Ash Wednesday

I played my PM church gig's Ash Wednesday service last night.   It was packed!  I was surprised that there were that many people.  I was there early, and there were two full masses going on before my own.  We were the overflow service for the main sanctuary, and our room was standing room only.

As usual, we were in the parish hall, which feels acoustically like the deadest room on the planet.  Yuck.  Since we were tucked in the corner away from the main speakers (and the music didn't call for it), I spent more time listening than playing.  No biggie.

In other news…

I've decided to let my website die.  This was based on a few things:

1.  Most people are headed to my blog anyway--a search for me on google brings up my blog first.

2.  Everything on my website has been added to my blog as a sidebar, so there's no new information there.

3.  My domain is going to expire, and Just Host has not been helpful at all in getting it (my domain) to point to my blog instead.  The hell with it it.

4.  I got an email from google saying that my site has been compromised by a hacker (a "cloaking" scheme).  Hacking seems really juvenile.  Leave me alone!

So…welcome to my new website!

Also….

I read plenty of griping about the Grammys, and it reminds me of this blog post by Seattle trumpeter Jason Parker, titled That's not MY Music Industry.  Perhaps it's apathetic of me, but I find the Grammys to be like several other things in life--I ask myself, "Do I have to care about this?  Do I have to have an opinion?"  No, I do not.  It doesn't affect me.  I then get on with my life.  Why waste any energy on it?

Upcoming Yacht Rock dates!

February 15, Taste of Dunwoody (Dunwoody, GA)
February 16, Cannery Ballroom (Nashville, TN)
February 24-March 1, Rock Boat XIII (the ocean)
March 2, Park Tavern (Atlanta, GA)
March 14, Wonder Bar (Asbury Park, NJ)
March 15, Theatre of the Living Arts (Philadelphia, PA)
March 16, Gramercy Theatre (New York, NY)
March 17, The Hamilton (Washington, DC)
July 11, Mohegan Sun (Montville, CT)
July 20 (Atlanta, GA)
October 19 (Atlanta, GA)

Monday Night Corporate Party

Yacht Rock was back in action for a corporate party at the Atlanta Airport Marriott Gateway.

I got things started by leaving fifteen minutes late--that ended up being about twenty minutes late because of the rain and traffic.  Embarrassing.

The Marriott is pretty nice.  I think it gets forgotten because of its location (next to the International Convention Center, which also gets forgotten).  It's nice and clean and moderately hip looking, and the load in is easy and clean and doesn't feel like the back door to a dungeon.

The crowd was costumed for the "rock and roll" theme of the party (I think).  We did three sets.  There were several other things competing for attention--green screen photo booth, pool tables, ping pong tables, and bean bag toss.  When we went on break, they played videos from pop music that was current ten to fifteen years ago.  The whole thing was kind of weird.  Not much dancing.  We were, for the most part, expensive background music.

At one point, we had the four guys from Kiss on the dance floor by themselves, getting down to Silly Love Songs.  Gene dropped his tongue on the floor a couple of times.  Yuck.

Done at 9:30.  Home around 11.  Nice!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Sunday Gigs and Dave's New Faves

So…I was back at my normal church gigs.  I kind of miss it when they don't happen.  I like the routine.

My AM church gig had a sub sound guy.  We were going to do some kind of mammoth song with tracks, but the sound guy couldn't get it to work--he couldn't find the track on the mixing board, and then he did find the track (coming off a laptop on stage), but couldn't get the stereo split (click on the left, music on the right) to work, so we abandoned it.  It worked out fine, though--we couldn't get off from the click that way!  I must say that I played really well on this song.  Actually, the whole service was good in spite of the sound guy problems.

My PM church gig went pretty well, too.  I had a great mix going, though I didn't play anything memorable.  So it goes.

In other news…Mark Cobb hipped me to this record:  Locked Down by Dr. John.  Fantastic record, and it has some really great bari sax playing by Leon Michels.  Yeah!  Totally bad ass.



Also courtesy of Mark Cobb, this super cool song by Jim James off his latest record Regions of Light and Sound of God.  This was on Jimmy Fallon.  More awesome bari playing, this time with Martin Perna (also Groove Collective's Jay Rodriguez on flute!).  So cool.  You can fast forward to 3:48 if you need a quick fix.



Things are starting to heat up again!  Look for Yacht Rock this Friday night at the Taste of Dunwoody and Saturday night at the Cannery Ballroom in Nashville.

davidfreemanmusic.net

A Building Downtown

Yacht Rock was at a building downtown last night.

davidfreemanmusic.net

A Week Off

I've had more or less the entire last week off.  Since playing the 40 Watt last Friday night, I've managed only my PM church gig (at that to a Super Bowl-shrunken congregation).

I'm not gonna lie…other than the fact that I made no money and we're living off savings this week (ouch), this has been a great week.  I got plenty of sleep, plenty of exercise, plenty of time with my family, and time to practice.  Ahhh!  It's been awesome!  During the day, I had to time to tinker with equipment, bang on the piano, watch YouTube videos.  It's kind of what I imagined my life would be like as a professional musician (except for the whole no gigs/no money thing)--that I would have time to practice (the kind where you work on universal things, not the "holy shit!  I have to play this Friday!" kinds of things), and still have time for my life outside of music.  This is it!  I'm lovin' it!

Next week is a lot more busy, with gigs Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and a rehearsal Thursday.  Feed me, Seymour!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Super Bowl Sunday

I slept in this morning because my AM church gig did not use me this morning.  Boo.  Last week, they did two services when I was out of town.  Boo.  Bad luck for Dave.

My PM church gig was sparsely attended, as it is every year.  I have not seen the first half of the super bowl in twelve years.  Good to have a gig, though, and I am not one to bail for something like a football game, or really anything short of death.

It's been a slow weekend with no Saturday night gig, either.  Last night I watched the new Dave Grohl documentary Sound City.  I highly recommend it.



Another slow week ahead, but things will be picking up soon.

February 15, Taste of Dunwoody (Dunwoody, GA)
February 16, Cannery Ballroom (Nashville, TN)
February 24-March 1, Rock Boat XIII (the ocean)
March 2, Park Tavern (Atlanta, GA)
March 14, Wonder Bar (Asbury Park, NJ)
March 15, Theatre of the Living Arts (Philadelphia, PA)
March 16, Gramercy Theatre (New York, NY)
March 17, The Hamilton (Washington, DC)
July 11, Mohegan Sun (Montville, CT)
July 20 (Atlanta, GA)
October 19 (Atlanta, GA)

davidfreemanmusic.net

40 Watt

Yacht Rock made the trip out to Athens to play the 40 Watt--one of our favorite places to play.  All the usual stuff happened…sat in traffic on 316, loaded in, set up, sound checked.

In between soundcheck and the show, we wandered across the street to Ted's Most Best.  Good pizza.  Yacht Rock recommends it.  While we were there, the lady who books the 40 Watt informed us that our show had sold out.  Nice!

Our show went pretty well, I think.  We played two sets, the first one beginning with Baker Street.  I can't complain about that!  The first tune can be a little tough because in any room it takes a few songs to get comfortable.  Dannells wiped out on the intro to the guitar solo--the lights had gone out for a second, and he described it later as a Helen Keller moment:  he could neither see nor hear.  It was a little touch and go for all of us--I had to check a couple of times to make sure my sax microphone was working.  All of this, we later concluded, was the result of the packed room which ate up so much of the sound in the house.  We'd sound checked to an (obviously) empty room, and perhaps set our levels hearing the PA bouncing off the back wall.

Once we got going, things were fine.  I played well in the first set;  in the second, my mind wandered a little bit.  We had Daniel Morrison subbing for Mark Cobb--that changed the set list around a little and brought out some songs we haven't played in a while.  For instance, I couldn't tell you the last time we played Who Can it be Now?.  I pulled that solo out of my butt.

650+ was the overall attendance.  Thank you Athens!

In other news…videos from last Monday's trio gig with Tyrone Jackson and Kevin Smith:



davidfreemanmusic.net

Pleaserock Weddings

Yacht Rock's parent company Pleaserock has opened a new branch…Pleaserock Weddings.  It's geared towards couples who don't want a wedding with a typical Atlanta wedding band and grumpy old photographers and an anxious/bitchy wedding coordinator.  I mean, cool people get married, too.

Several Pleaserock affiliated bands played little twenty minute showcases in the acoustic nightmare that is the upstairs room at the Park Tavern.  We closed out the evening with a couple of songs.  It was a snoozer, but if it helps the keep the Pleaserock machine humming along, I'm all for it.

We're in Athens tonight at the 40 Watt!

Upcoming dates:

February 1, 40 Watt (Athens, GA)
February 15, Taste of Dunwoody (Dunwoody, GA)
February 16, Cannery Ballroom (Nashville, TN)
February 24-March 1, Rock Boat XIII (the ocean)
March 2, Park Tavern (Atlanta, GA)
March 14, Wonder Bar (Asbury Park, NJ)
March 15, Theatre of the Living Arts (Philadelphia, PA)
March 16, Gramercy Theatre (New York, NY)
March 17, The Hamilton (Washington, DC)
July 11, Mohegan Sun (Montville, CT)
July 20 (Atlanta, GA)
October 19 (Atlanta, GA)

davidfreemanmusic.net

Tyrone's Return

I hadn't played a trio gig with Tyrone Jackson on keyboards since before Thanksgiving--his schedule had gotten out of control.  Currently, he's finishing up his masters degree in Georgia State (and doing the grad assistant B.S.);  at the same time, he's teaching classes at Kennesaw State.  The actual playing of music has been mostly limited to his Sunday morning church gig.

In spite of the noisy crowd, this gig was a treat!  It's pretty awesome to have my tunes interpreted by two musicians of the caliber of Tyrone and Kevin Smith.  Great stuff by fantastic people.

Here's the audio:



davidfreemanmusic.net

North Carolina Tour

photo by Pete

Yacht Rock had a tough little tour last weekend up to North Carolina and back.

First indication that things weren't going to be easy:  we made it to 85 and Clairmont before we pulled over to add air to the trailer tires.  It was then that we noticed the steel tread showing through on the left wheel!  No good…change that tire!

Several hours later, we were still on 85 (this time just north of Charlotte) when we noticed smoke coming off the right trailer tire.  We peeled off at the next exit and investigated--it seems that the bearings in the trailer axle were fried.  Some quick smartphone work found us a UHaul place in Salisbury, NC where we could rent another trailer.  Unfortunately, we had trouble hitching it up to the van.  We eventually got the UHaul hooked up and all the gear in it, but weren't able to get back on the road quickly enough to make it to the Lincoln Theatre, so we had to cancel our gig.  Bummer!

hiding from the cold in our empty trailer

We spent the night in Salisbury.  There was a Japanese steakhouse nearby that provided dinner and entertainment.

The next morning, a couple of the guys got our trailer over to a repairman, who quickly fixed our axle bearings and got us back on the road in a couple of hours.  We reloaded our old trailer and got back on 85, this time headed to Charlotte.  We stopped this time (in a sleet storm) to add air to our van tires.

Our first gig was to be at the Visulite Theatre.  We made it, though we had to jump a curb to get around a downed power line.  It's a pretty easy load in, through the back door, down a half dozen stairs and on to the stage.

Soundcheck provided me with the discovery that the octave key mechanism on my alto was messed up--it must have taken a hit somewhere along the way that bent the rod.  I noticed last week at my House Live gig that a few of E and F# with the octave key felt weird and then felt fine.  The bent rod was causing the octave key to close slowly (thus the weird note and then fine once it closed).  I pulled the mechanism apart, WD-40'd the rod, and then forced the key tubing over it until it smoothed out the bump.  Scary stuff for saxophonists.

The show was pretty awesome!  Our first show in Charlotte drew 350 people on a night with horrible weather.  It might've sold out under better conditions.  Yay for us!  The room was cool and sounded good;  everybody (except for Dannells) played well.  I had a really good solo on Takin' it to the Streets.  It was a fun night (except for Dannells).  Hopefully, this gains us a foothold in Charlotte, as it makes for a good stop on our tours to the Northeast.

A couple of videos from the show:





A tweet from a fan:

This guy made sweet, sweet love to that sax @yachtrockrevue #clt twitter.com/samanthaAmakeu…
— Samantha Smith (@samanthaAmakeup) January 26, 2013

The next afternoon, we loaded into a club for a delayed wedding reception--they were married a few months earlier.  Another neat looking room, though they were having some sort of trouble with the furnace, so it was freezing!  It didn't help that the front door was open for half the night.

This gig was pretty good.  Private gigs never have the same vibe that public gigs do.  Later in the evening, a couple of attendees were drunk enough to get REALLY obnoxious, grabbing microphones, falling down on the monitors, knocking over the PA, and grinding on Pete.  Hmmm.

Bencuya front lines it

We hauled ass out of there as the club was opening to the public.  Fifty minutes after the last night, we had our gear and the PA loaded into the trailer.  Not quite our record, but in the top five.

We drove back to Atlanta, swapped out gear, and made our way to King Plow for our final gig of the weekend--the Team Hidi benefit.

Friend of the band and local chef Ryan Hidinger has stage IV gall bladder cancer which has spread to his liver and lungs.  Yacht Rock helped out by playing a benefit to help raise money for his treatment.

It was an amazing event.  A lot of the local restaurants chipped in for the event (which was packed to the gills!).  Good food everywhere!

Our set was a throw-and-go situation.  We plugged in and went for it without much of a line check, let alone a proper soundcheck.  Knowing it was going to sound rough, I had low expectations, and they were met.  Still, no biggie--it was tolerable for the hour or so that we played, and if it helped the event, I could deal with anything.

We're at the 40 Watt in Athens this Friday night.  Come see us if you're around.

Upcoming public dates:

February 1, 40 Watt (Athens, GA)
February 15, Taste of Dunwoody (Dunwoody, GA)
February 16, Cannery Ballroom (Nashville, TN)
February 24-March 1, Rock Boat XIII (the ocean)
March 2, Park Tavern (Atlanta, GA)
March 14, Wonder Bar (Asbury Park, NJ)
March 15, Theatre of the Living Arts (Philadelphia, PA)
March 16, Gramercy Theatre (New York, NY)
March 17, The Hamilton (Washington, DC)
July 11, Mohegan Sun (Montville, CT)
July 20 (Atlanta, GA)
October 19 (Atlanta, GA)

davidfreemanmusic.net

Sunday stuff

After another wild night at the Variety Playhouse, I was up early to hit the first of my two church gigs.

The AM gig is back to a horn section, at least for the week.  The three of us (David Trumble, Garrett Anderson, and myself) sounded good together.  We had a good balance.  We played a tune we'd train-wrecked a couple of months earlier, and this time it sounded waaaaaaaay better (and no train-wreck).

My PM gig was OK.  I didn't find much that I wanted to play on, so mostly I monitored the mix, which I think was pretty decent.  Also, there was a football game on, and I monitored that, too.

More videos from Saturday!













Upcoming dates!

January 24, Lincoln Theatre (Raleigh, NC)
January 25, Visualite Theatre (Charlotte, NC)
January 27, Hidinger Benefit at King Plow (Atlanta, GA)
February 1, 40 Watt (Athens, GA)
February 15, Taste of Dunwoody (Dunwoody, GA)
February 16, Cannery Ballroom (Nashville, TN)
February 24-March 1, Rock Boat XIII (the ocean)
March 2, Park Tavern (Atlanta, GA)
March 14, Wonder Bar (Asbury Park, NJ)
March 15, Theatre of the Living Arts (Philadelphia, PA)
March 16, Gramercy Theatre (New York, NY)
March 17, The Hamilton (Washington, DC)
July 11, Mohegan Sun (Montville, CT)
July 20 (Atlanta, GA)
October 19 (Atlanta, GA)

davidfreemanmusic.net