was really pulling for "One" & "Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For".  Ultimately, as a fan myself, I like most everything on "The Unforgettable Fire", in particular I would love to feature "A Sort of Homecoming", "Wire" & "Bad".  I'm also partial to "The Three Sunrises", "Angel of Harlem", "The Fly", well, the list could go on and on.  I'm just saying that "New Year's Day" & "Sunday Bloody Sunday" have had their day and I used to play them years and years ago.  Time for an update.

Here are some pics from the Buckhead Saloon.

Shortly after we finished in Buckhead, we transported ourselves up to Buford to the club entitled 37 Main.  This turned out to be a great venue for us and we enjoyed a crowd that came to party and dance the night away.  We wisely chose this time to start with some Van Halen numbers and then go down the U2 list after the crowd was warmed up.  It worked well.  We had a birthday party crowd that was really into it, and the birthday girl joined us on stage for "Ice Cream Man" - is that a dirty song, I wonder?  I felt much better about my parts and my mix.  A good sound man can really ease one's mind on these matters.  I felt over all that the 2nd set was a wee bit short and that we played a more rewarding 1st set, which I probably should have foreseen.  Soon enough, we were packing it up and heading out to get home before it got too late in the game.  Shane took care of us and the club wasn't too bad either, considering.  I look forward to returning one day.  The band is most likely on a hiatus for now.

 

All set up and finding my happy place!