October 5, 2024: Atlanta, GA. It's crazy that our annual show at Chastain in Atlanta is no longer a big deal to us, it terms of the size of the show. These days, the Chastain show is a homecoming gig for us, and it's fun to catch up with our old friends who have stuck with us.
October 10, 2024: Atlanta, GA. We played a benefit for the Center for Hard to Recycle Materials in Atlanta. All of our meals were delivered in plastic boxes, and there were no recycling bins in the dressing rooms, so everything went into the garbage can. C'mon man!
It took me an hour and a half to get to the gig, which I think might be a personal record, definitely a PR for 2024. It didn't matter, though, because the load in was enough of a pain that things were getting to the stage for setup just as I arrived.
Ok gig. This room at Monday Night Brewing is a terrible space for a band. I bet it didn't sound too good, even with our top notch sound engineers. We did get to home at the end of the gig, though, which was nice (and it only took about forty minutes).
October 19, 2024: Atlanta, GA. I got a call on Thursday afternoon about filling in for a friend on a wedding gig, and since I didn't have anything, I thought "Sure, I'll do that."
Maybe not a good idea on my part, as this gig was extremely casual in preparation and performance, and if you know me, you know I like charts so that the song parts and the form (hell, even the key!) are determined before the song starts. So, I made charts for everything--it was about thirty songs. Everybody on the gig showed up with their version of the thirty songs, and we played them, but if my version didn't agree with the version that the trumpet player was playing, it didn't matter--each of us played his own version. Are we going to the outro now? Whomever was playing the loudest dragged the rest of the band into the outro.
It must've sounded fine--the reception attendees were all very happy with the outcome, so maybe it's my own issue. At least now I know how to handle it the next time I get this call.
October 25, 2024: Chattanooga, TN. Back to Yacht Rock gigs. This one was for the American Cancer Society, in a tent on top of the art museum.
Easy gig! Nice looking people! Plus, we went home that night! Chattanooga is all around pretty great.
October 26, 2024: Atlanta, GA. Back to the random wedding gigs! I got a text from an unknown person six days before this, asking if I was available. Well, yeah, on the condition that there would be charts provided, charts that agreed with the rest of the band. There were, so yeah, I'm game.
This gig was at a midtown hotel, on a rooftop space. Nice! The weather was pretty perfect.
The charts--all on iPads, and all interconnected via a network, so when the leader would pick a song, it would pop up on the tablet. That's pretty cool. We quickly learned (the trumpet player and I were the only local guys on the gig) however, that the bandleader had a habit of switching to the next tune while we were still finishing the one we were on, so you'd better memorize the last two lines of music before they vanish! That was pretty funny. It was all very low pressure, so it didn't matter if the horns had to bail out.
Other than that...hmmm. Wedding bands play some weird/musically inappropriate shit. Why not just play the song that way it was recorded? And why are there now horn parts on Don't Stop Believing? Why are there no horn parts on Sex Machine?
Over at 10 PM. The trumpet player and I ran to the elevator to avoid getting caught behind 150 guests (and we made it). I was walking the dogs at 11 PM. Easy night!
