Post by Gene on Aug 31, 2010 15:05:51 GMT -5
It’s been a muggy month, but I hope you’re having fun, nonetheless. It sure has been a busy one for me. Appreciate it while you have it, since things are going to cool off and slow down; My upcoming schedule definitely proves the latter:
SUN, SEP 5 : Mackinac Grille, St. Ignace, MI, 3pm-7
SAT, SEP 11: Driftwood Sports Bar, St. Ignace, MI, 9pm-1
SUN, SEP 12: Bullwinkle's, Moran, MI, 3pm-7
Lots of very local ones, here, since I tend to market these more in the off-season. These places often do things on very short notice, so I may have more coming that I’ll place on my website quickly if they happen.
Mackinac Grille’s new huge deck overlooking the lake is really great, and is worth checking out this Labor Day Sunday if you haven’t already. The Driftwood is a nice surprise, since doing business with them is often very difficult and mysterious, but I got lucky, I guess; This show is a real rare treat, so come on down! The old Rock Bottom Tavern in Moran got bought by new owners, and is giving live music a go, so try to support what they’re doing if you can!
I sure had a lot of new adventures at a lot of new venues last month: My debut at Mackinac Grille was great, since it landed on a birthday party for Yvonne Champion, who’s family ran the old Rock Bottom, so that turned into quite a big doin’s. Locals On The Bay was pleasant, with good weather and a great turn-out (and great CD sales!). Northern Lights Recreation had a friendly bunch of folks there, and I sure hope how well I did will be remembered come this ski season. The Elkwood Campground gig was very rushed, since I had to get my daughter Andrea to camp that morning, so I couldn’t give many other acts I wanted to see there much of my attention, but I did quite well to close off the evening. I did a private pre-wedding gig on an island cottage near Cedarville that has the new distinction of being the most profitable gig I’ve ever done, so it proved well worth the extra trouble involved with it! The Rusty Anchor gig got placed later than originally scheduled, which helped with attendance a lot. I have to morph myself to be my mellowest there, which isn’t “natural”, but the owner did compliment me, so it was the correct thing to do. I did The Islander again, on a Thursday this time, and it was STILL a wild party! This place is growing to be one of my faves! I did two more at Douglas Lake Bar, and it’s starting to feel very comfortable there.
Being so busy, I could barely check out other local artists as I usually like to. Well, I SORTA checked out one: While I was hurriedly setting up my camper at Elkwood, I was in earshot of hearing The Banjo Picker & Friends, a very good bluegrass band, while I did this. I didn’t really “see” them, though, but I got an earful. I enjoyed them a lot, and so did the many others that were there. The leader goes by the handle of Barry “Tiger-Bear” Jon Van Guilder, and he has a good way with the crowd, musically and with his banter. I believe his daughter, Rachael Brooke, does backing acoustic guitar and vox, and I think she does some other side projects, too. I believe they are out of Grayling. I actually saw a friend of mine, Laren Corie, step up and sit in competently for a few, too, but I was too busy to come over and say “hi”. They did a lot of old bluegrass standards and a couple originals, but nothing new (as most bluegrass groups do, as this is what the genre mostly demands). This is an entertaining little foursome, to be sure, but a fiddle player would really take this group from good to great, in my opinion (but the mandolin player did do a fantastic job filling the holes).
To segue with the previous paragraph smoothly, when I went to The Banjo Picker’s website, I learned that the Great Lakes Guitar Company in Traverse City did some fret crowning work on some of his instruments that he was pleased with. I won’t pass off Jon as a friend of mine that I would always surely trust, or anything, but I reasoned that he’d probably been playing long enough to know the difference between good and bad luthier work, and I needed some work done like this on my old Taylor guitar. Since worse Canadian border restrictions now make it difficult for me to reach my guy that I used to depend on for this, I was in need of a new good luthier’s services, so I thought I’d give this Tim Miller guy a try. I combined this trip with a camping weekend in that area and dropped off my instrument. It looked best do to a full-blown re-fretting, so that’s what’s going to be done. For any musicians reading this that would find this useful, I’ll let you know how this all turns out in a future e-newsletter.
Also, coming back from Petoskey one day, I swung by to check out Hipps ‘N’ Ricco again, this time at the Pellston airport restaurant, now going by the name of Smokey’s. Attendance was terrible, and here playing was probably the hottest live act in the area going on right now! It was a terrible shame, but I did get to experience this great duo practically “all to myself”. We also got to chew the fat a little about the local scene, gear, and so on. They handed off to me a couple of their CD’s. They hand these out for free with very little packaging otherwise, and claim it has proven to be a very good marketing technique. I believe them, and I think it’s a shrewd, smart move in these times (since few folks still actually BUY recorded music anymore…). It’s working gloriously, too, since they gig nearly daily, and sometimes twice a day. It also helps quite a bit that the CD’s are great! It’s very blues-centered, and most songs are just influenced by the standard blues song templates, but don’t lock-step mimic these formulas (which is the correct way to apply the blues in 21st century song-writing, I think). This writing with a lot of “curveballs”, along with Eric’s howly, gravel voice and interesting, riffy guitar, it somehow manages to be “dirty” and smart at the same time. Charlie’s harmonica is perfect frosting for that blues flavor going on, and he definitely holds up his end in the live show, since he seems to be the more extroverted of the two. Usually local acts this good end up moving to Ann Arbor or farther to make a semi-serious go of it, and I’m always waiting for this other shoe to drop with them, so enjoy them now while you can!
As for the coming months, my gig schedule should slow down. When the days get cooler in my un-air-conditioned house, I would like to start recording some video performances for my website, to keep up with the times. I would also like to de-emphasize my original material in my website more, since I’ve determined that most of the local venues I market to are not really looking for, or are impressed with this. I still want to dabble in original songwriting and production, though, but more as a “secret” side project for artistic fulfillment purposes (since there’s no actual money in original recorded music in the internet age, that’s for sure!...), and probably in ’11 or ’12.
Live Well & CREATE!
--Gene.
SUN, SEP 5 : Mackinac Grille, St. Ignace, MI, 3pm-7
SAT, SEP 11: Driftwood Sports Bar, St. Ignace, MI, 9pm-1
SUN, SEP 12: Bullwinkle's, Moran, MI, 3pm-7
Lots of very local ones, here, since I tend to market these more in the off-season. These places often do things on very short notice, so I may have more coming that I’ll place on my website quickly if they happen.
Mackinac Grille’s new huge deck overlooking the lake is really great, and is worth checking out this Labor Day Sunday if you haven’t already. The Driftwood is a nice surprise, since doing business with them is often very difficult and mysterious, but I got lucky, I guess; This show is a real rare treat, so come on down! The old Rock Bottom Tavern in Moran got bought by new owners, and is giving live music a go, so try to support what they’re doing if you can!
I sure had a lot of new adventures at a lot of new venues last month: My debut at Mackinac Grille was great, since it landed on a birthday party for Yvonne Champion, who’s family ran the old Rock Bottom, so that turned into quite a big doin’s. Locals On The Bay was pleasant, with good weather and a great turn-out (and great CD sales!). Northern Lights Recreation had a friendly bunch of folks there, and I sure hope how well I did will be remembered come this ski season. The Elkwood Campground gig was very rushed, since I had to get my daughter Andrea to camp that morning, so I couldn’t give many other acts I wanted to see there much of my attention, but I did quite well to close off the evening. I did a private pre-wedding gig on an island cottage near Cedarville that has the new distinction of being the most profitable gig I’ve ever done, so it proved well worth the extra trouble involved with it! The Rusty Anchor gig got placed later than originally scheduled, which helped with attendance a lot. I have to morph myself to be my mellowest there, which isn’t “natural”, but the owner did compliment me, so it was the correct thing to do. I did The Islander again, on a Thursday this time, and it was STILL a wild party! This place is growing to be one of my faves! I did two more at Douglas Lake Bar, and it’s starting to feel very comfortable there.
Being so busy, I could barely check out other local artists as I usually like to. Well, I SORTA checked out one: While I was hurriedly setting up my camper at Elkwood, I was in earshot of hearing The Banjo Picker & Friends, a very good bluegrass band, while I did this. I didn’t really “see” them, though, but I got an earful. I enjoyed them a lot, and so did the many others that were there. The leader goes by the handle of Barry “Tiger-Bear” Jon Van Guilder, and he has a good way with the crowd, musically and with his banter. I believe his daughter, Rachael Brooke, does backing acoustic guitar and vox, and I think she does some other side projects, too. I believe they are out of Grayling. I actually saw a friend of mine, Laren Corie, step up and sit in competently for a few, too, but I was too busy to come over and say “hi”. They did a lot of old bluegrass standards and a couple originals, but nothing new (as most bluegrass groups do, as this is what the genre mostly demands). This is an entertaining little foursome, to be sure, but a fiddle player would really take this group from good to great, in my opinion (but the mandolin player did do a fantastic job filling the holes).
To segue with the previous paragraph smoothly, when I went to The Banjo Picker’s website, I learned that the Great Lakes Guitar Company in Traverse City did some fret crowning work on some of his instruments that he was pleased with. I won’t pass off Jon as a friend of mine that I would always surely trust, or anything, but I reasoned that he’d probably been playing long enough to know the difference between good and bad luthier work, and I needed some work done like this on my old Taylor guitar. Since worse Canadian border restrictions now make it difficult for me to reach my guy that I used to depend on for this, I was in need of a new good luthier’s services, so I thought I’d give this Tim Miller guy a try. I combined this trip with a camping weekend in that area and dropped off my instrument. It looked best do to a full-blown re-fretting, so that’s what’s going to be done. For any musicians reading this that would find this useful, I’ll let you know how this all turns out in a future e-newsletter.
Also, coming back from Petoskey one day, I swung by to check out Hipps ‘N’ Ricco again, this time at the Pellston airport restaurant, now going by the name of Smokey’s. Attendance was terrible, and here playing was probably the hottest live act in the area going on right now! It was a terrible shame, but I did get to experience this great duo practically “all to myself”. We also got to chew the fat a little about the local scene, gear, and so on. They handed off to me a couple of their CD’s. They hand these out for free with very little packaging otherwise, and claim it has proven to be a very good marketing technique. I believe them, and I think it’s a shrewd, smart move in these times (since few folks still actually BUY recorded music anymore…). It’s working gloriously, too, since they gig nearly daily, and sometimes twice a day. It also helps quite a bit that the CD’s are great! It’s very blues-centered, and most songs are just influenced by the standard blues song templates, but don’t lock-step mimic these formulas (which is the correct way to apply the blues in 21st century song-writing, I think). This writing with a lot of “curveballs”, along with Eric’s howly, gravel voice and interesting, riffy guitar, it somehow manages to be “dirty” and smart at the same time. Charlie’s harmonica is perfect frosting for that blues flavor going on, and he definitely holds up his end in the live show, since he seems to be the more extroverted of the two. Usually local acts this good end up moving to Ann Arbor or farther to make a semi-serious go of it, and I’m always waiting for this other shoe to drop with them, so enjoy them now while you can!
As for the coming months, my gig schedule should slow down. When the days get cooler in my un-air-conditioned house, I would like to start recording some video performances for my website, to keep up with the times. I would also like to de-emphasize my original material in my website more, since I’ve determined that most of the local venues I market to are not really looking for, or are impressed with this. I still want to dabble in original songwriting and production, though, but more as a “secret” side project for artistic fulfillment purposes (since there’s no actual money in original recorded music in the internet age, that’s for sure!...), and probably in ’11 or ’12.
Live Well & CREATE!
--Gene.