Post by Gene on Jul 28, 2011 13:51:55 GMT -5
How’s your summer going? It’s probably as nutsy as mine is; You know Northern Michigan! My schedule sure is a good example of this:
SUN, JUL 31: Hoppie's, Pellston, 6pm-9
FRI, AUG 5: Fab Friday: Colonial House, St. Ignace, 7pm-9
SAT, AUG 6: Driftwood Sports Bar, St. Ignace, MI 9pm-1
SUN, AUG 7: Mackinac Grille, St. Ignace, 4pm-7
THU, AUG 11: Hoppie's, Pellston, 9pm-12
SAT, AUG 13: Bluegrass & Blues Music Weekend: Elkwood Campground, Wolverine, intermittently
WED, AUG 17: Locals On The Bay: Marina, St. Ignace, 7pm-8:30
Hoppies is a really cool place, but it’s pretty hard to find, being on the north end of Burt Lake. My last gig there was hellish, since the air conditioning conked out that day, and it was about 80 degrees in the room, but I poured sweat and soldiered on anyway (probably looking terrible!)... “Fab Friday” is kind of a busking gig on the street that the city puts on, which will be a first for me. Driftwood is becoming a comfortable home, and I can really cut loose an “be myself” there. Mackinac Grille got in touch with me late in the year, so this was the only date this year there I could schedule, so I’m looking forward to that, partly for the reason that it’s two blocks from my house!... It will be my third year being an act at the Elkwood Campground festival in Wolverine, which also offers me overnight camping, which is nice. I play at the St. Ignace Marina for another city gig, and it’s a real centerpiece show (as opposed to being background ambience), so that will be a special gig.
Past gigs have include many of these same venues. Douglas Lake Bar called me in to fill in a cancellation on short notice, along with one other scheduled one. It’s very much a subdued gig, and I try to keep it on an ambience level for early diners, but it’s fun for a mellow Sunday evening gig. I got a chance to debut at the Dixie Saloon in Mac City, but it was not as expected: Seemed I was the victim of a double-booking with Mike Ridley that same evening, and they chose to resolve it by having me play in the O’Rielly’s Pub half at the same time for a cut rate. Since it was a foot in the door to prove myself, and I was there already anyway, I took the offer. I sure hope that it proved worth it for consideration of future LEGITAMATE bookings, but we’ll see on that. It seemed like it went well, although I felt as though it was a competitive “battle of the bands” of sorts with Mike Ridley in the next room, which I don’t really favor doing with other local artists, but it went okay, and he was fine with it. I played my 30-year class reunion at a lodge in Ishpeming, which was fun, but it was at a cost of not being able to chit-chat and catch up with old acquaintances, so it was a mix of good and bad, I guess. The three gigs at Pink Pony on Mac Island went VERY well. I was scheduled for the lakeside deck in the afternoon, but one day was a bad weather day, so I got to perform on their famous behind-the-bar pedestal stage. The prestige of that sure warranted taking some pictures of me doing this, since few Michigan acts can claim to have done this, but unfortunately I didn’t bring my camera. Oh well, it’s definitely a good story anyway, and a great resume tag!
During one Sunday gig, packing up, I put my back out. The pain was so intolerable the following Tuesday morning getting out of bed that I resorted to going to the hospital. It’s much better now, but this experience along with the repeated setting up and transport of gear for Mackinac Island has forced me to conclude that I had to start considering “simpling up” my live set-up, and things needed to be more slick. It has occurred to me that other acts spend much less time with this, too, so I started looking hard at ways to cut trips to the truck, and abbreviate load, especially for the Island gigs. So, I have built a combination mic-stand/music-stand/stick-monitor-stand, based from a collapsible aluminum camping table. It’s hard to explain it without illustration, but if I may say so myself, it’s very clever, since it takes up little space packed, sets up quick, has less pieces and is strong. I even put a wall paper-trough on it to place already-performed song sheets, so they don’t blow away in the wind of outdoor deck gigs. (A lot of lessons learned the hard way were used in this design!...) I have also incorporated a small mixer with reverb effects directly onto my pedal board, and I will use my smaller powered speakers more often (with the exception of outdoor gigs), which will completely take out the powered mixer/amp “dongle” in the middle of the whole chain. It all looks very good, and I hope to be testing this new rig at the Hoppies gig on July 31. It’s about time; This has needed doing for quite a while. One of the inevitabilities of getting older, I guess!...
I haven’t had much chance to see other local performers I haven’t seen before, except for Tim Hatfield’s band at the casino one night, with some friends. (The band’s name was not advertised, but it probably just goes under his personal name.) Tim is a very established musician in the Soo that has been playing in this area in one project or another for about 40 years, now. The act was flawless musically, as you’d expect from a musician of this experience and caliber. It was very artistically “safe”, though, as far as delivery and material: The guitar was clean and chimey, the band volume was low, and it seemed that he quit listening to rock music at about 1974, since whenever the band would go over this time threshold, the song would be in the country genre. It was the right fit for the room, though, for sure, since it was nearly all grey-hairs in the audience. (The “Red Hat Society” just happened to be having a night out there, that night, too!) Tim’s obviously jet-black-dyed hair added quite a bit to the band’s “cheese factor”, too... I’m in my late 40's, but even I found the music to be a bit on the “old” side... I jest slightly here, I suppose, but seeing acts like this as I myself get older, I sometimes wonder if I’m getting a glimpse of my own future sometime soon down the road; Heh!... Where I’m at, I actually find it inspiring to see this kind of thing in what is mostly always a young man’s game. So, I say, good for him!
I try to make it a point to take a walk with my wife and dog down to the marina on Wednesdays to check out St. Ignace’s Locals On The Bay series. I have only caught Cedar Straits and Catholic Girls Gone Bad there, though, lately. I’ve seen both a few times before, but the new thing I could say is that as these acts are together longer, it definitely shows in the quality. With Catholic Girls especially, I find myself being subconsciously drawn to occasionally learning more songs of the lounge and jazz genres for my own act, (which are not my center genres) and I have to attribute that to their influence. Cedar Straits is also a good one for reminding me of overlooked gem songs in this acoustic music art as well, in what they choose to do. There are indeed many flavors of “cool”!...
As a segueing closure to that sentence, I sure hope you’re keeping cool this summer!
–Gene.
SUN, JUL 31: Hoppie's, Pellston, 6pm-9
FRI, AUG 5: Fab Friday: Colonial House, St. Ignace, 7pm-9
SAT, AUG 6: Driftwood Sports Bar, St. Ignace, MI 9pm-1
SUN, AUG 7: Mackinac Grille, St. Ignace, 4pm-7
THU, AUG 11: Hoppie's, Pellston, 9pm-12
SAT, AUG 13: Bluegrass & Blues Music Weekend: Elkwood Campground, Wolverine, intermittently
WED, AUG 17: Locals On The Bay: Marina, St. Ignace, 7pm-8:30
Hoppies is a really cool place, but it’s pretty hard to find, being on the north end of Burt Lake. My last gig there was hellish, since the air conditioning conked out that day, and it was about 80 degrees in the room, but I poured sweat and soldiered on anyway (probably looking terrible!)... “Fab Friday” is kind of a busking gig on the street that the city puts on, which will be a first for me. Driftwood is becoming a comfortable home, and I can really cut loose an “be myself” there. Mackinac Grille got in touch with me late in the year, so this was the only date this year there I could schedule, so I’m looking forward to that, partly for the reason that it’s two blocks from my house!... It will be my third year being an act at the Elkwood Campground festival in Wolverine, which also offers me overnight camping, which is nice. I play at the St. Ignace Marina for another city gig, and it’s a real centerpiece show (as opposed to being background ambience), so that will be a special gig.
Past gigs have include many of these same venues. Douglas Lake Bar called me in to fill in a cancellation on short notice, along with one other scheduled one. It’s very much a subdued gig, and I try to keep it on an ambience level for early diners, but it’s fun for a mellow Sunday evening gig. I got a chance to debut at the Dixie Saloon in Mac City, but it was not as expected: Seemed I was the victim of a double-booking with Mike Ridley that same evening, and they chose to resolve it by having me play in the O’Rielly’s Pub half at the same time for a cut rate. Since it was a foot in the door to prove myself, and I was there already anyway, I took the offer. I sure hope that it proved worth it for consideration of future LEGITAMATE bookings, but we’ll see on that. It seemed like it went well, although I felt as though it was a competitive “battle of the bands” of sorts with Mike Ridley in the next room, which I don’t really favor doing with other local artists, but it went okay, and he was fine with it. I played my 30-year class reunion at a lodge in Ishpeming, which was fun, but it was at a cost of not being able to chit-chat and catch up with old acquaintances, so it was a mix of good and bad, I guess. The three gigs at Pink Pony on Mac Island went VERY well. I was scheduled for the lakeside deck in the afternoon, but one day was a bad weather day, so I got to perform on their famous behind-the-bar pedestal stage. The prestige of that sure warranted taking some pictures of me doing this, since few Michigan acts can claim to have done this, but unfortunately I didn’t bring my camera. Oh well, it’s definitely a good story anyway, and a great resume tag!
During one Sunday gig, packing up, I put my back out. The pain was so intolerable the following Tuesday morning getting out of bed that I resorted to going to the hospital. It’s much better now, but this experience along with the repeated setting up and transport of gear for Mackinac Island has forced me to conclude that I had to start considering “simpling up” my live set-up, and things needed to be more slick. It has occurred to me that other acts spend much less time with this, too, so I started looking hard at ways to cut trips to the truck, and abbreviate load, especially for the Island gigs. So, I have built a combination mic-stand/music-stand/stick-monitor-stand, based from a collapsible aluminum camping table. It’s hard to explain it without illustration, but if I may say so myself, it’s very clever, since it takes up little space packed, sets up quick, has less pieces and is strong. I even put a wall paper-trough on it to place already-performed song sheets, so they don’t blow away in the wind of outdoor deck gigs. (A lot of lessons learned the hard way were used in this design!...) I have also incorporated a small mixer with reverb effects directly onto my pedal board, and I will use my smaller powered speakers more often (with the exception of outdoor gigs), which will completely take out the powered mixer/amp “dongle” in the middle of the whole chain. It all looks very good, and I hope to be testing this new rig at the Hoppies gig on July 31. It’s about time; This has needed doing for quite a while. One of the inevitabilities of getting older, I guess!...
I haven’t had much chance to see other local performers I haven’t seen before, except for Tim Hatfield’s band at the casino one night, with some friends. (The band’s name was not advertised, but it probably just goes under his personal name.) Tim is a very established musician in the Soo that has been playing in this area in one project or another for about 40 years, now. The act was flawless musically, as you’d expect from a musician of this experience and caliber. It was very artistically “safe”, though, as far as delivery and material: The guitar was clean and chimey, the band volume was low, and it seemed that he quit listening to rock music at about 1974, since whenever the band would go over this time threshold, the song would be in the country genre. It was the right fit for the room, though, for sure, since it was nearly all grey-hairs in the audience. (The “Red Hat Society” just happened to be having a night out there, that night, too!) Tim’s obviously jet-black-dyed hair added quite a bit to the band’s “cheese factor”, too... I’m in my late 40's, but even I found the music to be a bit on the “old” side... I jest slightly here, I suppose, but seeing acts like this as I myself get older, I sometimes wonder if I’m getting a glimpse of my own future sometime soon down the road; Heh!... Where I’m at, I actually find it inspiring to see this kind of thing in what is mostly always a young man’s game. So, I say, good for him!
I try to make it a point to take a walk with my wife and dog down to the marina on Wednesdays to check out St. Ignace’s Locals On The Bay series. I have only caught Cedar Straits and Catholic Girls Gone Bad there, though, lately. I’ve seen both a few times before, but the new thing I could say is that as these acts are together longer, it definitely shows in the quality. With Catholic Girls especially, I find myself being subconsciously drawn to occasionally learning more songs of the lounge and jazz genres for my own act, (which are not my center genres) and I have to attribute that to their influence. Cedar Straits is also a good one for reminding me of overlooked gem songs in this acoustic music art as well, in what they choose to do. There are indeed many flavors of “cool”!...
As a segueing closure to that sentence, I sure hope you’re keeping cool this summer!
–Gene.
