Tag: Chain Poets

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25-27 Apr: Atlanta

25 April – Floataway Open House (Atlanta, GA)
w/ weaklazyliar

This wasn’t really a public show, it was an open house for a complex of businesses in Atlanta. They do this every year, with food, drinks and live music. The first show I ever officially did post-Radiant City was playing this, back in 1999. It caused a lot of drama at the time because, though I had booked it as a solo show before the blow-up, the band saw it as proof that I had intended to quit all along. That night I played with weaklazyliar and the Young Antiques.

weaklazyliar sounds great with their new drummer Travis. He seems to me to be a combination of Joe and Mitch in all the right ways. Ryan also was playing his new Moog, making lots of little Fantastic Planet noises. I can’t say enough that I want them to keep making music. They could be so much more confident if they could be touring. They could be indie darlings in a way I don’t think I ever could.

We did the show as an acoustic three-piece since Lee was out of town. We… well, *I* was sloppy. And in pain. My hand was cramping, reminding me why I don’t like to play the acoustic. I broke a string on the second song (which Gerlinda fixed while I was playing her guitar). But overall it went okay. I had a few people tell me they liked the treatment we gave the songs and the changes we had made. Though, I’m not really aware of any changes that we made deliberately, so I assume they were mostly the subconscious ones. Watching dynamics and that sort of thing. they wanted one more song once we were done and we really hadn’t worked up anything else, not to mention I couldn’t imagine playing guitar any longer, so instead we did a version of Squeeze’s “Tempted” with Lyle playing bass and Chris playing a little percussion that went surprisingly well.

26 April 2003 – 10 High (Atlanta, GA)
on stage with chain poets

Now the secret can be told. For two weeks I went and rehearsed with chain poets to get ready for this show.

“Mr. Blue Sky”

That’s what we did. I’m sorry, not just “Mr. Blue Sky,” but virtually every tiny bit of “Mr. Blue Sky” short of the ‘clang-clang-clang’ sound which we couldn’t reproduce. But YES to lots of harmonies falling all over the place, YES to string sounds, YES to the vocoder, and even YES to the operatic ending. I did not nail the solo and would kill for another chance at it, but it still sounded great. Curtis, who normally runs sound, wasn’t going to be at the show but heard us run through it for soundcheck and swapped with another soundman for the night to make sure he was the one running sound.

Damn right.

And it was a fucking blast, too. Happy late birthday to me.

We also did “No Matter What,” but we’ve done that before. The thing I learn from being on stage with them, though, is that I do have that lingering urge to RAWK, to front a loud seventies rock band. But I find, in the end, that I don’t want it consistently enough to be in a band like that full time. Anyway, I don’t think I pull off the image.

On a side note, they’ve got a new song that kills me and I wish I had written it.

27 April 2003 – Borders (Atlanta, GA)

This was something that was set up about a month or so ago. An in-store in conjunction with EarthShare and Earth Day. Unfortunately, the person at Daemon who set it up with Borders was gone by April, and the promotion that had been promised at the time never materialized. So I really half expected no one would be there for it. Actually, I half-expected that the store wouldn’t even have a clue that I was supposed to be there. Thankfully, though, that idea was wrong, and they had the little area set up before I even got there. Still, I played to about 10 people, but having expected that it wasn’t such a big deal. I sold a couple of CDs, even, had a few people sign up. Even more unexpectedly I felt really good about how it sounded and how I played. Which goes to show you can never predict these things.

With the lull I’m in musically right now I find myself in sort of a pit. I feel a little short-tempered and impatient, and the whole enterprise seems terribly pointless at the moment. Nevertheless I keep going through the motions. I don’t really know when I developed this sort of ability to ignore myself and keep doing things musically while I wait out my depression. But thank whoever that I did.

I just need movement again. The problem is that I don’t know how soon that will come. A lot has happened in the past 6 months, most of it I would never have believed. But on the other side of it, taking the long view, it’s hard to feel that I’ve made much headway.

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rehearsing and recording

Last night I rehearsed with Chain Poets, an Atlanta band I’ve known for a while. We’ve talked off and on about doing something together but plans always seem to fall through. I have gotten up on stage a couple of times with them; once on the spur of the moment to do the middle part on “Creep,” the other time a planned cameo to do “Telephone Line” and “No Matter What.”

This time we’re working up a particularly ambitious little number and it was surprising just how well it started to come together in the first rehearsal. I get to use my vocoder pedal again; I’ve only ever used it live once and that was years ago. I also will be attempting my first guitar solo ever. Seriously.

Just like every time we get together we talked about doing an entire night of ELO covers somewhere… I don’t know that it will ever happen but at this rehearsal we ended up running through about five different ELO songs just off the cuff. Just rehearsing the song (on my birthday, no less) was fun, whatever else happens.

That same night after rehearsal I went by Eddie’s Attic to record a song. The owner had a death in the family and the club had decided to shut the music room down for a night and asked a bunch of musicians to come by and record a song live for a compilation CD for him. I couldn’t think of anything of mine that is particularly uplifting, so I went and did “Don’t Dream It’s Over.” I think it went well. it only took a couple of tries (because I forgot the lyrics the first time, but it turned out the soundman wasn’t getting the sound he wanted anyway, so it worked out). I should get a copy of it and will post it if I do.

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23 Dec: Atlanta

Eddie’s Attic (Atlanta, GA)
with Pat Walsh and weaklazyliar

Sometimes I think I should type up these show reports immediately after a show, but I never do. Invariably I feel like I’ve lost the mood of the thing by the time I talk about it.

My sincere gratitude to everyone who made it out. It really was a sort of Christmas party/present to myself, to basically have all of you in one place.

Pat Walsh opened up the show with Dave Condra and Tim Porterfield. They are getting even tighter, particularly on the harmonies. I had intended to maybe sing of 3 or 4 of their songs, but after they sound-checked I decided against it because I didn’t want to force one of them to not be able to sing. I did sing the lead vocal on one song, and song I had learned from pat a while ago intending to cover it at some point. Funny that when I did it was on stage with them.

Then I came up and did a song solo, and then Tim and Dave came up and backed me on “1985 by the Get-Go’s.” With no rehearsal, mind you, just having listened to my CD. Needless to say, they’re very good. Gerlinda came back up, along with Greg from Chain Poets, to sing with us on the Beatles’ “Something.” Then weaklazyliar came up to play “Guy Fawkes Day” with me, with Gerlinda singing. Then I sang back up for them on “Waiting for the 8:05.”

From that brief description you can see how the night progressed, and what the point was. Weaklazyliar and I played for about 2 hours, switching off, backing each other, doing covers. No real delineation between one act or the other. Without just describing the show from start to finish, I’ll just add that we did a cover of U2’s “Bad,” which ended with me handing a small white flag (about 6 inches square) to the audience and going on a Bono tirade. I thought it was funny, hopefully everyone else did, too. Also, Robi hopped up by request to sing “Heatmiser/Snowmiser” with me.

I was actually disappointed when the night was through. I’ve seen Gerlinda’s description of the evening already, and she’s right when she says the crowd seemed a bit subdued. I think I was disappointed because I was pinning my hopes on the show to be the thing that turned this holiday around. It’s been a very weird one for me this year, and for so many other people I know. I think I had an unrealistic hope that this show would somehow rise above that, and we’d all come together in one of those moments that only happen when they’ve been scripted for PAX TV.

This did not happen.

But, in retrospect, it was foolish to think it would. Gerlinda said, “It’s like, we’re all a little quieter; we’re all a little nicer; we’re all a little more tentative.” And that clearly seems to be the case. And so my disappointment has changed to merely gratitude, that people would allow us the chance to play some role in their lives, to make the attempt to let them forget other things. It’s a frustrating career choice a lot of the time, and it can lead you to forget what an amazing thing it is to be up in front of people who are there to hear you, and the weird, cliched sounding thing that happens when you do it.

I can never express enough how much I appreciate the support you’ve given me, and I hope I am offering something of equal value to you in return. Thank you, and happy holidays to everybody.