Friday, February 9, 2024: Ft. Wayne, Indiana.
Early flight, small plane, decent nap.
We were in town early enough to go find lunch before the load in, so our van landed at an industrial building that had been repurposed as a food court. This burrito was every bit as bland as you'd expect food in the midwest to be. Hans can tell you about it.
I thought it was going to be cold and miserable, but my run had pretty nice weather.
Dinner. Some kind of veggie burger and fries. Totally acceptable.
Our show for this evening was at The Clyde Theatre, which is owned and maintained by Sweetwater (a musical instrument supply company).
Sweetwater even has a gear vending machine in the lobby!
Pretty decent show! We were all really tired, but we got through it.
Saturday, February 10, 2024: Nashville, Indiana. Today's van ride was three hours long. We stopped in a shopping center in Greenwood for lunch, and Zach, Hans, and I ate in this Mexican restaurant with all these wood carved seats and...other things. Decorations? Olé.
This evening's show was at the Brown County Music Center. Pretty new, and really nice. This was kind of a hometown show for Nick and Pete, as we are very close to Columbus, Indiana.
Pete's knee brace. He messed up his knee when we were on stage in Florida, and as he waits for it to heal, he's using this to keep it from getting any worse.
Seen on today's run.
A birthday cake for Greg and Ganesh, courtesy of the Anchorheads.
Good show here!
When I was assembling my horn before soundcheck, the neck of my tenor slid out of the bell and landed on the floor. I didn't realize it at the time, but the octave key bent slightly, causing it to sometimes work fine, and sometimes not really work (almost like there was a major leak at the top of the horn!). I spent the first six or seven songs trying to figure out what was going on, and then once I remembered the next hitting the ground, I was able to bend it back in place well enough to play the show.
We flew home from Indianapolis Sunday morning, and the Indy airport had a basketball court set up in the atrium to highlight the NBA All Star game being in town.
Tuesday, February 13, 2024: Boston, Massachusetts. Before we'd even finished the gigs in Indiana, most of us were already concerned about the possibility of bad weather in New England, and by Monday, the news reports of a nor'easter forced us to switch to an earlier flight.
When we landed in Boston, it was raining steadily...
...and by the time we reached the venue, it was already changing over to snow.
This place was a cool spot to hang out, though. The MGM Music Hall is connected directly to Fenway Park, and had lots of music and sports memorabilia.
The room itself was much bigger than I'd anticipated! Kind of weird that it's situated just down the street from the Boston House of Blues.
By 2 PM, the rain/snow had completely stopped, and our gig was spared.
This is a very nice dressing room, by the way.
Nice room!
Since the weather abated, I was able to squeeze in a run. Boston is a pretty good place to run, but my phone and GPS watch get completely messed up when I need directions.
This was some kind of lemon cake. Fantastic.
We spent the night at the Verb Hotel (in the same neighborhood as Fenway), and I unwound from the day with a little Steely Dan on the record player.
Friday, February 23, 2024: Alpharetta, Georgia. I got a last minute call to sub on the Bumpin' the Mango gig for a sick friend.
It was a long, loud gig--three one hour long long sets from eight to midnight. We were on wedges, and the keyboardist had his keyboard so loud on our side of the stage that I couldn't hear much of anything else--I was definitely inaudible to him, and probably anybody else around us, so I jammed ear plugs into my ears (at least I could hear myself that way) and did the best I could.
Tuesday, February 27, 2024: Atlanta, Georgia. We played a private gig at Mercedes Benz Stadium for the company that owns Arby's, Jimmy John's, Dunkin' Donuts, and several other fast food brands. The gig was in the Delta Sky Club at the stadium. I got lost inside the building and did a lap around the field before I found it (remarkably, nobody ever stopped me to ask where I was supposed to be!). My poor sense of direction struck again.
My big excitement of the day was that I repaired the bite plate on my tenor mouthpiece. It had popped off when I was washing the mouthpiece. I dipped it in boiling water to soften it so it would fit back in the pocket on top, and dabbed a little bit of super glue to hold it in place. Good as new!
I also had a repairman go through both horns to catch the little leaks that have developed over the past couple of months, including my bent octave key!
