More Airports!

Last weekend: relatively easier in comparison to the previous weeks' travels.

Friday: We played some sort of hospital fundraiser at the community airport in Covington--the usual "stage in an aircraft hanger" situation. Right? One would think this would be a boomy sounding mess, but it was a surprisingly good stage sound.

In typical corporate fashion, the first several songs were played to an empty dance floor, but after about thirty minutes, we broke through, and the dancers were plentiful.

Very easy gig. Really, the only tough thing was sitting in traffic on a Friday afternoon to get out to Covington. 

Saturday: Noon flight to Connecticut. 

someone left their breakfast in the Park and Fly

This gig...maybe some kind of fundraiser in Darien? I guess I wasn't paying attention--I have no idea. Anyway, we flew up there, set up, sound checked, and still had four hours to kill. I went for a run around town.

This gig (I mean the room) sounded terrible, but it didn't matter because there was A LOT to look at. Money and good genes everywhere you looked. Good lord. Thanks for that.

Sunday: We (most of us) were on a lunch time flight back to Atlanta, so I did a loop around White Plains, NY before we caught the hotel shuttle.

I'm trying to watch the movie Can You Ever Forgive Me? but between the two flights (and two naps) I still have about ten minutes left. I'm not wishing to get on another airplane, but I would like to see how it ends.

Week Four

Off again! This week's run was Wednesday-Saturday, starting off in Michigan.

Wednesday: Grand Rapids! Not where I thought we'd first dip our toes into the gigging...waters..of Michigan? I thought that was going to work, but maybe not. Anyway--you'd think we'd begin our midwestern expansion in Detroit, or maybe Ann Arbor, but...no. Grand Rapids it is. Second largest city in Michigan. Home to several breweries.

Awww! The Great Bencuya in his home state

Step one: lunch! And wouldn't you know it, there's an Indian place right up the street. I hit the buffet for some chana masala. 

The evening's gig was at 20 Monroe Live, a newish concert venue in town (capacity 2,600!). Big room, but really nice and clean and well run. They had some sort of private event between our early soundcheck and the gig.

After a nap (thought the pollen was bugging me, but I guess I caught a cold), I didn't really feel ready to eat dinner, so I went for a short run.

I think we were all very pleased by this Wednesday nighter! Maybe 500 people showed up, but it didn't look super empty, and they were mostly enthusiastic. And generally, the place was just really cool--nice green rooms, nice stage, PA sounded good. All that stuff. Any easy start to the week.

Somehow, I ended up quoting Santa Claus is Coming to Town in my flute solo on Lowdown. It just kind of happened--not on purpose! I played the first phrase of it without realizing what it was, and when my brain caught up, I had to play the next bit to complete it.

Thursday: We headed out in the late morning across the empty fields of rural Michigan, northern Indiana, and Ohio, bound for Cincinnati.

we're in good company

Bogart's was slammed. Not quite a sellout, but it was still packed, and the show was really good. Also good: Indian food over by the University of Cincy campus (though they use a disappointing amount of plastic and styrofoam).

Immediately following the show, I packed up my gear as quickly as possible and jumped into this van with Nick and Pete for a late night ride to Indianapolis. We were scheduled to perform as a trio on the morning news.

It was a rough ride. The weather, the roads, and the driver were fighting the entire time.

Friday: My cold was in full bloom this morning. It probably would've helped to sleep late, but we zoomed over to the TV studio for the broadcast. Strangers in a strange land.

They'd asked us to play for the weather portion and then to play again after the interview, but right before the weather, I was taken by the producer and told to basically walk into the shot and play. Uhhhhhhhh...ok! It was pretty exciting to have to play on the spur of the moment, but I think it came out ok.

After a short interview, we played Summer Breeze. I swear I'm not trying to drown out the vocals!

Then I went back to my hotel room and crashed for a couple of hours. I had a very difficult and realistic dream that I'd played Careless Whisper wrong on TV and repeated it over and over and over. Once I had peeled myself off the bed, I went out for lunch at Yat's, my favorite cajun place in Indy, then a short run on the treadmill, and then off to work!

The gig du jour was in the Egyptian Room at the Old National Centre. We've played this place before, and though the room itself doesn't have a lot of vibe, the building is pretty neat.

Lotta people here. Indy is always a really great place to play--it's just a great city in every way.

We had a horn section for this one, and they dealt with my horn charts pretty well. Someday I'll even get all the mistakes out of them!

In other news, I had a really good solo on the end of Biggest Part of Me. Everything that could go right, did. Made me want to high five myself.

Saturday: Chicago! Also, last day of the run! We're almost home! 

Things started off with a photo session. We started off with some shots on a bridge (maybe Dearborn Street?), and then worked on some stuff at the marina basically directly under the Wilco Buildings (and the House of Blues). The HoB let us take some pictures up in the "Foundation Room" as well.

Chicago, lookin' mighty fine

 Another good show and...a sellout! This was a nice ending to four pretty intense weeks.

I crawled back into Atlanta with enough time to eat and head to my church gig. I made the mistake of not warming up before I got there, and it took the entire rehearsal and soundcheck before my embouchure finally started to come together. I did find some nifty stuff to play a pseudo-Latin flavored song, which hopefully made up for some of the rough stuff I played earlier in the mass.

More Donuts

Here we are, playing the gigs, making the donuts.

Thursday: Our flight to Washington DC occurred at a much more reasonable hour (noon!), and therefore I needed less of a nap on the plane and watched a little bit more of First Man - like from sixty-two minutes in to eighty minutes in. I'm going to try and finish it before this hunk of travel ends. Also, Ryan Gosling is not as douchey as I thought.

So...night one of two at The Hamilton in DC. We loaded in, sound checked, I did some personal warm up stuff, and still had time for a little run around the neighborhood.

I'm not sure what this was all about, but it was kind of great that something so preposterous was hanging out directly in front of the White House

I tried sushi for the first time. Edible, but kind of weird and fishy

Pretty great crowd, especially for a Thursday. I felt like I redeemed myself after Boston's performance. The best part was that we left everything set up for night two...

Friday: We had all day to kill. I slept late, ate breakfast with Greg (we were charged for the food because we ate from the "hot" part of the buffet--a fee Greg immediately dubbed the "meat surcharge"; for the record, I had pancakes), went for a long run in the rain...

Air Force memorial

...had Indian food delivered! (I think I got screwed on the bill, though)...

mixed vegetable curry 

...and played night number two. Another good gig.

Saturday: On to Philadelphia! Not a bad drive. South Street in Philly was spring-break-level packed. I'm kind of surprised that none of our gear got ripped off while we were loading in.

P.S. TLA is kind of a dump.

I did a little bit of personal warm up after soundcheck and then headed up the street for...Indian food! Lovash Indian Restaurant and Bar was really delicious. No wait, either. I even branched out and tried something new.

Rajma Aloo

Philly was sold out, too--our third in a row on this trip. We had several Atlanta friends in the audience, which was really cool and kind of upped the ante for us, I think.

After the show, we drove about forty-five minutes away from Philadelphia, crashing in our rooms somewhere around 1 AM. The next morning, we were back on the road at 8:30 AM. Ouch.

Sunday: On our way to Cleveland. In the middle of nowhere off the Pennsylvania Turnpike, we stopped for lunch in this empty strip shopping center. Mexican food or Subway; take your pick.

Cleveland's House of Blues feels a lot like the one in New Orleans, mostly in terms of its smallish size. Not a bad room. I had hoped to explore the city after soundcheck (first time here!), but it was pouring when we finished, so I practiced for about an hour instead.

Some dudes from Canada road tripped to come see us. That's pretty awesome/weird.

Nice gig overall! I think we had about 500 people there, which felt like a success for our first time (considering the rain and that we were up against Game of Thrones).

Hello PAR cans! Feel the heat of real light bulbs!

Monday: Somehow, I got upgraded for the flight home, and left these jokers at the gate.

No TVs on the plane, though, so my movie will have to wait.

One more week to go.