David Freeman Music

Gina and me Last night Yacht Rock played a benefit at the Atlanta History Center.  We've played this gig before...not much to say about it.  Us, auctions, natural reverb. After the gig, several of us attended Gina Niespodziani's birthday party.  It was like a college party--lots of people crammed into a tiny house, loud music, lots of alcohol.  I'm sure it's quite a mess in the daylight.  Happy birthday Gina! The Mark Dannells! Hans on sound! Tonight, we are off to Athens to play at the 40 Watt. davidfreemanmusic.net

Yacht Rock had a really fun gig last night at the 10 High.  All the regular guys were there except Pete, who's on baby duty right now. It looked like it would be another thin crowd, but people kept filtering in through the break in between sets.  I think it got MORE crowded during the break, instead of people bailing out.   Mark Bencuya dedicated Saturday in the Park to Sparky Anderson. We played Lovely Day  early in the second set, and that song got a really good reaction from the crowd.  After Nick made a comment about people liking Bill Withers, we kind of fell into Use Me .  I picked up my alto and played all over it.  The groove was good, my volume was good, my reed was good...I got closer to sounding like David Sanborn than ever before.  It was AWESOME!  Highlight of the night for me. davidfreemanmusic.net

Yacht Rock played a gig last night for Ketel One vodka.  It was a quick and easy two set gig at the Terminus building in Buckhead--the same place we played a few months ago . Much of the same...it's still an unfinished office space, all concrete echo chamber.  Very loud. In looking over the set list before the gig, I noticed that I needed alto on one song in the first set, and alto on one song in the second set, and the rest was keyboards and EWI.  I thought about leaving my tenor at home, but I brought it anyway.  Good thing!  Our encore was a tenor song. my view davidfreemanmusic.net

Last night was the big Ben Lovett show at Smith's Olde Bar.  Ben is known in the music industry for his young and hip movie scores.  This show was a live production of his solo project, which is of course young and hip. The show went pretty well, especially considering all of the technical difficulties involved in getting the thing together.  Say what you want about the lack of leadership at the rehearsals or the theatrics over the music, but the guy had a big vision and he went for it, and by and large I think he pulled it off.  In the end, he got a band of fantastic musicians to get on stage with him and play his music (without really knowing if it would work or how they would be compensated).  There's something to be said for that. Pictures: davidfreemanmusic.net

Last night Yacht Rock played "the place that used to be called Andrews Upstairs but is now called 8 Traxx Disco."  We did a set of Yacht Rock and then Michael Jackson's Thriller in its entirety. I used to really like playing Andrews/8 Traxx when the stage was a bit larger.  Since they converted it to basically a carpeted sidewalk, it's really hard to have fun on stage.  Now we're all in a row, with me on the opposite side of the stage from where I normally set up.  It's a drag. Sitting next to Bencuya feels like I'm taking a keyboard test.  Last night's grade was probably a B-.  I just couldn't get going and I was tired and made too many stupid mistakes.  I hope he doesn't think I play that poorly all the time!  I was pretty embarrassed about all of my screw ups.  On You're So Vain , he mercifully offered to double me ("to make it sound bigger") after I choked on it at soundcheck...

Yacht Rock played last night in Nashville at the Mercy Lounge.  There was an 80s band and a 90s band downstairs in the Cannery Ballroom, and we played upstairs (with some bad glam rock opener). Dig my John Oates look! The gig was pretty good.  That stage (really, that whole room) is super loud.  It feels to me like the drums are in the monitors, and then everybody jacks up their personal amplifiers to balance that. Anyway, the gig was pretty good.  We played Thriller again, to a pretty lukewarm reception.  In the quieter moments you could really hear the crowd talking.  When we finished, they wanted us to come out and play more Yacht Rock stuff (which I can dig), but it was like "Hurry up and finish Thriller so you can play Rich Girl ." I heard that Nick walked into the dressing room area after the show and one of the opening band guys was receiving some sexual favors on the couch.  Rock and roll lives!  It was the s...

Last night Yacht Rock played our usual Thursday night hit at the 10 High.  The 10 High is under the Dark Horse Tavern in Virginia Highland (816 N. Highland Ave, Atlanta GA 30306).  Here's a MAP . The reason I am being so specific is because THERE WAS NOBODY THERE!  Jeez!  The crowd was the size of an audience for an original act.  It was really sad.  We made no money. Most of the highlights were supplied by Mark Cobb , who played with more energy than he's summoned in some time.  Everything was leaning forward tempo-wise, and so all the songs had an extra intensity.  It was pretty cool.  I think the pushing left less room for us to screw around, and made the gig a little tighter--everybody was playing like they were holding on  to him for dear life.  I dug it. Ganesh Giri Jaya and Kevin Spencer manned the front tonight.  It seemed like Ganesh sang ninety percent of the songs.  I'm not sure why it worked out like th...