Tuesday, July 04, 2006 

Vacation, all I ever wanted...

Well, not really. But we don't have any gigs scheduled for a while so we can concentrate on the album for a while (in between all those "life" things). We've got the ingredients for a great meal... but a lot of vocals left to do and some serious mixing. I haven't made anyone's job easier - I've been recording a lot of different guitar parts and textures for each song and it's going to be difficult to see which ones make the final cut. Maybe none!
Wrapping up an exciting month, we played the big Bronson Arroyo/Raquel Aurilia show at The Madison Theater earlier in June. What an amazing time... the crowd was really into the show and it was definitely a highlight of our live shows. After the gig we had an impromptu jam with the LA band and some of the ballplayers - singing every bad cover song we could think of. Dueting on "Our Love" with Adam Dunn is certainly something I'll never forget.
June 30th we rejoined some old friends at the newly-named Poison Room (formerly Viper Room) on a balmy Friday night. The ever-amazing Swarthy Band opened the show and completely rocked it, as always. Their songwriting, while very distinctive, never ceases so surprise me. Very dynamic and aggressive pop songs in the vein of Kinks & Who with some modern punk sensibility mixed in. Of course, they didn't do my two requests, the bastards. The Newbees where next with a fantastic set of their thick, melodic groovey tunes... they are mixing just the right touch of country into their sound but staying with the pop sound that makes their songs shine. Everyone in this band is a thrill to listen to.
We were next. I had spent the majority of the time with the previous bands trying to get Preston, Jim & Randy as drunk as possible. The AC was broken in the club so by the time we hit this stage it was as hot as a Brangelina... I began hitting "Superdave" (thanks to everyone who recognized my shirt!) and we muddle through the set list with absolutely no vocals in our monitors. All I could hear onstage was bass and a little of Randy's guitar. Everyone in the crowd said it was a great set, but I was cruising totally on memory - maybe my guitar solo was in the right key, maybe not! I think I sang all the right words...
Buckra closed it out with their awesome funk rock sound and kept the ladies dancing. Great night! Great, sweaty, steamy night.
So, back to recording. I've got a few song ideas I'm going to be fleshing out this month too, so maybe I'll have a surprise for you at some point... thought about doing a podcast with some of my song demos. What do you think?