RJ Griffin & Company's Spring Party Friday April 22

Martay's good friend Dan had us back again for another springtime backyard dinner party.  Brent and I made good on our commitment to playing the hits, quaffing some brews, and eating man-sized portions of Low Country Boil (including crawfish, shrimp, corn, potatoes, onion, etc.).  They also served that famous vodko-spiked sweet tea with lemon that didn't seem to last much past sundown.  We set up and were ready by 7, more or less.  It always takes longer than expected.  I was the first to arrive and Dan welcomed me with a cold beer.  What a great host!  It was hard to say no, I must say.  Dan's house is amazing with a great front porch and a rear deck that is some beautiful wood.  He has installed a coy pond since our last visit with 2 stepping stones, which we had to traverse for the load in.  Very cool setup. 

It seemed like we didn't have a plan about what to play.  I think Dan likes the Van Halen and the hard rock, so we did play some of that.  We ended up playing The Joker, Jenny Jenny, and the typical safer stuff.  With this party, the load in and load out was the hardest part.  I helped with the PA cabinets and set up the lights, which were a huge asset. 

Ah, the night flew by and I said goodbye to Brent.  Then I took the PA cabinets, the lights, my rig, and a few other things out and packed our cars.  I went to look for Martay and he was still inside talking with the hosts who looked like they were ready to call it a night.  I was too, so I left before getting paid.  All in a night's work.  It was fun, at any rate.

More St. Patty's Day 2011 Pics From 37 Main

The great Michael Ingledew took so many shots of us and the crowd that night.  I had "lifted" some from his web site to show off our big event.  Now he has graciously sent a jumbo assortment of great photos, many different than the ones I had chosen.  Very nice to have clear hi-res pics of our time together.  We had put a lot of work into learning the U2 & Van halen material.  This band is special in that we can be 2 distinct tribute acts within the same night.  Well, I simply want to get these up on this blog and thanks again to Michael, as well as JT, Mark, & Martay "Edgie Van Evans".  While I'm at it, let me say here that I wouldn't be playing in this and all of my other bands without the help, cooperation, encouragement, and love from my beautiful wife Sabina.  She gives me the time and so much more needed to make my musicianship a reality.  Here's to you SS - every day is Valentine's Day with you!!!

Sweetwater Junction invades Seabrook Island Club

Seabrook Island is just south of Folly Beach & James Island, where my friends Matt & Cindy live.  We traveled to play a wedding reception.  Along for the ride were Brian "Big Time" Molin (his band essentially - he coordinates with the agency, supplies the PA & lights, rents the trailer & the storage space, does the driving, etc. - oh yeah, he plays the guitar just like a-ringin' a bell), Chris Garner (lead vocals & acoustic guitar, back from an extended leave of absence - we missed him), Mark Letalien (super-fine rhythm monster who really does not let up - a fun hang too), & Dan Barker (keyboards, very cool organ tones he gets with his Mac Powerbook), who I just met on the gig.  We played a great jazz set including "Song for my Father", "Cantaloupe Island", & "All Blues".  Also played some of the 2nd set using my NS WAV bass.  I think I'm getting a much better tone using my Fishman Platinum Pro-EQ Bass DI by simply bringing the high treble slider all the way down and boosting the midlle slider.  This outboard eq tweak allows me to keep the passive tone control of the WAV on 10, which allows more upper mids to pass through, thus accentuating the growl. 

Unfortunately, my Genz-Benz combo took a hit and the preamp pot got sheered off.  Sucks that it is the very pot that I had replaced not too long ago.  I need to take it back in for more servicing.  I really wish I could get all of my stuff up and running trouble free!  Well, Chris helped me get the pot up to an audible level - it wasn't easy - and I was able to use the rig.  My Ibenez 6-string sounded good and is a nice bass for what it is.  Those EMG's really made a big difference, moreso than any pickup I've ever replaced.  You know, I have all of these basses now but the old Ibenez is still a blast to play.  I probably should get a nicer 6-string one day and just go with that.  It's all I really would ever need in terms of range and sheer noise generation. 

The crowd was great and danced through all of our many jams.  We took them on a nice little ride, I must say.  Several people in the crowd praised us at the end of the night and they genuinely had a wonderful time.  I felt proud of us that we gave them so much variety and didn't have those dead spots in the night that can happen when 5 guys are up there that haven't all played together before.  Some hightlights were "Shakey Ground", "Wonderful Tonight" (on NS WAV), "Miss You" (with Chris on vocals - he didn't feel like sharing, and that's ok by me actually), and "Ain't Too Proud To Beg".  Standard fare but it got the job done in fine fashion.

Spring Thing --> Hail Storm --> Tornado Watch --> Padriac's

The night began with the family rushing over to Mt. Bethel for a great big spring party billed as "Spring Thing".  Unfortuantely, storms were approaching and the whole shebang was staged indoors, which was too bad.  Actually, it didn't really make much of a difference to the kids.  They had a lot of fun activities with a DJ, hoola hoops, moonwalk/slide/climbing inflatable playgrounds, pizza, face painting, teacher dunking, and clowns making balloon animals.  It was hot and muggy and super crowded.  I let Jack stay a bit longer so that he could act up with his friends, which actually bit me a bit since when I went back for him, the sky opened up and it hailed like I've never seen before.  It poured hail for several minutes!  We still need to clean up the yard a bit - so what else is new?  We huddled in the basement for a spell while the sirens sounded.  Binnie thought my gig might be cancelled.  She ought to know better by now.

So we played our 2nd gig of the year at Padriac's last night.  Brent couldn't make it, so Martay got Sam Owen to fill in.  Martay was concerned about vocals, so I tweaked my vocal list and sent him a copy.  I ended up singing 2 requests that were not on my list: "Tuesday's Gone" & Free's "All Right Now".  I thought I did well & Martay liked it.  He would have anyways.  The guy who made the requests was tipping $40 per tune!  Cliff showed up & made it a fun hang on the break, which ran over an hour!  We did a very nice shot of tequila but we did it Cliff's way: with 5 sqirts of Tabasco!  ell, I liked it, but then I like spicy stuff.  I like the salt & lime, too, so I guess I added at bit of flavor on the backside.  I finally persuaded Martay that we needed to play a bit more.  We ened with some nice jams on "Oy Como Va", "Little Wing", & "Round & Round", of course.  A side note is that Big Ernie lost his father and had just come back to work.  I gave him my condolences and he was grateful to share a bit.  I miss my folks a lot and wish I could share some holidays with them like the good ol' days.  

I love Decatur in the Springtime!

What a differnce a little warm weather makes!  We had a good crowd out there that sat and enjoyed our set for Java Monkey's wine tasting event last night, Thursday April 14, 2011.  Hey, does that mean it's tax day today?  How can that be?  Well, anyways, kudos to Jason for passing around the tip jar while we had a few warm bodies out there.  It gave us a few extras duckets when the pay was doled out at the end of the night.  Musically, we played a good mix of originals and some crowd pleasing standards.  We have a lot to choose from, it seems.  One that we played that came out well was Wayne Shorter's Yes or No.  I remember finding a cd copy of Juju in a cutout bin at Tower Records in D.C. back in the late 80's.  I was looking for some Wayne, and this was the album since I loved Yes or No from the Real Book and the jazz labs I had been a part of.  Ah, memories of a jazz neophyte.  Well, the tune is somewhat Coltrane influenced.  What I take away from it is the harmonic changes, especially the 1st eight bars: 4 of what is essentially a C over D chord: C/D but labeled as a D7sus4 with a sustained E as the melody (so it's a D9sus4 with the chordal tones of d, g, a, c, e).  C major has the tones c, e, g so the d & a act like the power chord fifth under the C.  That how it could be thought of.  The 2nd 4 bars are Dmaj7 (Dmaj9) so the f# is now audible, along with the c# major 7th.  It's like a cloud has been lifted from the tension.  The bridge or B section is basically a walk through 4th's in the key of Ebmaj (Lydian with a raised 4th occasionally).  Hard to generalize, but I like the A half-diminished versus the more tonic Abmaj7.  Well, that's my theory moment this week.  Other standards pulled out were Mercy Mercy Mercy & a request for Lullaby of Birdland by our audio engineer friend from Eddie's Attic who showed up as were about to call it.  Here are some shots that are worth sharing.

Wine enthusiasts relaxing inside as Jessica offers another tasting.

The incredible brews on tap, overshadowed by the righteous coffee drinks and wine selection.  Just look at the choices.  It's almost sad to order a beer since it means there are 5 others you can't have while you're quaffing this one!

Miss Jessica kindly poured me a small glass of the Sierra Nevada Summerfest pilsner to try in addition to my pint of Avery.  The fellas will tell you that I was a happy camper for the remainder of the break!

Self portrait as we were packing up.

Adrian with our bud from Eddie's Attic whose name promptly escaped me.  He requested and was quite appreciative and impressed to hear Lullaby of Birdland, which is a favorite of mine as well.

Extra special mention goes to the Fonkenator, who honored me with acknowledging my 1-year anniversary with the Adrain Ash Group.  He brought me a present of 3 brand new 12-foot long 1/4 inch patch cables!  Very nice cables too!  Sweet!  Thank you Guy!!!

One last thing: saw Planet Zu yesterday at Georgia Perimeter College's Jazz on the Lawn series.  Very inspirational in terms of my budding songwriting.  I think good smooth jazz may be my ticket.  I'm a trad fan but I honestly am a bit intimidated by all of the theory, heritage, and the plethora of tunes out there.  Well, these jazzers can lay it down: Dan Baraszu on guitar (primarily a nylon-string electic), David Ellington on Hammond B-3 (I hear he genreally kicks the bass but he doesn't in this line up), Joseph Patrick Moore on fretted and fretless basses, and Marlon Patton on the drums.  Spencer and I sat next to Greg McLean, who had just finished playing.  The weather was perfect for a picnic lunch.  Here's a pic from my vantage point - darn tent pole right in the middle of the stage view.