First of all, I got my turntable up and running this past Saturday morning, finally. It wasn't packed well (SKB - Shoulda Known Better) and so it wasn't operating upon arrival. I decided to try to repair it myself. I finally figured it out, after leaving it alone for a bit. All it took was one washer to level the platter. Let's hope that's it, 'cause now it's too late to return it... I played a nice guitar album and it made it all the way through. Very distorted at first, until I learned of the "line/phono" switch in the back; it was on "line" and I was plugged into the phono input (thus utilizing the premap on my Denon receiver). Modern issues. Old phonographs did not have that problem. Once I switched that, it was crystal clear and warm/fat/analog heaven! Next I need to connect it to my PC via the USB cable so I can rip a record - funny to type that! Old friends remember my big ol' collection of vinyl - still have a bunch of it.
Rock-N-Ride was going on downtown adjacent to the fine Capital City Club, making for a potentially tumultuous commute and load in. It turned out to be okay. Peachtree Street (yes, THE Peachtree Street) was closed, but the police let me through the barricades to enter the driveway of the club. We had a few things to go over, most notably my vocal turn at Sting's Fields of Gold. I practiced singing it several times as the week went on after reading V's email concerning who would sing it... I almost memorized the words. In fact, I'm on somewhat of a mission to do away with the charts on stage. During the soundcheck, I gave it my best. We were all a bit uncertain of the form. It's a bit strange but it does make sense if you plot it out: begins with the vamp on Bm, after the 1st verse it returns to Bm, after the 2nd it goes to the tonic D, after the 3rd Bm, after the 4th D, then the bridge G, last 2 verses it goes to the D. Not so bad, it's those pesky Bm vamps that fool us. I almost had those lyrics memorized, I just needed those reference lines to get me through. I guess I wasn't spectacular; nobody said anything about my attempts. Nothing. How nice. Well, if you can't say something nice, then don't say anything at all. I really gave it my best and tried in vain to sing strongly and with some emotion. The song really speaks to me in a way that it probably doesn't to others. I find it to be a brilliant 3 minute pop ballad in a very classical sense: the repetitive imagery, the musical pauses that give the story time to develop, the cool minor 11 nylon string voicings, the lower range of his voice, the sedate drum pattern played by Vinnie C. (! - that alone is worth the price of admission, if you know what Mr. Colaiuta is capable of), I may think of more down the road. I just like to sing and aspire to try a simple song like that once in a while - that's all! I thought it came out nicely - my own opinion. I didn't choke and didn't get too self conscious. All of the sudden it was time to do it; I was wearing the NS WAV (a new trick, strapping it on - no jokes, please - before slipping the jacket on over the strap. A clean look considering the hardware involved to wear this beast! Consequently, I couldn't switch fast enough to the J bass. I played the song on the WAV and it was nice.
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| My only chart for the night! |
As you can see, I need some help editing my photo uploads! I just decided all of this was too good to keep to myself! The one with Kevin over my shoulder makes me laugh just thinking about it! We had some time to kill, so that's how I dealt with it all. Glen tried to come to my rescue and he took that artsy angled pose of me - thanks G-Clef! You are a musical wonder, all that info you keep in your cranium!
We had a real good gig with people dancing on virtually every song, even the first ones after the featured dances. Made a medley out of Start Me Up --> Hurts So Good. That Stones song gets so much mileage out of that one riff and then just playing those chords over and over. Funny how the chorus sounds different but it's just the same chords as the verse, without the Bb (in our case A as we drop it down a half step). So, what I was especially proud of was that I did the gig (other than the Sting tune) without my music stand - no charts! We even did On Green Dolphin Street (in E flat) and I had those changes memorized. Yay for me! I'm going to try extra hard to not utilize my book in the future. Been working on some of those nutty tunes (Last Dance is one I thought I would never get in my head, but I'm real close). I'll always have to bring it, as we know so many and I guess anything could be called at any moment. We are given the setlist ahead of time so that does help a lot! My J bass sounded sublime after the darkness of the WAV. It makes me wonder why I bother with all of those others I bring out. I'm liking my "synth" patch on the Boss ME-50B utilizing the square wave setting, with the 4 pots at 12 o'clock. It's not as chewy as the other "synth" settings but still nice and springy.
Gus is close to losing his cast and starting on the physical therapy. His double kick pedal was in full effect at any rate. We had Anton, of course, and he rapped on Good Feeling - did it well but then I couldn't really hear him. His little keyboard really sounds dope; nice to have 2 keyboardists once in a while. He got with me a couple of times, as he's wireless also. Fun! Derek was his usual bad-a** self, shredding all over the joint. Glen had to sing a lot, but he nailed that high note during the break on Shout! The front line of Kevin, Virginia, and Lexxi were laughing and having the best time. Lexxi did great on the first dance of This Will Be (An Everlasting Love), Virginia sang a beautiful rendition of Adele's version of Bob Dylan's Make You Feel My Love, and Kevin led us through a fine version of Brown Eyed Girl (sorry Kevin, I can't remember what new tune you were on this time out)! Dianna was hanging out at the end - great to see her and she was her usual good-natured self. Oh yeah, DJ was there. He doesn't hang with us during the breaks so sometimes I forget that he's the 9th member. Great sound from him, but no subs so I was not in the system. No worries - my amp wasn't even pushed to the max like on some of the shows.
We hit it again next weekend in Asheville, somewhere on the Biltmore Estates rambling campus, so we'll catch up after that!
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