Georgia Link

Funny thing about being a sax player…my brain automatically thinks mouthpiece (Otto Link) whenever I say or hear the word link.  Ha!  I just made a (hyper)link for my link.

Yacht Rock played a private party in Centennial Olympic Park for Georgia Link, which is a lobbyist group.  We played on the stage, almost across the street from CNN.  Usual easy stuff…no problems from the audience, and we played well.  We were fortunate to have the gig as an opportunity to run down the things from rehearsal again before the big Park Tavern show tonight.  With that said, I fared a lot better on the things I'd ruined the other day (Sara Smile and Night Fever).  Bring on the next gig!

Anyway, this gig was a long one…three sets, so it stretched out from 7:30-11 PM.  We were there all damn day.  Still, I was home earlier than I would've been if we'd been stuck at the 10 High, so yay for that.

Here's one of Dave's faves...

 Whatever Gets You Through the Night by David B Freeman

davidfreemanmusic.net

Dogs on I-20

The Yacht Rock Revue played a gig for the Georgia Chamber of Commerce on Monday night, out at the Ritz at Lake Oconee.  Super sweet gig!  We played one ninety minute set (8:30-10 PM), and they set us up with rooms for the night (as in individual rooms at the Ritz).  Holy cow!  We also ate steak and asparagus and some kind of banana custard desserts.  Good stuff.

the view from my room

So…the Ritz has a dog!  A chocolate lab named Dooley who spends the day next to the concierge.  Awesome dog--I tried to bribe him with my apple core to come to 346 so we could hang out.

Tuesday morning, we stopped at a McDonalds for coffee, and there was another cute dog parked out front who looked a lot like the Reggie Dog.

my dog Reggie (picture for physical comparison)

We straight to a rehearsal…me, not so great.  Ugh.  I sucked real bad on my big two measure string solo on Sara Smile.

In other news…Yacht Rock has released a live album!  I'm not sure if I'm proud to be on it, or terrified that somebody might hear what I'm doing and maybe realize it's, uh...not so great.  I did hear the sax solo in the van a few weeks ago, and it was a little bleah…a tuning optional kind of thing.  Big surprise.  This was right around the time I got fed up with my alto mouthpiece and switched, but the solo is on the old piece.  Hmm.  Anyway…here's a link--you can purchase it (the CD, not my old mouthpiece) for $10!

There are lots of gigs this weekend!  Stay tuned!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Sunday=Chart Day!

My AM church gig did not happen yesterday, which was fine because I was busy all day being chart man.  Mostly I was cranking out Finale versions of some of my hand written salsa lead sheets, so I will be able to read them a little easier on the gig.  Following that, I had a few tunes to work out for an upcoming Yacht Rock rehearsal.  I also updated a handful of Beatles charts for an upcoming gig.

My usual PM church gig went off without a hitch.  One of the singers turned around to see if her mic was working so I pushed the fader all the way up.  That failed to satisfy me, though, so then I took the panning knob on her voice and the panning knob on the shaker microphone she was using and ping ponged them back and forth on the quarter note for an entire verse and chorus.  I wonder what that sounded like out front…

davidfreemanmusic.net

Police Ball

Yacht Rock played the Atlanta Police Ball.  Just like last year, there were no actual police involved.

This was another easy corporate/private gig.  The sound on stage was outstanding.  I didn't even need ear plugs.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Quartet!

I played a GREAT gig last night!  My jazz quartet was hired to provide a quartet for a corporate networking function at the Marriott Marquis downtown.

Tyrone Jackson is one of a kind.  He is super awesome!  One of my favorite keyboardists and one of my favorite people.
Nadav Spiegelman is a younger guy on the scene.  He has a beautiful bass sound and plays really melodic solos.
Chris Burroughs has an incredible sense of time--he is constantly shifting gears and reacting to everything and everybody.  Fantastic stuff!

Here's the audio:

 David Freeman Quartet-May 18, 2012 by David B Freeman

I had a wonderful time!  Hopefully we can all play together again soon.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Neither Rain, Nor Sleet, Nor Snow, Nor Hail...

I loaded up my gear in my truck for the trek to the 10 High last night, and the sky was grumbling.  I thought maybe I'd be able to get away before it struck, so I jumped in and took off.  By the time I got to I-75, the clouds were really dark and low, and most were poised just south of me.  It looked like I was definitely going to have to go through it, but if I could go really fast, maybe I could get out from under it before my gear got wet.

Just south of Delk Road, the sky was creepy and dark.  All of the sudden--POW!--a big piece of hail hit my windshield, then another, then another!  Aghh!!!  Before I knew it, I was in the middle of the most ferocious hailstorm I'd ever seen--and all my gear was getting pounded in the bed of my truck!  The interstate was completely covered in ice, so much that you could no longer see the lanes.  People were pulling over and slowing way down, while I tried to weave through them at sixty miles and hour, fishtailing madly on the ice.  I needed an overpass to get under, but every one I came to was already packed with people waiting out the storm, so on I drove!

I stopped screaming long enough to look down and see that I was doing eighty.

I finally found an open overpass, so I pulled over.  The bed of my truck had a bucket's worth of ice in it.  As I grabbed the first cases and moved them into the cab, a car came flying up behind me.  A guy jumped out and screamed "THAT WAS FUCKED UP!!!!!!!!"

In a few minutes, I had all my gear reconfigured, and the hail had switched to rain, so I headed out again. By the time I got south of West Paces Ferry, the rain had stopped, and it the ground was dry when I got into the city.  Crazy weather!

Yacht Rock was at the 10 High again.  We had a better crowd than the previous week, though it looked bad until just before we started.  It definitely helps when the door guy isn't stealing money.

The first set was ok.  I played pretty well.  Monkey was having a bad night.  We went on break, and I gave up.  The second set, I busied myself by adding Hot in Herre (an homage to Chuck Brown, and an attempt to piss Bencuya off) into every song, sometimes transposed and sometimes not, and almost always between songs.  It actually sounds OK in the verses of Power of Love.  When I had an organ sound dialed up, I tried the beginning of Bustin' Loose, but he ignored me.  I wished I'd brought seven band aids.  Dannells was drunk enough that he started singing along.  No worries until he actually takes off all his clothes.

That was it.  Another night of being subversive and annoying.  No rain at load out.

davidfreemanmusic.net

House Live

Wayne Viar and I were back at Ventanas for a House Live gig this past Monday.  It's been a while!  This one was a four hour party, which meant that for sure there'd be at least an two hours of total bullshitting by us.

The gig wasn't too bad.  Jeremy did a nice job of setting up little sections in which Wayne and I could play, and then when we would finish he would go into the track.  I really we'd be in agony (four hours of this?!), but everything turned out fine.

This has nothing to do with the music, but they had these cool balloons that had controls, and you could steer them around the room.  Many times, I was nearly attacked from above by a large, inflatable shark.  Death from above!

Here are videos from the middle set:



davidfreemanmusic.net

Ups and Downs

I had two pretty good church gigs yesterday.  The AM gig is coming together well--we've figured which voices in the horn charts we need to make the section sound good, and the leader is picking songs that work for us as a band.  More importantly, we've added Phil Smith on drums!  Super solid drummer.  I've known Phil since the late nineties, when he was in love with Kenny Washington.  Over the years, he's expanded his focus, and his pop/rock playing has strengthened immensely.

The PM gig was small but mighty, with just two vocalists.  No problems, though.  If Lopes ever gets around to repairing my soprano (which I gave him two weeks ago to fix), I might play it again on this gig.

In between, I did some less exciting stuff like finding guys for upcoming gigs.  I checked in with a local guy I'd used before via text, and he hadn't bothered to save my number and had no idea who was asking.  That kind of crushed my ego--I thought I'd played pretty well, but to him it was forgettable.  It also reinforces my feeling that I'm completely off the local jazz scene.  Bummer.  It makes me think that the guys who do play with me are there for the check and not the music.

I also had a random guy ask me about sending him my transcription for Us and Them (Pink Floyd).  Occasionally somebody asks after seeing me on YouTube…anyway, I told the guy that yes, I would send it to him.  This week, he asked again, so I got out my handwritten chart and put it all into Finale so it would be nice and neat.  The dude never sent me an email, so I ended up making a pdf of it, then saving the pdfs as jpegs, then emailing them to myself so I could save the jpegs on my phone, then texting the three pages to him.  All that, and I heard nothing in reply.  Thanks would have been nice…

The hell with that guy.  Here's the chart.  Send me an email and I'll send you pdfs if you'd prefer.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Dunwoody Beer Fest + 500 Songs

Yacht Rock had quite a long day Saturday.  Nick and Dannells flew in from Indianapolis;  the rest of us began our third day of gigging in a row.  We played the Dunwoody Beer Festival for the fourth time.  I think this is the first time the weather's been clear--usually we are huddled under a leaking tent.

Why anyone would want to stand in the parking lot of Perimeter Mall and drink beer in the middle of the day is beyond me.  People turn out, though, and we gave them three sets of music (our first set was our Dazed and Confused stuff, so I only played on half the set).  No problems.  Still no crazy bass feedback, which makes me think The Hamilton owes me some kind of monetary apology.  Get it together!

Anyway, we finished and it was still light out.  Yay!  I went home and unloaded all me gear, and then I started to get really tired.  It was tough to turn around and head out to Smith's to play 500 Songs for Kids. We were given Strawberry Fields Forever.  No sweat, right?  We do a slammin' Beatles tribute!  I think I got about eighty-five percent of my part (the trumpets thing, which I played on keyboard) correct, which sadly is one of my better attempts at 500 Songs.  Usually, I suck real bad..remember November Rain?  This time I only sucked on the first full chorus with brass (the third one if you're counting from the beginning…CHORUS, verse with flutes, CHORUS, verse with brass, CHORUS THAT SUCKED, verse with brass, CHORUS, tag, outro).  Right notes, wrong spot.  Booooooo!!!!!  We backed up a friend on Imagine right after that (me on strings, which I miraculously did not screw up).

Following (my) tradition, I ran out the back door and went straight home, tired and brain dead.  Why do these gigs take so much out of me these days?  Gettin' old?

davidfreemanmusic.net

Snoozer

The Yacht Rock Revue played a snoozer of a gig last night.  The audience was a bunch of lawyers.  We were largely ignored (except for the half dozen wives who tried in vain to get the party going).

My big entertainment was trying to fit "the lick" into all of my solos.



davidfreemanmusic.net

10 High

The Yacht Rock Revue (with a couple of subs) was back at the 10 High after a few weeks away.  It's still a dirty hole of a room.  Load in through the back hallway, past the stagnant puddles of something(why there are puddles indoors is a mystery), past the dead roaches, over the rubber bar mats that are thrown in the way, and you're in, but then avoid the dead roach on the dance floor and the leaking pipe from the bathroom upstairs while you're setting up.

The crowd was thin.  I'm guessing the crowd has moved on as we've moved on to bigger and better things.  The head count was somewhere around sixty people on the night.  Not very inspiring!  We made the best of it, though, and generally played well.  Oh well…at least there were fewer people to dodge while loading out.

Thanks to Jim for the pictures.  You can check out his Yacht Rock fan page here.

davidfreemanmusic.net