Monday: We have begun a new project, recording an album's worth of original songs. Day one of recording involved a lot of checking to make sure everything was making sound, balancing mixes, and later in the day, some recording. I haven't been involved in any of this; I spent the day as a spectator.
The song that the guys recorded today will eventually have string and horn parts, which I have mostly written. Once my arrangements are finalized, they'll be added as overdubs.
Tuesday: The whole TSA/government shutdown thing cost me some extra sleep, as we decided to play it safe and get to the airport extra early for our flight to Indiana. The traffic on the interstate ended up being more of an inconvenience than the airport, though. No delays in Atlanta or Indianapolis.
I slept like a dead guy on the plane, but was awake for the very hard landing/very soft crash at the end.
There was snow.
The gig was...something. Five days later, I can't remember anything about it. It was a late developing gig, I guess you'd say--what I mean by that is that we had almost no crowd for the first hour. They softened up a little later on, and we actually went into overtime, which will be a nice boost to the ol' paycheck. More positives: easy load in/out (we used our own gear), good pre gig meal, single hotel rooms, and the gig ended at 9 PM.
Wednesday: It's deicing season.
I slept on the plane because that's what I do. I wonder if my hands went to sleep, too, because I had this wild dream where we were playing Baker Street, and I was sitting at my keyboards and couldn't pick up my saxophone--like, my hands wouldn't work--and then I realized that I didn't have my hat or sunglasses on, and I couldn't pick them up either. I looked down and I didn't have fingers or thumbs on my hands. The whole dream kept repeating; it was the two measures right before the saxophone riff starts--the band just kept chugging on the eighth notes while I struggled to get my horn off the sax stand.
So, is the nightmare:
1. I can't pick up my horn to play Baker Street?
2. The band is going to vamp and therefore Baker Street is never going to end?
3. I'm dreaming about Baker Street?
The rest of the guys headed to the studio after lunch, but after spending almost all of Monday looking at my phone and planning out my pee breaks, I opted to stay home and work on the aforementioned arranging homework.
Thursday: Van ride--approximately six hours down to the Florida panhandle for a gig. We played a show to kick off the 30A Singer/Songwriter Festival. Wrap your head around that one--they hired a cover band to launch a singer/songwriter festival.
Not a bad gig, though. The crowd was decent, the weather (we were outdoors) was just under 60 degrees, and...that's it. It was fine.
Friday/Saturday: We played two shows at Venkman's back in Atlanta. Both shows were pretty fun. I'm not always a fan of gigs at the V (the small stage, the potentially shitty in-ear sounds), but both of these sounded really good, and neither dragged on and on. The crowd was very good Friday; Saturday felt a little like a throwback to our drunken Thursday nights at the 10 High (which I guess has some strange charm to it).
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| we added an extra song or two, but I can't remember |
No load out Friday night after the gig! I put my horns back in the case, but it was kind of nice to otherwise just drive away.
It's funny...things that I didn't practice worked on Friday's gig, but things I DID practice Saturday afternoon didn't stick at all Saturday night. Overall, though, I played well. These shows were surprisingly fun.
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| we also tucked PYT in there somewhere |
Sunday: Unpacked all my gear, played my church gig, and nailed it if I do say so myself. Thank you very much.