Yacht Rock played a good gig last night on the Square in Marietta. The weather got a little wild--right after we loaded in, a bad thunderstorm came through and we had everything under tarps. It cleared off enough for us to play, but eventually the rain returned (with lightning!) and we had to bail on the last half hour.
the wind in his hair
The place was packed! Very cool, and a decent number of people from my neighborhood showed up. If the weather had been better, it might have been even better. We have a gig coming up at the Strand Theatre in November, and I bet that will be packed because of it.
The sound on stage was super loud. There were a limited number of monitor mixes, and I ended up with more vocals than I would ever want to hear bludgeoning my head. Adding to the volume were main speakers right up next to us. Ouch! The sound out front was good (according to reports from the locals), and all of my stuff was in there. Cool.
I'm still trying to get my effects pedal dialed in. I have faith in it, but I can't replicate the conditions of a gig by myself. I need to tweak it some more so that it works within the context of a gig.
Yacht Rock played on the local CBS morning show "Better Mornings Atlanta." We had to be there at 3 AM. That part was not too hard…I'm used to staying up late. The fact that I had to stay awake until 7:30 AM or so…not so fun.
We loaded into the TV studio at 3 AM. Set up, soundchecked, changed. We played a few bumpers (as the show was going to commercials) and a couple of camera shots.
Most of my stuff is inaudible. You should be hearing piano on the first segment (on the chorus you can hear a little bit of the synth, so I know the line works). The second segment is a little better--you can kind of hear me because the guitar and piano parts are kind of sparse. The Web Extra segment is about like the first (I'm not there)--I love the part where there's the big synth solo and you can't hear anything. And you still can't. And then Bencuya adds his layer on top and it's really loud.
Screwed by another shitty mix. Staying up also shot Wednesday to hell. Yippee.
Wow! Last night was a cool little trio gig. Tonight was a terrific quartet gig. Super fun! We (Tyrone Jackson, keyboard; Kevin Smith, bass; Marlon Patton, drums) were in the bottom of the Hub at the World of Coke. I guess it was the acoustics of where were positioned, but we were able to play with all the energy that could be brought, and nobody was offended. I was surprised--we were really pushing, and yet everybody was cool with it. It made for a wonderful evening. Wish I had more of these!
The band was very generous in interpreting my tunes and putting up with my strange harmonic sense and bizarre phrasing. I am EXTREMELY fortunate to get these guys. Who could ask for anything more!
I played a really good trio gig with Tyrone Jackson (piano) and Kevin Smith (bass) tonight. A little one hour reception. We have a quartet gig tomorrow night (adding Marlon Patton on drums), so this was a good little tune up.
The audio!
P.S. If you'd like to check out my YouTube videos of last week's trio gig, you can find them HERE.
I played two bar gigs on Saturday. The first was with Uno Dos Tres Catorce (Yacht Rock playing a set of U2) at Meehan's in Sandy Springs, opening for the REMakes. We loaded into the tent just in time for the sky to explode. The band was trapped with just a few six packs of beer to ride out the storm. We made the best of it…Mark Cobb bought a drum set (60s Slingerlands! Nice!), and Bencuya told us about all the Yacht Rock live recordings he's been editing.
Because of the rain, we started a half hour late, but we blazed through our set and finished in an hour. I think things were pretty good.
Check out how the sound man rolled his rack/mixer out front so he could mix accurately. Impressive! I've never seen a guy do that.
My second gig was playing saxophone and flute with the Yacht Rock Schooner at Dixie Tavern. Another pretty good gig, though the crowd wasn't as good as the last time I played there. Zac Brown never showed up, but Wheat Williams did. The band sounded good! That was a fun gig.
soundcheck
dig the polkadots
On to Sunday…
Church gig number one was fairly easy. The guy who was supposed to get his raise only got half of what he was expecting. He emailed the leader and got no response. Big surprise, since he can check his email on his new iPad!
The church is investing a couple of thousand dollars on a V drum kit. That's good to know. I was worried they had no money.
Usual Thursday night 10 High gig. It was really fun, but geez…I sucked really bad. It was like I haven't thought about any of these songs in a month. Some particular low points were the little synth break in Heart of Rock and Roll (which I practiced and played well in Nashville last week, but haven't thought about since), and All Night Long (which completely bit me in the ass).
My last big equipment upgrade of the year was a new effects pedal for my sax stuff. I bought a TC Helicon Voicelive 2. Super fancy and very state of the art. It seems to be infinitely programmable. I have the first preset built as my basic thing--just reverb. Then, I can turn on (or turn off) chorus, slap reverb, and doubling within that preset by stepping on the different buttons. Crazy. Before, I would have to have a preset for each one. Then I have a big stack as another preset (like three or four octaves wide) for Silly Love Songs. For Heart of Rock and Roll, I have the solo sound, then one harmony set for the little back and forth thing, and then another harmony set where me and another voice move in thirds, and there's a note on top of us that stays the same. Is that crazy or what? I also have a thirds thing for Kodachrome and a couple of settings for I Want a New Drug. Wow. Cool.
It's XLR in and out, and also does fantom power, so I can use my Shure clip on mic without having to power it separately. Plus, the noise floor on it is way lower than that cheapo Digitech pedal, and the effects are much better sounding.
Last night was its maiden voyage. First set, I had some feedback issues because the gate wasn't really doing its job. Boo. I managed my way through by keeping my body between my monitor and the mic. On the break, I jacked up the gate. Unfortunately, I just guessed, and I guessed poorly! I had it at -15 db, so it would only open when I was playing full blast; it kept opening and shutting mid phrase on Silly Love Songs. Oops. Fix it next time?
Bjorn Borg on drums!
Anyway, it was a good gig and everybody else played well, but I was not good. We all had a very good time and the room was moderately crowded, so everybody went home happy! Yay!
Today I had a pianist come over to take a lesson with me on improvisation…like I know what the hell I'm doing! I did my best to interpret my own stream of consciousness stuff. I guess it's kind of good to stop and think about my playing--a lesson for both of us. Since I don't have any kind of "system," I suggested we get together and play, and he could stop us and ask questions. Here are a couple of tunes we played. My time is not too good on either.
