P.S. David Sanborn played sax on the L.A. Law theme song.
P.S.S. Was Susan Dey hot?
Wednesday: we flew nonstop Atlanta to LAX. I slept for all but about twenty minutes of the flight--asleep by the end of the safety video, awake to buy a sandwich somewhere over Oklahoma, and then woke up as we made the initial approach.
First stop: In and Out Burger. Having now eaten one, I'm not sure what the big deal is.
LA Weekly was advertising our show, but unfortunately misspelled our name.
Next up, we hit the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery, which is stacked full of celebrities, and they're all jammed in this little lot behind a couple of office buildings. You may read a list of the dead people here. If you don't care to, just know that this is the cemetery where Marilyn Monroe is buried.
Wednesday night, several of us went to the Dresden Lounge, which is a legendary dive bar. Marty and Elayne have been the house band for the past thirty years. Check it out.
Jon Hamm sat down in the booth next to us.
I should mention that before that, we ate at Il Capriccio. My dinner was excellent, but Dannells wished that they had beaten his chicken flat and not cooked it until it was so dry. Foodie.
Thursday: we were up early to play Good Day LA…fortunately, our bodies were still on Atlanta time, so the 6 AM lobby call felt like 9. It was easy--we played two minutes of You Make My Dreams.
Here's the video (do yourself a favor and skip ahead to the four minute mark--don't sit through the bullshit).
Once again, trouble with the name: the blurb on Good Day LA accompanying this video mentions us (sometimes) as the Yacht Club Revue.
Nice cameo of the van in there at the beginning.
After that, a couple of us made a quick pilgrimage to Sunset Blvd.
That afternoon, we jumped in the van and took a field trip to Gary Wright's house. How cool is that? A couple of nice looking Rhodes suitcase pianos, pictures with George Harrison, a cool studio with Moogs, and awesome stories. Did we really just do that?
We got back to the hotel, regrouped, and made the eight mile, hour and forty-five minute journey to The Satellite where we were playing that night.
Great gig! We had Elliot Lurie from Looking Glass sing Brandy and Dancing in the Moonlight, and Bo Wagner rocked the mallet solos on Starbuck's Moonlight Feels Right and I Got to Know. James Gadson stopped by to watch us. Mark Dannells played some great stuff on My Old School, and Mark Bencuya's organ solo at the end of Biggest Part of Me was fantastic. Around 150 people showed up to see us. Very cool for our first time out to California.
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| with Elliot Lurie |
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| with Bo Wagner |
On the way home, we stopped in Venice Beach to score some weed. No luck. It was ok, though, because we were already high.
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| High there |
Friday night, we went to see Jon Brion play at Largo. Can you say self indulgent? Thanks for the $25 nap. The five of us who went walked out in the middle of the show.
From there, we met up with Nick and Pete (who attended the Lakers game--Kareem bobblehead night!) and went to the Rainbow Bar and Grill on Sunset Blvd, where it's still 1989, judging by the dress code. We had pizza. Ron Jeremy walked by.
Saturday: wedding day! We played a reception at the Bel Air Beach Club. Old school. The wedding party=awesome; the Bel Air staff=crappy. The staff was evidently used to pushing bands around. We don't put up with that. There was friction ASAP.
Anyway, the attendees and the bride and groom were enthusiastic from the first note, which made the gig pretty easy in spite of the conditions.
Sunday: we flew out of LAX around 1 and landed in ATL around 8:30. Football and naps.
Special thanks to our soundman Hans, who drove all of our gear out there, ran sound for us, and is currently driving it all back.
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