Where have we been?
Wednesday: The Yacht Rock Revue began our little northeast tour with a local gig at the Weather Channel, celebrating their thirtieth anniversary with a party. An unusual start, if for no other reason than I drove down to the office, loaded my gear in the trailer, and then drove most of the way back to my house for a gig. This one was 80s themed, since they began in 1982.
The gig was pretty easy. We backed the trailer up to the stage, unloaded, and set up. Good weather (predictably) made it all go well. We were on one end of a giant tent; food trucks were on the other; Jim Cantore in the middle. Cantore looks like a cop, by the way--a bit shorter than me, stockier, shirt sleeves rolled up--Detective Cantore. The food truck (Yumbii) was awesome, by the way, and I had two desserts from the King of Pops.
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| Detective Cantore in the lower left hand corner |
After the gig, we packed up and drove up to Charlotte, NC, where we spent the night.
Thursday: We were up pretty early for the drive to Baltimore for our next gig. This one was a public/private event for Groove Commerce at a bar called Little Havana. Pretty cool setting--right on the inner harbor in a pretty good sized room. They loved us and we loved them. B is for Baltimore and B is for beautiful boobies. I saw many of them; exquisite scenery. Evidently, internet marketing is big with the babes.
The sound was good, the energy was great, and the views were mighty fine. Another good performance by us.
Here's a video:
Friday: We were able to sleep in because we only had to go to Washington DC for our next gig, so we left around 11 AM. The traffic in the city was incredibly bad, even mid day--it took us probably forty-five minutes to get parked once we got within sight of the venue.
We played a public gig at a super swank room called The Hamilton. It looked to me like a really upscale jazz club; their calendar lists everybody from Roy Hargrove to Toad the Wet Sprocket.
They had an underground loading dock where we could stash the van and go wander for a few hours.
Dannells led a few of us to a pretty good African restaurant called Peri Peri. Lots of dead chicken. I ate four bowls of frozen yogurt (it was all you can eat).
We still had an hour before load in, so we then went to the Spy Museum. Pretty groovy, with lots and lots of Cold War stuff. It had hidden listening devices, guns disguised as other things, things you can stick up your butt in the name of national security, and an air duct for Dannells and me to climb in.
The Hamilton was cool, the stage was nice, the backstage was super groovy. I had an hour to actually warm up for this gig, so I found a back hallway where I could zone out and play saxophone. Ahh…
The gig itself was OK. I figured out really quickly (as did everybody in the room) that there was some kind of low end thing happening to the right of Dannells, and whenever I would step forward to take a sax solo, it would feed back--a gig-destroying low frequency, high volume roar that the sound guys never could fix. If I stayed at my station, things were OK, but it kind of neutered my performance (on a night where we played Baker Street, Maneater, and Careless Whisper). I was really disappointed. Everyone seemed to have a theory, but nobody had a solution. Could it be that I when I walked out, I was right on top of the sub under the stage? The sound guy didn't think so. Whatever it was, they couldn't get it right.
Awesome light show, light guy.
Here's a video of us crushing Rosanna. The mix sounds really good! Early in the night, I turned my amp off for a while--I was so cranked in the house, I didn't need it!
Saturday: This was the toughest day of all. We spent the night at a crummy hotel in Maryland, then got up on four hours of sleep and drove to New York City for a pair of gigs.
Gig number one was a three set extravaganza on a pier in NYC (pier 83, I believe). We were on one end of what was really just the Circle Line's parking lot); Wrestlers were on the other end--a Nacho Libre situation. In the middle was the most pathetic excuse for a taco stand ever, manned by the Disgruntled Asshole Taco Servers Union. We changed on a boat with about thirty of the wrestlers, in a haze of body odor that nearly asphyxiated me. All of us has an El Guapo to face.
The whole thing felt really cheap. The stage was small, the taco thing sucked real bad, the wrestling thing was weird (congratulations to DJ Phat Pat for winning his match). If I didn't know any better, I would have sworn that he was one of Cobb's biggest fans (by weight), Terry.
We had a really good all female mariachi band open for us. Nice pants, ladies.
In spite of the surrounding BS, we played well. The sound was pretty good, though my sax mic picked up some interference and started cutting out (nobody told me until the gig was over, though).
When the Cinco del Cheapo was over, we packed up and let a crew of guys move our gear two piers over (pier 81?) to a boat for a booze cruise (ride around New York harbor, drink yourself stupid). The one we did last time seemed like a decent set up for music on a boat. This one, in contrast, looked like Yacht Rock hijacked a Circle Line Cruise. We jammed ourselves in a corner and set up.
This gig was pretty insane, like we were playing a basement frat party. No stage (and no room), so the crowd was right on top of us. I had some crazy girl who kept banging on the top notes of my keyboard. She also jumped in and screamed into Dannells' microphone a couple of times. The security guy was worthless, but I also think the crowd was so thick, he couldn't see what she was doing. The sound man couldn't see us either. Afterwards, he told me "When I was learning how to use this mixer last night, I was hoping to get a band like you guys." Yikes.
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| Hey Gina! |
We loaded out and headed to our hotel. Greg almost got in a fight with a guy picking up laundry. The place had problems with the rooms, so we had to share beds. I flooded our entire bathroom by taking a shower. What a messy day!
Sunday: We left Nick and Dannells behind in the city and pointed the van towards home. The five of us took turns snoring.
Our return got as far as Gastonia, NC, where we spent the evening. Applebees. Yay.
Monday: The last few hours went by pretty quickly. Home again!
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