We All Will Be Received In Graceland

A cold, blustery night has descended upon Atlanta.  It must be the time for my return to Java Monkey.  I've been there during the hottest and the coldest temps.  The wind was particularly harsh.  Had to bring the brunt of the PA system.  Don't tell a soul.  My PA is less than my bass system, for the most part.  Still. it involves a couple of mains and a powered mixer.  Plus, I was giving Jeff a ride, along with his guitar, weighted electronic piano/keyboard, amp, and various accessories.  The jalopy was loaded down.

I had spent the better part of the morning, not to mention the better part of the day before, making and improving charts for the said gig.  Well, as luck would have it, I decided to mix up my arsenal.  To the detriment of my self esteem, my book of charts was left in the pocket of my bass gig bag that I chose to leave at home.  No charts after all.  Well, the decision was made and I found myself alone on the chart front - until, JT came to the rescue!  He had printed out some older, weaker charts from the first time we made a notion in public.  Horway!!!  I probably would have died a slow death without these fabled charts.  It was an awesome realization.  I cannot discount the level of wonderfulness I might have for Mr. J.T. at this moment in time.  Are you with me?  Here is the kicker: my wife and our 2 sons make their way through the curtain of disdain into the heated patio area as the set was winding down.  What a shocker!  From Marietta to Decatur, with the boys!  She could have brought the book of charts!  If only I had alerted her!

We performed the entirety of Paul Simon's Graceland album for our second set.  This was quite an undertaking, even without our attempt to recreate it note for note.  We didn't have horns or even one saxophone, and we certainly weren't from Africa.  I gave it my best to cop the lines on my fretless bass.  We had done a few of these tunes before.  It felt like the climax was the a capella tune Homeless.  All in all, it worked well, perhaps a bit slow and pensive.  I was given the low register, which in many ways is the easiest to hear.  The PA system that I brought was indeed am adequate one for the vocals, keyboards, and percussion.  My little GK combo that I had recently worked on was plenty loud, although I felt like I could have nudged it up a bit more.  On this stage, smaller was better.

Highlights of the night:

a great groove on Richard Cory, with a sense of tightness that we haven't felt in the past.  Kind of wishing I could do that one on a tapping instrument to realize the baritone guitar/Fender VI old-school bass lick in conjunction with the standard bass.  What I do is still nice - Adrian prompted me during the rehearsal to detune my low E on the Fender down to D.  That way, I'm hitting the lick in the correct octave and then getting the real bottom from the low D.

set 2 with all of Graceland - not too bad!  We had played some of these before, so it wasn't all brand new.  However, the arrangements have continued to become more fleshed out.  Jeff brought a great neo-accordian  vibe to The Boy In The Bubble, which before was simply acoustic guitar.  Don added so much, evoking washboard effects through his use of shells and inventive percussives.  It wasn't noticeable until I heard the audio playback.

a most excellent Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes, where we had a great vocal intro (nailed in the key  of E), thus launching into the melodic shimmering guitar in F.  Matt nailed that beautiful guitar figure that is jsut so flowing and wonderful.  My bass was virtually on; as good as I've ever been on the fretless glissandos and subsequent slap on the weird 2 beat delayed chorus vamp.

the aforementioned Homeless, sung by all of us with an ear on each other.  Deep and forlorn, it was rather nice how well it worked.  I'd like to see us try this again on a different stage where we could all come up front, stand in a line, and sing it without our instruments.  Simple ideas like this can come together for each song to make it more of a show.

A few shots from Sabina's lens...

Here are some that I took of the guys before we began the first set - warming up, so to speak.  Note the debut of Matthew's new Ibenez electric!

My family showed up, making this a most memorable occasion!  Thank you Sabina!  You rock!

Note audience members John Marsh, keyboardist and vocalist from Deep Blue Sun, as well as our other percussionist Richie Jones with his lovely wife Samantha (yes, that's J.T.'s sister!) (that couple are new parents on their first date since their baby girl was born - congrats!).

Martay's Holiday Party at Padriac's

It was rather desolate.  You know the crowd will be thin when Marty and I both park close to the front door.  The few tables that were there were not there for us.  Too bad   We tried to remain inspired with the sparse crowd.  We actually had the best mix onstage of any time we've played there.  It sounded supremely tight.  I had a small revelation concerning some slap technique: utilizing the thumb more for those quick 16th-note thumps versus a thumb and then a pop.  It sounds so much more funky to hit just the low note.  Save the pop for the occasional accent, not for every call and response.  More on that later.  Most real players already do this.  I have some slap issues to still iron out, I suppose.

Yeah, our balance was great and we had some nice confidence going on.  I think it was several factors:

a. Brent's kick drum was mic'ed and fairly high in the mix
b. My bass was clear but not too loud or boomy
c. Martay's guitar amp was mic'ed, but mixed low into the PA
d. The vocals were loud, and we had monitors
e. We had some near perfect tempos (tempi?) and Brent kept them very steady
f. Um, no dancing girls means no distractions?

On my amp, I think it sounds better to have the attenuation switch off, meaning a high gain input.  I was previously thinking that this simply made my signal too loud.  It steals a lot of the tone with the pad in place, to my ears.  No hair, no balls, whatever  you want to call it.  Better to not run the master volume very high.  Only issue there is that any adjustment makes a big difference, as the master is set on 1 or maybe 2..  The wireless performed really well.  I think it works better upside down, so that the output jack is on top when connected to my strap.  Just have to use the little bungee chord to secure it to the strap, as the hook is inverted.

We ended up not playing a second set.  Ernie stuck us with the tab, since we didn't bring many people in and  we took a break for the rest of the night.  Can't say I could argue with him.  Too bad I wasn't able to fill in for Fuji at Pastis.  That would have been a much better crowd.  I asked Marty to ask for the odd-numbered months for next year.  Late December is always a bust.  Sometimes late August can be as well.  Great to hang with Cliff.  Wanted him to sing with us.  Maybe next year.

Cliff is a good friend of the band.

Getting ready for Christmas, and then 2 gigs to close the year out:

Saturday December 29: Absynthe Makes The Art Garfunkel at Java Monkey Facebook Event Page

Monday December 31: New Years Eve with Platinum V (a small, house-trained subset of Platinum featuring the prodigious performing talents of Dianna Crawford.  It's a closed event at Atlanta Athletic Club in Johns Creek (no apostrophe).  I still say look it up and come crash the party.  All right, that may not work.

I will try to give more notices through some sort of calendar or just random posts.  Until then, here's mud in yer eye!

A Christmas Party for the Night Owls at Chambrel

First of all, it's always been a challenge for me to write about these events, er, gigs.  The bottom line is, they are a contractor job much like any other.  The fact that music is played sometimes doesn't even necessarily make them fun.  I hope they are fun.  Reading about them is probably not that fun.  Writing about them can be less than fun, but we persevere.  I will try to continue to be honest and fair, certainly even at my own expense.  Those who know me well enough to hire me are generally pleased with my performance.  I make a good effort to show up on time or even early, have the music under my fingers (or least charted out), have good sounding and reliable equipment (we know how that goes), and be in a good mindset to offer some good rapport with my comrades on stage and elsewhere.  I haven't been able to keep up with the flow of the jobs that well lately.  I appreciate those of you who may chose some of your valuable cyber-time to come over here and see what's up in my world.  What I'm trying to say is that I usually don't finish a posting in one sitting.  These posts take time - time to chose and process the photos, time to proofread and then fix the typos, time to remember, time to simply find the find to post...  The pictures are always tweaked.  My digital pics are always cropped, re-sized, color corrected, adjusted for contrast and brightness, you name it.  Thanks for hanging in there and if you do, be sure to go back a few posts every so often to see if you can spot the changes.  There will be some.

Here was another Christmas party, up at Chambrel Assisted Living in Roswell.  We've done this event before.  This time out, Reece Harris filled out the trio of Martay and myself.  It was the first time Reece and I  have played together with Martay.  I've known Reece since, when was it, 1991, maybe earlier, maybe 1990.  He was finishing up some classes at BU - Boston University, and I was hanging with Shannon Pengelly (yes, the Shannon Pengelly) and we were in the planning stages for a band of our own.  Reece came back to Atlanta and the band ultimately became Fuzzy Logic, and then Baby Brando.  I could've been a real Stick player if the band had stayed together!  We'll have to revisit that thought before it gets too late in this game.

Yes, here at these facilities, he is Crazy Marty.  Good memory, you faithful readers.  The folks were ready to go early on.  We were to start at 5:30.  I got there around 5:10, after getting out of work at 4 and stopping at the nearby UPS Store to ship out some (too late for the season but that's another story) Christmas cd's and a card for my brother Steve and sister-in-law Debbie's restaurant in Leesburg, Virginia: MELT Gourmet Chesseburgers.  Ah, I hope they have a nice busy weekend and can play some of these tunes in their awesome eatery.  I have yet to try it, but I know it will be the best burger I've ever tasted.  Steve makes food that is so far above anything else in the same category.  He truly raises the bar, on everything he does.  Wishing them the best this season and always!

Okay, enough diversions.  Isn't there a medication for this sort of stream of consciousness rambling?

Reece took this with his iPad - I look so tired and worn out, I had to photoshop my eyes just a touch...

At any rate, Reece was there when I arrived.  I was told via email to set up stage left.  Reece saw the same email and set up on the stage right side.  I played some EZ Listening genre stuff from my iPod (lots of ol' Blue Eyes) and they enjoyed that.  Some even danced.  Well, when Marty arrived (over 30 minutes after the start time...), he finally figured out that he was bass-ackwards on the stage left/stage right instructions.  Just for the record, stage left is the orientation of standing on the stage, looking out to the crowd, and where your left hand would hang is the direction of stage left.  I tried to explain that.  Down stage and up stage will be addressed later!  The folks who were ready for us were not disappointed.  Many Christmas tunes and some ballads, a la It Had To Be You and even Ipanema.  They seemed to really enjoy it, even when we got a bit heavy on the endings.  The grand finale was Miserlou, an exciting blast of Dick Dale.  It got loud, but those folks probably remember surf music when it was fun and fresh.  Got bless them all.

Platinum Rocks the Intercontinental on Perhaps the Worst Day of Traffic Ever!

It took me a solid 90 minutes, okay, maybe a bit less time but not much, to get to this deluxe hotel in the heart of the Lenox area.  Long lines at the 400 toll booths (which are rumored to be around perhaps only one more year, is that right?), and then turning onto Peachtree from Piedmont.  This is one challenging load-in, with a very congested dock, tight turns, and then the imposed parking deck with the potential of getting stuck with the tab at the end of the night.  Virginia has never done us wrong on that end, so there were no worries.  All in all, I think we had a good night, but perhaps we were out of sync a bit.  I made more errors than I had in a long time; an unfortunate return to form.  I replaced the 2 9-volt batteries in the 6-string and it was fat and bright.  Had the Stick along again, for the hip-hop and easier tunes.  I learned that a tune like Flo Rida's Club Can't Handle Me, with it's chugging 8th note bass line, just doesn't work so well on the Stick, no matter how much I practice that tapping motion.  It becomes too bright and light, even with mad bottom end poured into the tonal circuit.  That is a cool advantage of the NS/Stick, the ability to finger pluck on the instrument as one would on a bass.

We didn't have Kevin, he was out with the flu.  Rough going, I'm sure Kevin.  Better to have it now than over Christmas.  We missed him quite a bit, although we were joined by a real talent: Tyron "Bogey" Thornton.  Tyron has his own band: Bogey and the Viceroy that stays busy, from the looks of it.  Bogey did a good job; nice stage patter and presence.  Hard for anybody to walk into another band and front them.  What he didn't know, Glen could certainly handle.  Hard to overstate Glen's importance in this group.  He would be a logical front man, but then who can play all of the keyboard parts?  Allen, of course, but there are so many tunes we've amassed, just over the course of this year alone.

The front line also included Marguerita Smith, who has performed several times with us recently.    She has become more comfortable in her role, adding her own twist to program.  She really shined on Aretha's (You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman.  Aretha's song, but of course it was written (and later recorded) by Carole King, with lyrics supplied by Gerry Goffin and inspiration delivered from producer Jerry Wexler.  We've been able to keep it in Aretha's key of C, which is nice in that it gives it a classic familiar sound and certainly pushes the vocalist to her limits.  Glen worked out the harmonies so that they all moved together.  I'm just glad that I can remember the tune!  That is, without having a chart in front of me.
The bridge does a bit of a maneuver:

I (maj7)  -  v        I (maj7)  -  v
IV(maj7)  -  i        IV  -  iii  -  ii  -  V

That Gm7 is the odd chord.  Your ears tell you it's a dark one, but after hitting the dominant chord throughout, going into the chorus and so forth, it's not the chord you would expect.  My little analysis above is most likely way off base.  It's more like this, now that I consider it a bit more closely:

I(maj7)  -  ii/IV     I(maj7)  -  ii/IV

It's too much to think about there!  Songs like this tell me that there are just no rules to writing songs!

Marguerita also stole the show on Midnight Train to Georgia.  Who doesn't want to be a Pip when they hear that song?  Check out her myspace link here.

He, before I forget, about that parking.  We finished at midnight.  Took a while to pack it all up and then go down the elevator.  Well, I got my parking card stamped, but that doesn't help as far as the machine to process it is concerned.  By a stroke of good fortune, an official looking man was walking past as I was preparing to go through the un-manned gate.  I showed him my card and let me out without any questions.  What if he hadn't been out there (at 12:50 am)?  I would have had a tough time getting out without paying.  That was two times this week that I got lucky on the parking fees.  Karma is energy being thrust around this world.  I intend to keep it bouncing around by doing my part and helping others as much as I can, that's for sure.

Billy Batts Ensemble Plays Your Christmas Favorites

Wow.  Hadn't had this delightful experience of when I type an incredible heartfelt post, only to have it all completely deleted.  Such is the feeling I have about this entire night and the day that preceded it.  Jason LaMarca not withstanding, it was a gig to just best put behind me.  The playing was good.  I had some melodic turns that only those 3 guys would be aware of.  My intonation on the fretless was good.  Earlier, I had the good fortune to bring my GK combo to work.  I found out that a company comes by and picks up gear to be repaired.  My amp made the list, and it's a new company for us to use.  Get this: the company we started using was founded by the tech who was leaving the electronics job I was coming into (where i only last maybe a month).  He seemed very knowledgeable.  I bet he will do good work.  That was about the only good thing to happen that day, as far as I'm concerned.

Just over it at the moment.  Had a nice long summation of the evening and now it's lost.  Oh well.  You do this enough and something unfortunate is bound to happen.  The Christmas songs were uninspired, but I was thinking about that awful tragedy in Connecticut.  What a horrible day.  Those poor people.  I can't get over it.  It's just so sad and senseless...

An addendum.  In case you're reading Walt, my apologies for not having a clue on the solo changes for the Vince Guaraldi tune Christmas Is Coming.  It was an easy vamp, that's for sure.  I will look into improving my Christmas charts for next time around, that's for sure.  The book has gotten fat, with too many page turns.  When all of those extra pages end up leaving out some crucial sections, however small, then that truly makes the sum less than its parts.  My head was not in the game, and truthfully hasn't been the last few times with the BBE.  Will have to do better at getting some much needed sleep on those Thursday nights...

The Class Act Trio Brings a Touch of Class to a Holiday Party in Midtown

I had a great time performing at a late afternoon Christmas party with Judy Boehm and Brent Whiten yesterday.  The shindig was held in the lobby 1100 Peachtree Street, or as the sign out front says: "Eleven Hundred".  Easy to miss when you're driving in early rush hour traffic and trying to find the correct entrance.  Enough said on that matter.  Judy and Brent know of what I'm alluding to.  The loading dock is on 12th Street.  We used that entrance as well, later on in the night.

Judy keeps the pace fast and furious.  There is no time to look for charts!  We just kept it going.  Santa came by and gave me a great photo op.  Brent kinda stole the show.  He's the drummer, and he also is the primary vocalist.  Then, after his verse and chorus, he sets a brush down, reaches to his side, and picks up his trumpet. and blows a chorus or two, all while keeping the beat steady and solid.  Then he puts the trumpet back down, picks up the brush, and sings the bridge to take us out.  Can you say triple-scale?!!!  That's what he should be getting on this one.  I felt so inadequate, just playing the bass.  Judy is a monster pianist, playing the full range and making everything glitter with pretty harmonies.  She is a one-woman band on this instrument.  As a bandleader, she is no nonsense, but a lot of fun and quite a pretty woman as well.  There, I said it!  I think Santa wanted a kiss from her - can't blame him!  A very winning smile and just the right amount of sass.  Anyways, we ate some delicious food and enjoyed our little break, and then we were back at it for more Christmas music.  One great tune we played was the José Feliciano chestnut Feliz Navidad.  A popular tune, easy, a bit repetitive, but we mashed it with Stevie's I Just Called To Say I Love You.  A fun mix, and we nailed the cha-cha-cha ending without even having to cue it!  A nice moment.  Other tunes I prepared for were Carol of the Bells, which has that distinctive descending bass line and then that cool V chord run with major tonality yet a flat 6th & 7th.  I practiced that and hit it with Judy, but then I realized that it's actually nicer to have those goose egg low B's holding out.  People really enjoyed what this little combo brought to the party.

One thing I gotta put in here: don't forget to get that parking ticket validated!!!  As luck would have it, neither Judy nor Brent parked in the parking deck.  Well, we all left separately, with myself being the last to exit the premises.  As I was driving to the exit, I realized that i would have to pay for parking after all.  We were promised free parking, but that was all heresay as far as the attendants were concerned.  I wisely put my car into reverse, hastily parked (in a valet spot) and ran back to the floor where I had spent the evening in search of any willing soul to help.  I found a nice lady who I remembered chatting with Judy.  She took me back to her office and presented me with a voucher that you slip into the machine after the ticket.  I was so grateful, as the fee to park would have been a heft $15.  Yeah, it's not that much, but it is to a a struggling musician who was only there to earn a few bucks anyways.  It all works out in the end sometimes.  Trust your instincts!

A Christmas Party at Coca-Cola NAT Cannot Be Flat!

Had been looking forward to this for a couple of reasons.  First and foremost, don't tell anybody but my wife works here!  Shhhh, I told you to keep it on the down-low!  She started at the Wildwood location, but as soon as she got comfortable with working 7 miles from home and not having to deal with the highway, they up and moved her to the North Avenue Tower.  So much for letting her have an easy commute and being able to get the kids on time without worry.  Anyways, she wasn't on the invite list.  Also anyways, she doesn't read this blog, so 'nuff said on that matter.  The other reason I was looking forward to this was that we played the same event last year.  The action was feebly documented here.  Many aspects were the same.  We were treated very well.  A great hot meal of filets, mushroom ravioli, salad, veggies, and of course, all of the free soda including Coca-Cola we could possibly want.

My big issue of the night: my batteries died once again in my 6-string.  I guess I've finally come to learn that that deluxe 18-volt EMG pre-amp and active pickup system is quite a current drain.  Damn!  I need to change those puppies when I change the clocks to standard or daylight saving time.  I brought the Stick (check out Stick Enterprises here) out for the hip-hop set.  Let me say that the Stick just may be my ticket to hip-hop groovedom.  Well, maybe not exactly, but I want to get some playing time on it, so let's try that.  I need a niche with that instrument and I may have found it.  It has a glorious attack on Gold Digger, This Is How We Do It, and many of the other ones.  As far as playing Ain't No Mountain High Enough on it, I'm not quite there yet, but I got through it.  I had to after my bass starting farting and spitting through Brown Eyed Girl.  Glad I had something to go to.  As luck would have it, I had my Jazz bass in the car.  It was safe in the gated parking of the NAT complex.  I fetched it after the 2nd set, rather than try to change the batteries.  It sounded great.  Why do I ever play anything else?  Really?  All I need is a Fender and I'm there.  Oh well, that's how it is with me, I suppose.  I'm not sure the band loves the Stick.  Nobody has ever said anything about it.  They look at me.  Gus shook his head.  That's about it.  Glen knows what it is.  I might bring it all back out this next weekend when we play at the Intercontinental.  Would be nice to have fresh batteries and all.  I need a more pronounced damper since I raised the nut screws one-half turn to allow for more tapping volume at the 1st and 2nd frets.  The low D-flat (and A-flat on the G string) sounded great on Gold Digger.  That song is just not right, in a good way.  A bit too much, but the crowd dances like it's the greatest song they've ever heard.  Kanye knew what he was doing on that one.  The Ray Charles hook is certainly catchy. Love the Stick, and I think I'm more or less comfortable with playing just the bass on it.  I grabbed some nice chords on This Is How We Do It:

Fm with the right hand playing (low to high): Ab C Eb (an Ab triad)
F# with the right hand playing (low to high): A# C# E#
- really, I think of it as Gb bass with Bb Db F on top (a Bbm triad)

The Stick really makes one think of the chords in a different way, I suppose how a piano player thinks.  No revelation here, but any jazzer should know that one should not be playing the root when the bass is already doing that.  One should explore the upper partials, or simply omit the root, then the fifth after that.  Great fun.

More on the Stick, if I may.  I had to play it on a good amount of the "Motown/Stax/Atlantic R&B/Classic Rock" set, starting with the middle break of Brown-Eyed Girl.  I wasn't easy, as the next tune was that James Jamerson tour-de-force Ain't No Mountain High Enough.  The best moment came with The Drifters' nugget Under The Boardwalk.  The bass kicks it off, with simple arpeggios, for us, in the key of F.  For the first time, I could bask in the juicy tone of the sweet spot of the Stick.  The piano-esque timbre made it really come alive.  If I could, I would always play that tune on the Chapman 10-stringer.  At any rate, I ran and fetched my Jazz bass during the break and played that during the majority of the 3rd set.  For a second time, the Kanye West nasty track Gold Digger was the hands-down floor packer.  No n-word was ever muttered, and that's a good thing.

Tony subbed for Anton.  Man, the band really misses those extra keys and all of the nutty stuff that Anton brings.  No offence Tony; your tenor tone was Brecker friendly and Berg-ish in all of the right ways.  I think the role has morphed into much more than that of just a horn player.  It's a multi-instrumentalist who also dances and even raps!  I talked it over with Anton at the following gig and he explained that he wouldn't do what he does now if he were subbing for someone else.  It's a level of comfort and familiarity.  That's the beauty of a regular band.  Playing with different people lets you come in refreshed; it's not stale.  Then it gets to be "what can I bring to it this time without losing the essence."  Anton has got it going on in that department.  His little keyboard is sick with the dope patches and he's got the 'tude to pull off just about anything.  Tony, get that keyboard (get one like Anton's - it's small & it has the real deal sounds).  We love you and want you back.  Make it happen!!!

Kevin informs the people that this dance isn't for just anybody, only the sexy people!

The crowd was tough and rather indifferent.  Dancing was not the focus of the evening.  We tried to read the crowd.  Numerous changes were made on the fly.  The folks were in a social frame of mind.  Still, on the loadout we were heralded as one of their favorites.  Promises were made to have us back the following year.

It was all a blur to me, until I realized that my lens was in need of a wipe down.
How about that shirt, though?

Shiny shoes and scuffed up leather pants.

Derek and Tony.

Gus driving the bus.

Glen knows the songs inside and out.