Cinco de Mayo with Kings Tartar @ The Stoney Inn

Y'know I knew going into this gig we were gonna have problems. First of all, it took place on Cinco De Mayo and we aren't exactly a "party" band. Nope, not really. Second, I realized about mid-week that our show was going to take place at the same time as the final game in the first round playoffs for the Sacramento King's vs. the L.A. Lakers.

Since moving here I've learned : If you don't know basketball, you don't know Sacramento. I mean, my pal Gavin and the Press Club had even asked me to hang out there on this night, "I have a gig", I told him. I would've been better off at the Press having a beer...

The game started out bad, and just got progressively worse. Shaq was unstoppable under the boards, and for some reason the King's just couldn't get either their shooting or their rebounding together. It was sad to watch.

At first I was worried that we would be playing while the game was going on and no one would be watching us - or worse, they'd be complaining for us to "turn it down". But that's not how it went. Instead they had the game up on a large screen TV next to the stage and they told the bands to wait before they played until the game was over. It was sort of like asking for the coffin to be completely lowered before starting the dirge.

By the end of the second half the King's were down 50 to 30. Sometime in the third quarter when the score had shifted to 96-62, people we're like shouting "Start the BAND Up!!!".

We said, "We can't play until the game's over".

They said, "It is over.", by which point the score was something 106-68.

Well ok, then - how can you argue with *that* logic?

We actually didn't get everything arranged with the equipment and the P.A., until the last moment of the fourth, but nobody was watching the King's flaming carcas simmer by that point anymore.

We started off with "Run" as our sound-check song just to make sure everything was set up right. It wasn't - so we made some adjustments, brought all the instrument levels down some, adjusted the volume on the monitors and keys, then went into "Pay your Dues" and "Pain". So far so good, about halfway through the first verse of "Dues" we were hitting our stride and thing were starting to feel good on stage - even though I was picking up a "funky" vibe in the room.

This took me back to a couple days previously when I was sending a email to the band Smarty, saying we should play together again since our Boardwalk show together and mentioned that we we're playing the Stoney, as they had played it a couple weeks previous.

The response I had gotten back was curious : "We would love to play a show with you guys in the future....but never.....ever....at the Stoney Inn... our last experience there was horrible.... Smarty was definitely not there idea of a great band....to bad - for them I mean."

Ok. so I kinda have this on my mind as we launch into "The Hero Inn" and when we finish the song - all of sudden Ron (bass) announces that "we're Done".

What the F--!

Apparently the owner, a short, 50-ish woman with straight blonde shoulder length hair - which almost looks silver - had asked us to cut our set short. We'd only played about 20 minutes - just 4 songs.

Why?

Well, I'm not entirely sure why. They'd asked us to turn down and we did - maybe not enough? Some people who were there watching us did leave about halfway through "Hero-Inn", but I saw them - they were dancing on their way out, so I simply thought they had other commitments seeing as it was - both Cinco de Mayo and let-watch-the-King's-get-their-asses-kicked-day.

(Hey, Don't get me wrong - I love the King's, they have heart. I attended the Rally last year in Caesar Chavez Park after they were knocked out of the playoffs by Utah after double overtime of Game#5. And you have to appreciate me saying that since I grew up in L.A. and I can remember seeing the Lakers at their peak as a dynasty with Wilt Chamberlin and Jerry West on the team. Vlade Divac of the King's used to be a Laker - so I feel right at home with the King's, but they got stomped. Still it was annoying watching all the Biff's and Muffy's on their cell-phones during the 4th quarter. I didn't like those people when I lived in L.A.)

Anyway, I really didn't think twice about the group of people who left - there were plenty of other people at the Stoney, even if most of them were playing pool - besides, once they're gone - they're gone, there's no bringing 'em back.

Still - we had to stop playing because of it, and not even halfway into our set.

I have to say, we we're pissed. Even all the guys in Oil Kan were pissed. A friend of Darryl's - whose a member of the band Girth who had specifically come to see us, was pissed.

So we packed our stuff and got out. Everybody else in the band left almost immediately, Darryl (guitar) headed for the Boardwalk to catch Vicious Rumors, I hung out to enjoy Oil Kan for a while before I finally did go home and then over to the Press Club and comiserate over the King's loss with Gavin and Gwamba (Lead singer of Okra Pickles). Frank Jordan, a group with an interesting blend of funk, alternative and reggae was playing. I told Gavin the entire sad story.

The whole thing was kinda weird, because we've played the Stoney at least a couple times before - with the same songs. Some of them even fit in perfectly with the idea of taking your lumps, but not giving up and continuing to fight in the future ("Pay your Dues") - so they were even topical. I know for fact that the owner lady has seen us play, I recognized her from previous gigs. Originally I figured that the miss-match was with Smarty and their sound which is much more "alternative" and "punk" than ours and that simply didn't work with a crowd that was basically into bands like Creedance and the Beer Dawgs - but maybe, just maybe, the guys in Smarty really weren't so dumb after all and now it's a a little too late to brush up on Born in the Bayou.

Like Smarty said - too bad, for them.

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