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WEDNESDAY
07.29.98
reflections of arizona
After getting back from Arizona, I felt completely drained and exhausted. It had been extremely hot there and the temperature never fell below the 100s. As a matter of fact, it had been consistently between the 105 and 115 degree range, as I was told. But most of the time we were always in an air conditioned environment, whether in the rented vans, in our hotel rooms, at a restaurant or at the venues, we always had air conditioning, which was definitely a necessity in this part of the country. This was my first time to Arizona. I sort of fell in love with the whole desert scene, despite the heat. I had been told it was quite nice during the winter months. I've always loved the desert and have had dreams of living in the desert. It's just that in my dreams I don't feel the heat of the real desert. Overall I truly enjoyed our tour to Arizona. The people I've met there are warm, friendly and very hospitable, and they made our stay there an enjoyable experience. Steve, our promoter and booking agent who made arrangements for all our gigs there, our accomodations, food and well-being, did an excellent job at keeping us happy and cool. Highlights of the band's tour in Arizona included the Bash On Ash near Arizona State University, Borders in Phoenix where we performed on the second floor of this book store and signed autographs, The Rialto Theater in Tuscon where Cherry Poppin' Daddies had just performed two weeks before and where The Squirrel Nut Zippers were going to perform in a week or two at an already sold out show. Also, we performed a great, intimate show at The Academy of Ballroom Dancing, and our last and highly successful show at The Rockin' Horse where we performed two encores, was packed and the dancers really enjoyed our tempos. Before the Rockin' Horse show Steve gave us a reception at his place in Scottsdale and we all got a kick out of viewing his collection of swing and dance film footage on video tape. Overall it was a very successful tour. The people, especially the dancers seemed to love us, and they definitely want us back but we are booked solid up to New Year's Eve and we already have tours scheduled for Colorado in October and San Fransisco in November. It might not be until early next year when we get back to Arizona, and there's also the possibility of a tour to Japan in January. Just spending a whole week with the other nine guys in the band was enough to get tempers riled up, especially with the temperatures in the 100s, at times we were all over each about this or that. It wasn't all a bowl of cherries, but most of the time we all got along and joked around quite a bit. I'll be the first to admit that people's tempers are bound to rise with the rising of the temperature. I complained about certain things to a few of the other guys in the band and some people were offended. I'm always torn sometimes between bringing up mistakes or problems I hear in the band's sound, and just shutting the hell up. Being a person that's concerned with the band's sound in relationship to other bands in the neo-swing movement, I am forced to say something about those problems. I guess someone has to say it. If we all keep quiet about it, we're only fooling ourselves. That's the main thing with me, honesty and integrity, and if something sucks, I have to bring it up, for the overall good of the band. The band has to keep getting better and better, or otherwise we perish. With the neo-swing movement building up steam and gaining in popularity, it's our responsibility to give this new young audience an adequate representation of what swing is, and pay tribute to the masters of that era by really swinging, and swinging hard. I felt really good about my playing during this Arizona tour. I received alot of great compliments about my playing, about my drum solos, and I felt generally confident in my playing ability. I was able to practice a lot during the day with no interuptions, and so I was able to keep my "chops" up the entire week in Arizona. I really didn't miss surfing the web and working on my web sites, and the opportunities to practice on the practice pad were a blessing and felt great. I guess when you're at home you can have many distractions, or projects and errands that can prevent a musician from practicing enough, and being on the road gives a musician more time to practice his instrument, period. Today my wife and I went to see the movie Saving Private Ryan. I was warned about the strong graphic content and violence in the movie. Although we felt it really should've been given an NC-17 rating, the graphic violence depicted in this film was necessary for the overall impact that Spielberg wanted to convey about World War II, about what actually happened and to dispell all the propaganda movies about World War II that had appeared over the years. I thought this was an excellent movie and really payed tribute to the war veterans who have given their lives for their country, and to give us the freedom we take for granted today. I was deeply touched by the film. My father-in-law was captured by the Japanese and spent some time in the concentration camps in the Philippines. He had told me many stories about what the Japanese did to them during that time. The rest of my evening I spent in reflection about World War II, and how guys like me simply can not fathom what those young men went through in WWII. The whole reality of an actual World War happening just a few decades ago is beyond my comprehension, and I hope to God something that horrific and terrible doesn't happen again in the future. As I tucked my two boys into bed, I said a prayer to myself that they wouldn't have to experience something like that last World War. That's why I felt the movie was excellent and necessary, to show us the real horrors of war so that something like this will never happen again. CDs Played Today:
Miles Davis - Kind of Blue Joshua Redman - Mood Swing The Modern Jazz Quartet - The Quartet
Carl Sandburg - Selected Poems
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