An interview, An accident, An album session, A general update

I recently (2 months ago?) sat down with local Austin personality Arcie Cola to shoot an episode of 'Day Drinkin with Arcie Cola' where she takes various people out for a few rounds and asks them questions once they're a bit piffed.

Pretty genius. I thought I bombed mine, as I was a chatterbox up until the recorder came out. But she was holding off on releasing it until there was something with which to cross-promote. That event was a rare Adrian and the Sickness show at Hole in the Wall last week Thursday.

But holy cow, I don't remember saying 75% of the stuff I said hahaha! Came out pretty damn good, if you'll excuse my Kermit the Frog voice haha... :/

Here's the clip, courtesy Austin.com

The Adrian and the Sickness show went pretty well tho it was a Thursday night. Great to play with Adrian and Armando again! The Surleys, who I haven't seen yet, were fun and I dug them. FEA from San Antonio was also a blast. Fun night all around!

Friday was a rare night off from gigging, tho I did have offers I couldn't accept and a residency gig I walked away from for my own reasons, which I'll get to. Instead went to Amber Saxon (Hell's Belle's/BugGirl) and Heather Webb's (BugGirl, ex-Adrian and the Sickness) place in South Austin for Amber's going away party. She is moving to San Diego, and will be missed.

The party was a blast tho my allergies flared up something fierce shortly before heading over there. Lots of friends and musical family. She will be back to visit in a few months, so that's good.

Saturday night Adrian and the Sickness took Vincent Van Go to San Antonio for a gig.

Turns out my "allergies" were really a cold. Shit. We were playing all night, two long sets. I'd get through them, but would be clearing my schedule Sunday to recover...

So Adrian is piloting her 22' Sprinter van on I-35 at speed just coming into San Antonio.

There is a loud BAM!!! and an impact. Did we just lose a tire?!?

No, a 4-door sedan comes barreling past us, skidding, with obvious damage now to the driver's side. We watch in muted shock as he continues forward at high speed, muscling between two cars each in respective lanes. We were to busy watching out for the inevitable accident he was going to cause (which surprisingly and thankfully didn't happen) to get a make or license #. And it was night as well.

So we pull over to survey the damage, not really sure what to do. This was the sight that greeted us:

Fuck.

Tail lights and housing are toast, door hinge damaged. Most of what is pictured fell off when I touched it with my finger. Fuckin people.

We get back on the road and head to venue where Adrian would call the cops to at least file a report for insurance people. We also expected to see either a wreck or flashing cop lights where the guy was pulled over, so we could pull in and say THIS IS THE FUCKER THAT HIT US. But there was nothing.

Hopefully wherever he had to go was so important that he had to risk the lives of who knows how many. Fuckin people.

The cop was nice tho, and not much he could do. He gave Adrian his card in case we got pulled over for the busted tail light, as an indicator that yes this just happened and no there is currently anything we can do about it. But we managed to get the top light working, just had to put the bulb back in as it had popped out. Made it home without incident.

Gig was fun, even tho I was battling the aforementioned cold. Adrenaline kept me going, with the inevitable crash as soon as we went on break or were done. The venue was great and the people there really dug it!

Anyway.

My schedule this next two weeks is rather light, which will allow me to fully recover from the cold (already turned the hump last night) and get caught up on Ocean of Stars booking and business, and various other business related things.

OoS is convening on Thursday to rehearse and start bringing two new songs to the set, which would give us an hour of material and more to offer for gigs.

Lately my schedule has been so hectic we've been on another unintended hiatus.

One last minute thing that came to pass was an album session with Chet Himes at The Ranch.

Awesome place, good to be back. Jason Patten has another albums worth of music we have been working up with drummer Derek Hensley. Chet was able to squeeze us in for a day to track, before Derek moved back to New York state.

Went quickly and smoothly. With as intentionally sparse as the music was, there was much more space for me to fill out as a bass player. So I spared no expense in uncorking, going really OUT THERE quite a bit. That was fun! Can't wait to hear it!

Chet, Landis, Jason, Derek, myself (and a Jimi Hendrix photobomb):

In other news, I will no longer be doing the Sean Evan and Very Handsome Band Wednesday and Friday residencies at a bar downtown which will go un-named. I finally hit the wall with that place 2 Fridays ago.

My reasons are my own, but involve the noise ordinance, the fact that we are still told to set up right next to the goddamn front door, and the antagonistic attitude of the person in charge. The money was decent at best, and it was in no way a career-making opportunity. Sean, Johnny and Bruce were all VERY understanding and very supportive of my decision. And I will continue to play with them, just not at this particular locale.

I'm 40 now, and am having a lower and lower tolerance for bullshit. There will be other opportunities.

Back to business

Got back to work after my doldrums had subsided.

Last week:

Tuesday rehearsed with Jason Patten and Derek Hensley in prep for an imminent album recording with Chet Himes. Jason and his lady made me a chunk of German chocolate cake, laden with candles so it looked like a sea urchin. Awesome! That was really nice of them and made my day! Update on that situation, looks like we hit the studio tomorrow, which will conflict with rehearsal with Heather Bishop tomorrow night in prep for her birthday show at Saxon Pub next Wednesday. Shit.

Wednesday had afternoon rehearsal with Ulrich Ellison before a gig at Hanover's in Pflugerville that night. Both went well. Despite my rookie mistake of leaving my pedalboard (containing all pertinent cables for the gig) at his practice space. Well shit. Had a tuner in my phone and borrowed cables so not the end of the world. Having my bass drive does come in handy for giving my hands a break. Was able to function without it and dig in more with my attack to get the extra volume. But lets just say my hands/forearms hurt like hell the next morning. Which sucked because:

Thursday had 11am rehearsal again with Ulrich and this time the keyboard player (all gigs save Sat at Maggie Mae's were trio gigs). My hands were blown by the time we were done. And I still had a 4-hour recording session with Sean Evan to bass for 4 more tracks on his album. Spent the day resting and not playing music. Listened to the 4 songs before heading out, wrote down the charts Sean had emailed me for a guideline.

Went in there with little to no prep and still knocked them all out by the third take. Felt really good about that. Once I locked into the kick/snare pattern, the bass line fell into place. Went back to clean up a blown change or two, but still made quick work of the tunes.

In between all this was trying to settle a booking controversy for Oct 4. Had a Hooka Hey show which I agreed to, but then had two other offers come in the same time which unfortunately would have paid much more. But Hooka Hey doesn't have the roster of possible subs that the other two bands do, and to back out would mean cancellation of the date (an outdoor festival in Victoria TX at 9pm) altogether. Shit. So I did what I should have done to begin with, keep the date I initially accepted and explained the situation to the other two situations.

Friday played Anderson Mill Tavern with Ulrich. Spent the day resting, then doing some much-needed housework. Oh yeah, we're having a dinner party coming up this week. We need to clean!!!

Saturday was supposed to play an early private party for some bikers in Del Valle, but that got rained out en route. They still paid us half which was really cool of them. Got the news just as I was pulling into a gas station for a 5-Hour Energy and wondering how I was going to get through the day. Back was really bothering me, hands still hurting, and really really wanted a nap...

So we killed some time here, then loaded in at Maggie's early to avoid the clusterfuck of Pecan Street Festival going on downtown. Uli dropped me off back home and he ran to do a short set with Nakia Reynosa. Finally got a nap. Headed back downtown (this time with my damn cable box, thought my cables were in my pedalboard... glad I noticed that loading in, my hands would have killed me) in Heather's car (smaller than my van and could fit my rig) with plenty of time to find parking and have a leisurely set up.

Gig went great! Good crowd all night, and was cool to finally have the keyboard player onstage as well, kind of gave me a bit of a break from holding down rhythms, heh. Was really fun playing with Ulrich and Michael Davila and Bill Commander. Glad Ulrich's wife Sabine (usual bassist) will be ok and home soon to begin their upcoming tour. But I had a blast playing with them and kinda bummed the shows are over :)

Sunday resumed rehearsals with Dead Oak. Good to see them, been awhile. They may be hooking me up with three days of freelance work next week for a handsome paycheck.

Which is great as October was looking light so far...

This week, rinse and repeat. Rehearsal tonight. Recording tomorrow. Hooka Hey rehearsal on Wednesday. Joint birthday dinner party for Heather and myself here at the Hobbit Hole on Thurs (invite only, there is not much space here hahaha), Friday probably with Sean Evan at Dizzy Rooster, Saturday in Victoria with Hooka Hey. Sunday Dead Oak rehearsal. Mon-Wed could be working freelance 9-5pm. Rehearsal with Heather on Tues for her birthday show at Saxon on Wednesday.

Maybe late next week I'll have another day off finally. See what happens.