I’m in Palm Springs in the press room covering a golf tournament. Next door the Charley Daniels band is doing their sound check. Kick drum, kick drum, fiddle, fiddle, bass, keys, and then it happened…
The guitar player started playing. The tone was perfect. The notes were perfect. He was playing “Circumstances” by Rush.
The apres ski gig went pretty well. It’s not a deal where anyone dances because all the people in the club are in ski boots.
It was a 3-piece setup: Drums, bass, guitar. The female singer plays a pretty decent bass guitar.
I finally figured out who the lesbian singer looks like. Linda Hamilton. Remember Sarah Conner from the Terminator movies? That’s her.
White Knuckle Drive Home
Apparently it had been snowing outside during the whole show. When I got to my car it was covered. I don’t have snow tires and my tires are fairly bald. So I put it in 1st gear and inched down the canyon, managing not to slide off the windy road to my death. I didn’t want to be yet another dead rock & roll musician who died a tragic death….
Got a call last night from a band I sub with now and then. They need a drummer for an “apres ski” (after ski) gig at Snowbird today. Sounds like there’s already a drum kit there too. All play and no load makes guru a happy boy.
Should be a fun gig, playing for a bunch of tired and drunk ski tourists. I wonder if the gay female singer is going to bring her amazingly beautiful girlfriend again. What does it matter anyway?
I had a gig scheduled for tonight. It was to be the biggest paying gig of the year and perhaps even the biggest paying gig I’ve ever had. I got a phone call from some lady I don’t know who said she’d been “calling the band leader for a month straight” trying to confirm the gig. She said she was getting someone else if I didn’t call the band leader and get back to her in 1/2 an hour.
I didn’t hear back from the band leader in time and she booked someone else. When the band leader did call me back, he said “fuck ’em. I don’t feel like playing for them anyway.” Hmmm… Fuck them? Fuck me too. How about considering that this gig was going to pay a shit load of my bills?
I played drums for the largest crowd ever for me, about 16,000. No it wasn’t a rock & roll gig. I played drums in the pep band at my university’s big basketball game today…
But hey, if someone asks what the largest crowd I’ve played for I can now say 16K.
Note: I wasn’t nervous either..