Weezer Cruise

photo courtesy of Julia Wallace

As I write this, I can still feel the boat moving, even though I'm at home.  Here's everything I can remember…

Thursday:  we got on the boat later than we usually do.  I think, in fact, that most people were already on there--we went straight through registration and hopped aboard.  A late morning flight and a stop for lunch got us there just in time for the lifeboat drill.

The rooms were bigger than usual.  We even had room for a couch!  

The bathroom had a countertop, which I like a lot better than the usual glass shelf above the sink.

We played pretty early on in the cruise--something like 8 PM--on the stage in the Criterion Lounge.  Much bigger stage than the Candlelight, and they gave us an hour to set up and and hour to soundcheck.  I like that.  Sometimes it's a real "throw and go" thing, and there's no time to hear what things sound like until you're into the gig.  

The first set went pretty well.  Things sounded fine (lots of low end out towards the front line--possibly a hollow stage?).  I had my own monitor, so I could hear my stuff.

We're used to the way these boats work, so it was no surprise that there weren't many people in there with us, but the ones who came saw and believed.

We finished around 9:30.  Some guys went to bed.  I wandered the ship with a large cup of whiskey.  It was a REALLY slow night--not a lot people out, and not much partying going on.  What do you expect with a boatload of hipsters?

I saw the first half of the first song by song by Dinosaur Jr.  Too loud and not my thing (i.e. I didn't like it).  Check out the guitar set up (left side of the pic) and the bass set up (right side).  A bit much. 

Back to the Criterion Lounge to see who had followed us.  There was some band--a guy with a DJ set up who also played guitar, a bass player, and a drummer.  The DJ guy would get a groove rolling, and then the trio would play along with it--like chords and the bass line.  I was sitting next to the front of house guy and I said "Wow!  A song with no hook!  How about a melody?"  At that moment, the song ended and I exploded with drunken cackling laughter and several people turned around and looked at me, so I removed myself.  Oops.

I went up on the Lido deck, sat in a lounge chair, and listened to some indie rock band.  Nothing memorable, so I gave up and went to bed.

Friday:  we got up and started preparing for our big show on the Lido deck.  Unfortunately, it was uncovered!  NOOOOOOOOO!  Neither my electronics nor my acoustic instruments like direct sunlight.  That sucked.  The gig was good, though, and we had (as usual) a significantly larger audience.  Reports from out front said that Baker Street sounded huge.  The Caribbean has been alerted to my presence!

Here's a cool article about our Friday performance.

The rest of the day was easy.  More sleeping and more eating of copious amounts of fruit, but I took a day off from drinking.  I hung out a little at the end of the night at the mid-ship bar waiting to see if a party materialized, but no avail.  Instead I had the experience of listening to Nick tell people I was the biggest asshole in the band, and then later on some girl got in my face because I wouldn't dance with her (I was leaning against a pole watching the band).  That's how Friday's fun ended.

Saturday:  Cozumel!  We got off the boat around 10 AM.  The original plan was that we would rent scooters and not wreck, but the cheaper option turned out to be hiring Jose to drive us around.  $80 for the day for four of us (Mark Dannells, Greg Lee, Ganesh Giri Jaya, and me).  

The first place we went was the Mayan ruins.  Not much to look at--a stone pyramid and an old Catholic church.  They did have some dogs.

We met up with some fans in a stretch Lincoln Navigator--totally homemade!  There was a weird air conditioner unit built on the top, and the windows were smeared with silicon caulk.  We started drinking with them, passing around a bottle of tequila.

From there, the four of us moved on to the tequila tour, where our tour guide, Gabriel, got us drunk on more tequila shots.  He was loud and sweaty.  Dannells bought an $80 bottle of tequila.

Jose!  get us out of here!

From there we moved on to another restaurant.   

 They also had a dog.

I had a margarita and some kind of cheezy chicken and peppers thing.  The Navigator crew showed up shortly thereafter.  

Once everybody was finished eating, we ditched Jose and got in the Navigator with the crew.  Our next stop was some tourist trap place called Carlos and Charlie's on the main drag.  More alcohol.  I danced;  I was part of the conga line.  Other highlights included doing the dance along with Y.M.C.A., except the DJ would kill the music and say "Why are you gay" in the chorus.  The servers also opened a tank of compressed air and shot it at the dance floor while pouring tequila into the stream.  That looked cool.  I got sticky.

We got back on the boat, sat in the hot tub and listened to Dinosaur Jr (from behind the stage, which was still WAAAAAAAAAAAAYY too loud, but tequila and beer got me through it).  I ate and got back to my cabin.

The next thing I knew, it was 4:30 AM and I was still in my swimsuit, still in my room.  I changed and went back to bed.

Sunday:  thanks to a TV in my cabin, I saw a lot of football stuff.  That ate up a good amount of time.  All the bands on the boat took a photo, and we met a couple of significant people:  Brian Ray, who plays guitar with Paul McCartney and also worked with Etta James, and Josh Freese, who plays drums with everybody.  I never know what to say to those people, other than thanks for checking us out.  They're not any different than any other high caliber musicians I know, they just happen to be on bigger gigs.

So…football football football.  Dannells told his fitness joke at the Weezer Q and A.

We played our final show of the cruise at 10 PM back in the Criterion Lounge.  This show was the best attended, but sounded the worst--speaking specifically of the sound (not the playing).  The production was all digital so all the settings were saved from our previous show, but it seemed like the bass was all over the place, and Dannells was EXTREMELY UNHAPPY with the amp he borrowed.  In spite of that (and this one happened to be a "throw and go" with a thirty minute change over from the previous band), I think we performed really well and the crowd was extremely enthusiastic.  Ganesh played his ass off.

Josh Freese (with a fake mustache) sat in with us on Peg.  No big deal for us…just another performance of a song we've played hundreds of times.  He had fun--how often do you get to play a Steely Dan song with a band who can really nail it?

It reinforces my feeling that the difference between that guys with whom I play locally and a guy like that is more about the opportunity than some giant leap in talent.  I think we can hang just fine.

Some more drinking…I was doing my best to plow through the remainder of the whiskey we'd smuggled on the boat.  I gave up pretty early (2 AM, maybe?).

Monday:  we didn't have to get off the boat until 9 AM (usually it's an hour earlier).  Nice.  Not so nice was that our flight wasn't until 7 PM, so we tried to kill off the day in Miami.  The cruise organizers helped us leave our gear at their hotel, so we caught a shuttle to the airport and then city bus to South Beach.  Hours later, we arrived!  Pretty cool--I'd never been there before.  We ate at an awesome restaurant (I had 4 steak tacos and a side order of rice--for my homies!)  We took a stroll on the beach.  

Finally we ended up drinking mojitos at some lounge (called "The Mojito Lounge").  A real stick of sugarcane jammed in there.  Nice.

At the end of the day we cabbed it back to the hotel (our cab driver's name was "Louis XVI"!), shuttled it to the airport, and flew home!  The end!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Variety Playhouse show

We made it!  Another big show has come and gone.  There were some rough spots, but we all got through it.  Thanks to the crowd for the great turn out, and thanks to Farrell for making it look so good.

Not much for me to do on this gig…I played on about two thirds of the first set (things like cowbell on the outro of one song), two minor things on the middle set, and most of the last set.  At least it made loading out quick and easy.  I also ate half a bag of Cheetos on stage and drank enough of a martini to make my lips numb.

I got up and did my two church gigs (with a big nap in between).  I've got nothing to say about either one.  Actually, I will say that my soprano sound was good tonight--I have a reed in just the perfect point in its life.  Also, my flute is still in the shop from the beer spill incident, so I used a different flute with much better results.  It really shows how messed up my instrument was.  Not cool, beer spill girl!  You owe me a frickin' boatload of money for the repadding of my flute!

Here are a few recents YouTube additions…Dick in a Box has a good sax solo at the end (2:15 until the end).



My Old School…utilizing my sax effects pedal to set to play in octaves.  I could afford to be louder in the mix, but damn everybody sounds good on this one.



davidfreemanmusic.net

The Ivy

Yacht Rock played a show at The Ivy in Buckhead last night.  Where's that?  It used to be Carbo's, and then it burned.  Now it looks like a two story Buckhead bar, complete with asshole parking attendant.

It was a strange gig.  I can't really say why we were there.  It was the beginning of their "Thursday Night Concert Series" (what the hell is that?), which is obviously so huge and important and worth the money that they failed to mention it on their EVENTS PAGE on their website.  I guess they made up for it with multiple Facebook posts.

I think we played alright.  The place was packed in spite of the aforementioned ineptitude.  We tested out a few of the songs from our upcoming Dazed and Confused show, which gave me a chance to sit back and do nothing.

Anyway, no big deal…

Friday was an all day mega rehearsal for the Variety Playhouse show.  A week ago, I thought we were screwed and it wouldn't come together in a week.  Now I think the show's going to be really good.  Fear and charts!

I managed to watch almost all of Top Gun while Led Zep 4 was rehearsed.  I still can't believe Kelly McGillis is a lesbian.

Big show Saturday night!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Old Friends, New Year

I'm back!

I started the year by attending a friend's wedding.  Will Scruggs played in the band (Kingsized) at the reception.  Yay!  I've known Will since he was still in college at Emory, and he sounds better than ever.  Will has done really well at creating his own gigs and finding his own "thing."  Very cool!  He's also a really nice, dependable guy.  You can see what he's up to by checking out his website.  Yay Will!

Will Scruggs!

My family took a week long trip to Disney World during the first week of the year.  Along the way, we had a little time to take the David Freeman:  This is Your Life! tour, visiting all my old schools, homes, ex-girlfriend's homes, and hangouts in Orlando.  It looks just the way I left it twenty years ago.  Has it really been twenty years since I graduated from high school?

my old house

my old school

Being back gave me a chance to reconnect with a few of the most important people in my life.  First was my old saxophone teacher, Artie Almeida.  She (and her husband John) have been on the music scene forever in Orlando, and they're still playing and teaching a lot.  Amazing people!  I love that they've stayed in central Florida and made the most of their opportunities (she got her doctorate in education and flies around the GLOBE giving seminars about teaching elementary music;  he is now the trumpet professor at UCF).  Aside from my family, they were the most influential people for me as an aspiring musician.

After that, we zoomed by my old neighborhood to check in with the Mr. and Mrs. Dougherty.  They are parents to my best friend in high school, Neil, and they often served as surrogate parents when mine weren't available!  Mrs. Dougherty has been one of my biggest fans FOREVER.  They are wonderful people--I wish they were still a bike ride away.

On Sunday, it was back to work.  Church gig number one…usual stuff.  I got a little solo on one of the songs.

 Even Now (sax) by David B Freeman

I didn't bother bringing my flute to church gig number two--just played soprano through the whole thing.  I think most of the pads in the right hand are ruined from the beer spill a few weeks ago.  Time to go see Bryan Lopes!

davidfreemanmusic.net

NYE on Ice

The Yacht Rock Revue closed out our spectacular year by playing our New Year's Eve show at the Park Tavern.  Just like last year, they put carpet and a stage on top of the skating rink…we were the greatest show on ice?

We played a really good show, I thought.  I can't think of anything that didn't sound good--it was just a really solid, even show to a sold out (1,500 people) crowd.  It was also shown on a webcast, so anybody could tune in.  How cool is that?  Very hip--I hope that continues with next year's Park Tavern summer concert series.

I played pretty well.  I had a couple of spots where I was really killing it, immediately followed by brain farts and corresponding wipeouts.  Oops.  Tim Smith was standing behind me offstage for the entire second set--maybe he wasn't listening to me?  On the whole, I think I was good, though.  Hopefully this erases my abomination of a performance the last time we were here.

As far as New Year's goes…I've never been a fan.  I think because my parents treated it like it was any other night, I've never felt like the world was crossing some imaginary boundary.  After the show, I couldn't get away from the Park Tavern quickly enough, past the puke puddles and the girls so drunk they were crying.  Some lady stopped her car in the middle of 10th Street for several minutes because her passenger had his door open, throwing up again and again (I know because I got stuck behind them).  

At the next light, I looked in my rearview mirror, and guess who was behind me, hazards on, passenger side door open.  Not impressive.

davidfreemanmusic.net

A Wedding? On a Thursday?

Yacht Rock played a wedding Thursday night.  Weird, huh?  I guess they were cashing in on every discount you could find.  Fine with me, though…instead of coming home at 2:30 AM smelling of smoke (and possibly having to wipe spilled beer off my flute),  I was home at midnight.  Plus, we made more money.  So ha!  A win all around.

The gig was pretty fun.  I mean, especially for a wedding, it was a relaxed, nobody's bugging us kind of thing.  We hadn't played together in ten days--it felt pretty good compared to the previous wedding where we were all committed to getting out of there ASAP.  Mark Cobb seemed pretty refreshed, like he was enjoying himself.  Bencuya slipped Rockit into his I Want to Be Your Lover solo again.  Good stuff.

We played Give a Little Bit again.  I screwed up the sax solo the last time we played it.  And then I heard it in the grocery store a few days before Christmas, and as soon as it started I knew I would be standing there listening to the spot where I bit it.  My shame, conveniently located in aisle six at Publix.  Anyway…the solo came back to me.  I played it fine.  I need to stop thinking about it so much.

We also hit Biggest Part of Me for the first time in a long time.  I had a pretty good solo going on that one, but the weird thing was that I was kind of doing little bunny hops and kind of moving around a bit--almost uncontrollably.  Not like a seizure;  but I the part of my brain that was not involved in the head-to-hands chain that makes the music was saying "Why do you keep doing that?  What the hell is wrong with you?" but I just kept kind of using a little body language to pound out my solo.  I don't do too much of that--there's always some "for the show," but this was more of the involuntary, electricity-running-through-me kind of thing.

Last gig of the year…Yacht Rock is playing at the Park Tavern Saturday night.  Get your tickets now!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Duo Dave

I played a GREAT duo gig last night with the one and only David Ellington.

Driving up Main Street in Woodstock, I thought "Man, it's dark here!"  My directions told me I was in the right place, but all the shops and restaurants looked closed.  I pulled into the parking lot, met up with Ellington, and we investigated on foot.  It turned out that a car had plowed into a transformer and knocked everything out!  I sent Ellington home and agreed to play the gig solo.

Right before I was to begin, the power kicked back on, so I called Dave and told him to turn around and come back.  In the mean time, I went ahead and played solo sax for about twenty minutes.  Once he was set up, we played a couple of normal length sets.

Part of it was that I was having a great night--I felt good and I had a good reed and I could hear myself--but Ellington really made me play better.  We hadn't played a gig together in over a year, and it felt like we picked right back up.  He played really well and made every tune comfortable.  It was a good gig and good hang with one of my favorite people.

Some guy tipped us a dollar for playing Giant Steps.  I think it worked out to be a penny for each of us per chorus.

Fun stuff!  I hope to see Dave again soon.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Christmas Eve Gigs

I ended up with three Christmas Eve gigs last night…two at church gig number 2, and one at church gig number 1.

The first two were in the parish hall, and turned out to be pretty easy.  I think the most challenging thing about being in there is mixing, as we plug into the wall and use the speakers in the ceiling.  From our spot in the corner, it's impossible to hear what we sound like--I had to walk out a half dozen times and check it out, usually right down the center aisle because of the Christmas Eve overcrowding.

I did help myself right from the start by unplugging all the XLRs from the mixer and zeroing out the board.  No point dealing with all the crap.  I did figure out how to use the onboard effects, so the second service got to hear us with reverb.  Yippee!

Playing-wise, things were ok.  I felt ok on flute, and my soprano felt really good (Lopes just finished putting it back together about a week ago).  Christmas carols are pretty straight forward.

I raced out of Buckhead at 7, headed to church gig number 1.  Driving and changing my shirt at the same time...what other profession does stuff like this on a regular basis?  I thought, what am I going to say when I wreck with one arm in my shirt and my pants wide open?

I made it in plenty of time.  No sweat.  I could have changed my shirt in the parking lot.

The gig went pretty well.  I did catch an audible--play Oh Little Town of Bethlehem on flute.  I was WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY out of tune on that one, and fumbling the melody a couple of times made me sweat, which my flute slide around on my lip, which made me sound worse, which made me sweat more.  Turn up the suck!  I was really bad on that.  Good thing only about a thousand people heard me.

They did this really cool thing last year, so I was ready with my camera this time.  Lights out, and then they pass candles out.  It looks awesome.

No church gigs on Christmas Day.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Frampton Proclaims my Brilliance!

I played my final Thursday Yacht Rock show at the 10 High for the year.  Due to the holidays, it was mostly Schooner guys (just Greg and me from the Revue), with the mighty Eric Frampton on the other keyboard.  That means different keyboard parts for me on a few things (Peg, Reminiscing, Hey 19, Lonely Boy, Somebody's Baby, Silly Love Songs, Takin' it to the Streets, Lido Shuffle, Doctor My Eyes, and Thunder Island).  It's fun, but I kind of flinch because I'm used to playing the other part.  Anyway, Frampton said afterwards that I was brilliant!  Quite an endorsement, though I really did play really well if I do say so myself.  I'd played all of those except for Thunder Island before, and once I got through the opening octave thing where the piano enters, it was easy.  I did have one small disaster--in Lido, I was banging out the piano part, thinking about how great I was doing, and then I drove off the cliff at the synth build up.  First synth thing was fine, but when I added my other hand, boom.  I think I tried to start it outlining an F major triad instead of a G major triad.  I had to stop for a second and reset.  Stoooooopid.

Let's get back to the brilliant part…so yeah, I was brilliant.  Let's remember that.

It was not all smoochy lovefest stuff, though.  Some chick knocked a beer off the speaker in front of me, and it splashed beer all over my saxophones and flutes.  Raise your hand if you're guilty (and get poked in the left boob).

Thanks a lot.  Particularly irritating was that she heard the bottle hit the stage, looked to see where it was, shrugged, and went back to trying to take a picture of her friends.  I should have had Nate throw her out.  Now my horns are sticky and smell like beer, and my flute has sticky keys (flute took the worst of it).  Fortunately there were no dents and everything seems to play.  I worked on cleaning flute pads through the entire break.  I tore a dollar bill in half in the process.  Federal offense?

Side note:  Yuengling is really shitty beer.

At some point in the second set, and second drink (in a cup) came off the speaker.  Not cool at all!

Other than that, it was really good crowd.  I went into the gig thinking that the 10 High would either be pretty packed or totally empty.  It was the former.  Yay for that!  Lots of good looking people (women) across the front row.  Thanks for that.

davidfreemanmusic.net

We Made It!

Yacht Rock finished off a tough stretch of gigs by playing a wedding Sunday night at Puritan Mill.  I'd never played a wedding gig there with a stage--always on the concrete floor.  I wonder if it's permanent?

I think it was probably the best gig of the weekend.  The crowd was into it (and really good looking), the load in was easy, the stage was big, we had someone else running sound for us, we only played two sets…piece of cake!  And the band played pretty well.

Not much to report, other than that.  Pete's wife Alyssa was the wedding coordinator (from Sashay Events with Mark Cobb's wife Katy) and she sat in with us on five songs, some of which we hadn't played in a year.  In particular, we hit You're So Vain again, and I finally got through it without choking (like last time).  Yay for me!

Bencuya slipped Rockit into I Wanna Be Your Lover.  Very cool, though it got no reaction from the band.  Not listening?  I tucked three Christmas carols into my Reminiscing solo Friday night and got no reaction either.  It makes me wonder what everybody's doing.  Dannells was standing right next to me and didn't hear any of them.  Kind of like last night at the Buckhead Theatre--I was pumped up about my solo on Dick in a Box, and when I said something to Bencuya about it, he said, "Was it good?"

Anyway…we finished at midnight.  In bed by two.  We made it!

davidfreemanmusic.net