Friday: This was our first time playing a Top Golf, which is basically a two story driving range attached to a music venue. How these go together, I don't know, but the room sounded pretty good and the load in was not too bad.
This week, we added the Doobie Brothers' Minute by Minute, so we spent a fair amount of soundcheck trying it out. Here's my chart. It took a long time to sort out those voicings! Bill Payne (of Little Feat fame) played the synth stuff on this as well as What a Fool Believes. I think he has six fingers on each hand.
After a few swings at this one, we sound checked Magnet and Steel with our old friend Walter Egan, who sat in with us at the end of the show. Before we changed, though, we ate, and before we ate, we took a few swings. I am really bad at golf--like missing the ball completely bad.
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| Greg Lee takes aim |
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| Zach demonstrates his unique swing |
Pretty good gig! I think we ended up attracting a different (older) crowd to this gig, and they weren't as rowdy as we've maybe come to expect--they would actually get kind of quiet in between songs, which felt kind of weird! We played alright, I think--after a week, there's always a little bit of hesitation. I didn't feel a whole lot of connection to what we were doing. Anyway, looked good, sounded good, felt pretty good. I'll take it.
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| photo cred: Meaghan Farrell |
Saturday: The day started at noon, as we only had about three hours to cover between Nashville and our next stop, Birmingham. We had an equipment failure (broken snare drum stand), so the first stop was a Guitar Center. Monkeyboy was excited.
Kip bought me a shaker that looks like a banana.
So...Birmingham has been good to us! Tonight we were set up in the big room at WorkPlay, which holds about 900 people (they oversold it on this night--by fifty tickets!). Big room, big stage.
The guard dog Cheeto (with her ears dyed red) was relaxed...
...after pooping in the middle of the room.
I know--gross. On to the gig! This gig was a little better in terms of our connection to the audience, our own performance. Minute by Minute was a little rough at the beginning, but once we got into it, I think we all dug in a little more than last night. The only hiccup in this evening's show occurred when we returned from intermission and the local lighting guy did not--we played almost an entire song with no stage lights. Oops. Other than that, a good time was had by all.
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| photo by Zach Wetzel |
Sunday: We drove back to Atlanta in the late morning, arriving for an early (1:30 PM) load in for the Team Hidi/Giving Kitchen event, a fundraiser that raises money for restaurant workers in need. We've played this annual even six years in a row, and it's a nice, easy gig for our friends at home. Also, it sold out--our streak continues!
After load in and soundcheck, we hopped into the van and drove back to get our cars and go home, since we would have most of the afternoon off. Ya know what sucked, though? I left my keys on stage, so when we drove back to midtown, I had to bum a ride from Kip and Zach BACK to venue, and then BACK to my truck before I could go home, burning a precious hour of doing nothing at home. Ugh. Not my best work.
The gig was a piece of cake, though (even though that room sounds bad), and the rain had stopped before we finished, so let's do it again next year! Home by 10:30 PM.