Another Blog About California

Heads up: here comes A LOT of pictures. This trip had about as much down time as it did work time, so I did my share of exploring. I'll spare you the shot of Indian food, but here's an edited catalog of the rest of it.



California: This trip started Wednesday, March 4, with a flight from Atlanta to LAX. We got there in the late afternoon, and with nothing to do until the following evening, it was run, eat, and sleep. The following day was coffee, run, and eat. Everybody was wandering around Hollywood, enjoying the weather.

Sunset Blvd.

Capitol Records with Chet Baker, Gerry Mulligan, Charlie Parker, and Tito Puente

Thursday afternoon, it was finally time to gear up for our big show at The Wiltern in LA. Very cool theatre with some groovy art deco green rooms.

Very fun gig! Our originals went over well, our special guests (Elliot Lurie, Matthew Wilder, and Peter Beckett) sang great, the crowd was big, the room sounded good...everything on my checklist!

LA is definitely one of those places (like NYC) where it's not just a gig, not just a "big show", but a real moment where we have to rise to the occasion, and we did, and it was glorious. On a Thursday, no less!

Friday, we planned to head to San Diego at noon, so I got in one more tour of Hollywood before we headed off down the freeway.

Unfortunately, there was plenty of traffic leaving LA, and then we ended up in hellacious San Diego rush hour traffic. All of this cut about an hour off of set up/soundcheck and killed our best chance to eat dinner.

The Obersvatory North Park! Another nice stage, nice room, nice crowd, and this one SOLD OUT! Yeah, San Diego! I like that!

Saturday was our longest travel day, a six hour journey over a mountain and through the desert, with a pitstop at our favorite Mexican restaurant, Duron's (Duron's El Zarape Grill), in Yuma, Arizona.

Our second show at the Van Buren in Phoenix was tremendous. I mean, Steve Gadd didn't show up for this one (you can read about that highlight of my life here), but we packed the place out and gave 'em a great show. This place has got it going on, with or without ol' Steve-o.

Sunday: More time in the desert. Tuscon is less than two hours away, so we left at noon and still got there too early to load in.

I washed some clothes in these mean machines. Warmed up on flute, warmed up on saxophone, talked on the telephone.

This gig had everything working against it--Sunday night, our first time here, fourth gig in four days, day off tomorrow, big show the night before, but it turned out to be fun. The place was kind of grungy, the local crew looked like they'd spent the night before out in the desert, and we were kind of in a silly mood. Still fun once we got things in motion. Maybe a hundred people in the audience.

Sooooo...Monday morning, we got dropped off at the Tucson airport (with plenty of "have we ever flown here and if so what was the gig" discussion), headed to San Francisco for the next few tour dates. The van would catch up to us in a couple of days.

leaving Arizona

hey SoCal

This included a layover in Los Angeles, and we had to change terminals, so we had to get on a bus. Doesn't this look like fun? Aren't they having fun?

After a few hours, a burrito, and a desperate search for a place to charge a phone, we flew to San Francisco. Now get in the elevator.

Hello, San Francisco. It's Monday evening. We play Wednesday evening. I went for a run, and then...you know...Indian food. Anyway, San Fran is very photogenic. Take a look.

Tuesday morning, I hopped aboard to 10:30 AM ferry to Alcatraz. Woah! Every time we've been here for a gig, I've always pined for a chance to take the tour. Today's the day!

the lighthouse

the yard

showers

solitary confinement cells

I went to lunch after this. Before heading out in the afternoon, I took this shot from the roof of our hotel.

And then, with nothing on the schedule for the rest of the day, I went for a run, and this time made it across the Golden Gate Bridge.

mildly terrifying

Made it! Aaaaaaand then I had to turn around and go back across.

After returning to my hotel room for a shower, I walked to a vegan Mexican restaurant called Gracias Madre. It was about a mile and a half away and on the same street as our hotel (Mission Street), buuuuuuut...I still managed to get lost on the way there, by about a half mile.

saw these beauties on the way back to my hotel. think of the banana bread!

Finally, Wednesday! We didn't check out til noon, so I did one last lap around SF before giving up.

the Bay Bridge

Just an hour later, we took this very bridge across to Berkley and then up towards Napa for our show.

We'd played the JaM Cellar Ballroom, site of Pat Monihan's (Train lead singer) birthday party about a year ago. This year was a public show, or first in this area. How would it go, on a Wednesday, with the Corona Virus closing in on us?

Uh, around a hundred people, so I guess that's ok. Good crowd, though! They made it fun.

Thursday morning, we finally got the call that the remaining California shows in Sacramento and San Francisco had been cancelled, and we were heading home.

Back through the vineyards...

Back across the Bay Bridge...(check out the layer of fog in the bay!)

Back to the San Fran airport...

Back to Atlanta.

See y'all when it's safe. In the mean time, buy our album, or buy some merch! Help keep the lights on!

Tennis Time

Monday afternoon, Yacht Rock played the Atlanta Challenge at Gwinnett Arena. The main event was an exhibition tennis match between Rafael Nadal and Grigor Dimitrov. We played for about an hour while people were coming in.

Easy enough. Our gear is somewhere between Seattle and Los Angeles, so all the gear was backlined (I brought my spare horns from home).

The gig went fine. It felt kind of frantic in the pacing, but I played ok. After our set, I packed up my gear and went home.

Pacific Northwest

Keeping things rolling, Yacht Rock flew up to the Pacific Northwest for a few gigs.

We flew in Wednesday evening, so I did a little exploring before we went to the venue Thursday afternoon.

Portland straddles a river, so there are many bridges to check out.

We stayed in a different location from our only previous visit, and I lucked out that we were right around the corner from an Indian restaurant.

Our first show of this leg was at Revolution Live, an old school that has been repurposed as a music venue (there might also be some other artsy stuff tucked into the other classrooms as well). Very cool place.

This one sold out! I wish this place was bigger; it's really cool and sounds really good, but we may have already outgrown it. Anyway, we had a great show here.

I did have one super scary moment--right as we launched into Africa and I picked up the EWI, I noticed that my laptop had not been charging, and was down to 1%! Holy shit! I reinserted the charger and got things going just in time, and by the time we got to the solo, I was at a whopping 2%...but I knew that the laptop was not going to go black on me in the middle of it. Guess I was lucky to notice it in time--that would've been really awful. Regardless, it gave me a massive adrenaline boost that took about five or six songs to burn off.

Friday, there was most of the day to waste, so more exploring.

Hello fren.

And more time at the Indian restaurant.

We got news on this day that an article about us had been published in the online version of Rolling Stone. You can check it out here. Pretty surreal.

Mississippi Studios is a "sister" room to the place we played the night before. It's quite a bit smaller on stage and off, but still sounds pretty good, and has a cool vibe.

This was supposed to be an "unplugged" acoustic show, but we ended up playing it pretty much like any other gig. Good sounds and a good crowd.

Saturday, we traveled to Seattle, but not until after noon, so I had one more chance to wander around.

The Neptune is an old theatre next to the University of Washington campus. It's a little old and funky, but I like it. Lots of good food options around the corner, too.

The sound is a little boomy, but the vibe was cool. Our crowd was more than double our last time in Seattle, and they were in the mood to party--the bars closed an hour into the show because people were getting too wild!

Sunday was spent sitting on a plane. 5 hours.

I watched a documentary on David Crosby by Cameron Crowe. I can't decide whether he's a giant asshole, perfectly honest, or both. One thing I do know is that the knit cab he's wearing probably smells pretty bad at this point.

Home again for a minute.

New Stuff

In the midst of all the travel, I forgot to mention that Yacht Rock released an album of new material on Friday, plus a silly video for one of the songs! Check it out.

Colorado

Yacht Rock spent last weekend in Colorado, playing a couple of high altitude shows. I love this place. Colorado might just be the best state in the country.

But first...Thursday night, I played with the Atlanta Latin Jazz Orchestra at Venkman's. Not my best playing! I came up short in preparation, and it bit me in the butt. Several of those charts are much too difficult to sightread (or play after working through them the night before, as I attempted). Add to that a pretty lame solo, and, yeah...I was kind of disappointed in myself.

Friday: We came in to Denver through what was probably thirty minutes of consecutive turbulence. Monkeyboy almost broke the armrests off his seat. I slept through most of it (though I had a dream that I was flying, but I was in a closet inside the plane, and the only other guy in the closet was eating potato chips and trying not to throw up).

Anyway, the Colorado sky. Beautiful.

Our show was at the Mission Ballroom, a relatively new place and a venue we've never seen before. Quite big and well laid out. We like it!

After soundcheck, I jumped in a Lyft to make the short (2.5 mile) ride to my favorite Indian food restaurant. The quickest way to get there, unfortunately, was on the interstate, and by the time I'd gotten there, eaten, and gotten a ride back, I'd probably wasted $20. Should've just ordered it delivered!

I made it back to the venue with plenty of time to warm up and change clothes, and also injured my big toe while throwing a tampon a Monkeyboy. It was as stupid as it sounds. I immediately had to put on the shoes that I would wear on stage and go play, and I wondered if my toe would swell up so much that I wouldn't be able to take them off later. For the first four or five songs of the night, it really hurt, and then the Advil kicked in.

Anyway, it was an epic night. 3,300 people in attendance. Lots of fun.

The next day, I went back to the same Indian restaurant, had the same waiter, and sat at the same table, and the food was just as good.

By the way, my toe wasn't too bad. The tip is bruised (maybe?), but I was able to run, the nail did not turn black, and I can grip with it.

After lunch, we headed off to our gig in Breckenridge, where they apparently had more snow.

Here's some news: altitude matters for wind players. Holy hell! My reeds felt kind of stiff, but not awful, in Denver (5,280 feet). Breckenridge's altitude (9,600 feet) was tough! It felt like I had popsicle sticks on my mouthpieces instead of reeds, and the solo I played at soundcheck felt like my sinuses were going to explode from the back pressure. I actually looked inside my tenor to see if there was something stuck inside.

I warmed up a ton and felt better by the time we started the gig, but geez. Maybe I should pack some softer reeds next time we come through here.

Other than that, nice room! The place holds 750 people; I'd guess there were 400 people?

The hotel sells oxygen bottles. How crazy is that?

We woke up Sunday morning to six inches of fresh powder. Wow! It made for a tricky journey back down the mountain to the Denver airport. Hard to believe that I was snorkeling in the Bahamas six days ago.