David Freeman Music

Some different stuff this weekend! Dig it: Thursday: Yacht Rock road tripped to Athens to play the Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense  at the Georgia Theatre. Most importantly (to me), this was the debut of my new Prophet 6 synthesizer--a pretty awesome machine, especially considering how small my role is in this show. I shopped around and considered several different synths (price tags and analog vs. virtual analog) before finally biting the bullet. This is the real thing. Highlights from the post-soundcheck pre-gig run... Saved By the Band opened with a very strong set of covers. The room was nowhere close to full, but there were enough people there to give us some positive feedback--maybe 300 in attendance? That was just fine, as we needed a shot at this show before our Friday night back in Atlanta. Once I got going, I was fine, but I blanked on the first thing I was supposed to play, and I just stood on stage thinking, "Why does this sound...

The Yacht Rock Revue spent last weekend in Florida (central and north, I should say). The weather was perfect, which means we probably escaped right before the heat and humidity arrived. Friday: Orlando! We were once again at the House of Blues at Disney. I still wish we were closer to the city, but daaaaaammmnn this room sounds good. Like, so good that I would almost forget to play my parts because I was just listening. I went for a short run before the gig, and there were people lined up around the building. Aaaaaaaand...holy cow! There were something like 1,100 people at our gig. It was packed! According to Pete, it was technically a sell out because the floor was completely full, but there was some kind of thing where they could've made some more room in the balcony?...I don't know. It was a frickin' TON of people, they loved it, and the room sounded fantastic. I might also say that we collectively collectively kicked ass. This was the most fun I've...

Last weekend was maybe a little different from our usual routing, as we began north of Chicago, then hit Indianapolis, headed north again to a private party in Lafayette, Indiana, and then flew home to play an Unplugged show at Venkman's in Atlanta. As for me, it was sleep on the plane, sleep in the van, sleep in the hotel room. Thursday: Where in the hell is Palatine, Illinois? North of Chicago--north of Evanston, too. We played a St. Patrick's Day kickoff on Thursday night at Durty Nellie's.  Kind of a strange gig--the stage sounded good, the crowd (maybe 200?) was solid and enthusiastic, but I think the Thursday night/unfamiliar town thing got to me. I guess I could never shake the "Wait-what day is it and where are we?" feeling. From what I recall, we played pretty well--no disasters. Friday: I-65 between Chicago and Indianapolis. Mellencamp to the max. Rain on the scarecrow, blood on the plow, little pink houses--all that shit. Back a...

At the Giving Kitchen event earlier this year, some folks with extremely deep pockets bid on a private shows with Yacht Rock, and the winning numbers were in the $26,000 range. We played one of those shows last night for one of the winners, US Foods. There was a cajon... ...views of Atlanta on a beautiful day... ...and a giant check from US Foods for $50,000 to The Giving Kitchen, an organization who provides supplemental aide to those in the restaurant community. How about that! Plus the gig was super easy--we played it in the "unplugged" style, so I brought a saxophone, a flute, a piccolo, and a bag of hand percussion. Easy load in/out, and home before 9 PM. Not too shabby.

Yacht Rock was invited (for the sixth year in a row) to perform as a musical guest on the Sail Across the Sun Cruise. For the past five years, the band Train has headlined this cruise, but they are stepping aside, leaving us a decent chance of not playing on this boat anymore. I think I've had enough of playing on the ships, so if this is the last one, so be it. Wednesday: the ship leaves from New Orleans, but we flew into Baton Rouge to save some money. I slept the whole way--I'm an excellent sleeper. The van we'd arranged to drive us to the port was more of a limo than a church van, so we were forced to pile most of our luggage up on the floor. Not very comfortable for the ninety miles to New Orleans.  The view from my cabin balcony. We left New Orleans around 5:30 PM. After a nap, a run, and dinner, we checked out Christopher Cross' set in the theatre. Great band--the sax player, Justin Vasquez, was fantastic. Also, Keith Carlock (...