|
|
|
|
WEDNESDAY August 19, 1998 Didn't feel too well when I woke up this morning. I know some of the guys in the band have been sick with the flu or bronchitis, or some symptom due probably to our intense schedule. My whole reason for setting this journal up was to serve as therapy for myself and my stresses in life. Between my obligations as a husband, father, artist and musician, I feel the constant pulling from all directions. It gets to be really hard sometimes and it's important to find some kind of outlet. So for me, writing and poetry seem to calm me down some. As long as I'm writing something, I feel so much at ease with myself. About a week ago I started The Big Time Operator mailing list as a means of connecting with the swing culture out there, and to provide a means to make information about the band available to the swing culture. I met a nice young lady on the list by the name of Regina, who's very prolific on the RCR and BTO mailing lists, and I believe she's on the San Fransisco Swing list as well. It's just great to be able to connect with folks out there who are also into the neoswing movement. Well, if you happen to be reading this entry, Regina, hello to you from my journal. Debbie and Andi have also joined the BTO list, which is growing steadily but consistently. I am amazed at how big the Royal Crown Revue mailing list is, and how there's a definite swing movement out there. It makes the purpose of having a swing band more defined and necessary. So there is a purpose to this thing called swing. There is a need to provide swing music to the masses, because I sense this is a great thing for the younger masses. And swing dancing is really becoming a national obsession it seems.
It turned out to be a busy day today! This afternoon I had to take the boys to their swimming lessons today just after lunch. Then I had to take my older son to his soccer practice right after swimming lessons. I was feeling so tired that I ended up napping under this tree at the park where we had soccer practice. My younger son was there riding his bike all around. I kept drifting in and out of consciousness, making sure I kept tabs on my younger son. I bring my Sony Discman everywhere I go nowadays, and today was no exception. I was listening to Dave Weckl's Master Plan and Heads Up at the park. In the drumming world everyone knows of Weckl, he's one of the greatest all-around drummers there is. It's extremely hard to connect with my spouse when you're heading out the door and she's just coming in from work. I guess that's the hard part about this setup now, but it's been going on for years; it's just that now with BTO it's very busy and we have alot of out-of-town gigs to Los Angeles and Orange County. Today I was heading out to The Rhino Room in Huntington Beach, a very nice establishment with two different levels of dance floors and an agressive swing crowd that's really into dancing. Nate and I left his house after loading my drums into his car. I always get nervous when I have to carpool with Nate. He's always running seemingly behind schedule and seems to always push that time envelope. Myself, I'd rather leave as early as possible so I don't have to worry about being late. Anyway, we left at 7:26pm and had to get to The Rhino Room by 8:30pm and downbeat was at 9:30pm. On the way up we started talking about the band again, how we needed to improve and get better. I guess the bottom line was that some of us had to show a little more improvement, especially with all the key gigs coming up. And, with the new recording project the band needs to be tight and very together. I pretty much agreed with all his comments, I myself needed to improvement and continue to improve in order to succeed.
The Rhino Room was packed tonight! We noticed this as we pulled into the parking lot--- we couldn't see any vacant parking--- which was great; we have a great crowd, now we just had to do all we could to keep them there once we started playing music. I was loading my drums into the Rhino Room when I noticed that I had all this mud on my spectator shoes! I ended up having to clean up a bit before I finished loading in my drumset.
With the usual swing following present to greet us, and the swing lessons that concluded, we started our first set to a rousing rendition of Lunceford Special. This was well-received and the rest of the set was pretty much the same with the dance floor being packed the entire time; great! We were doing our job! The rest of the evening was quite successful. I always gauge the evening by how many dancers are enthusiastically dancing on the dance floor. During one of the breaks I had to criticize one of the guys in the band and he pretty much said he was ok. But he said that he always wanted to be informed of problems. Well, I informed the guy and he said he was ok. I was beginning to get really pissed off because I was definitely hearing some problems there and he said he was fine. Of course, when he was telling me this he had a beer in his hand and was wreaking of alcohol. Not much I could do there!
On the way home from the gig, Nate and I stopped at the Del Taco on Avery Parkway in Mission Viejo. As we headed into the parking lot we saw Marc and Jim heading out. Apparently they had picked up some food from the joint. Hmmm. They were always making fun of Nate and I for going to this Del Taco in the wee hours of the morning after our Los Angeles and Orange County gigs, and to see them coming out of the joint with food in their hands and laughing, it was just too much for me to take. I laughed out loud at the irony of it all. I guess when you're hungry, you're hungry.
CDs Played Today:
Dave Weckl - Heads Up Dave Weckl - Master Plan Big Time Operator - High Altitude Swing Fourplay - Greatest Hits Poncho Sanchez - Salsa Hits!
The Big Lebowski (video) The Apostle (video)
|
|
|
