BAY CITY POST-MORTEM...

The Big Bay City Concert is over. It went really well—without a hitch, in fact—the audience (most of whom I knew) loved us, and there were a few of the Arts Center’s Board on hand, too (so I urged the audience to tell those guys how much we were appreciated).

We did some things that worked right. We did four practices in the three weeks before the gig, plus I spent the better part of a day with John the bass player, Wednesday nights with lead guitarist Jeff at the Ghost Hole, and Friday nights at City Hall with the Friday Night Group (which includes Dick the blues harpist). And in those latter two events, I tried to make sure the material I played was material that we were going to do at the gig.

All that practicing meant that when we got on stage, we didn’t have to look at each other—we could all face the audience. We knew exactly what each of us was doing, and going to do, all the time, because we’d done it so many times.

Giving everybody in the band CDs with draft recordings of all the songs helped a bunch, too. All of the band said they played the recordings a lot, and played along with them.

Jeff, John and I went to the Arts Center three hours early and set up and tested the sound, and arranged the seating so there’d be room for dancers. It fell together pretty fast, and we didn’t need any extras we didn’t have in our respective kits, so it was pretty much over except for the waiting.

While we were waiting, John got to look over my ancient 6-channel mixer, and thinks it will work for our soundboard for the Failed Economy Show (we’ll have to provide our own sound system at Garibaldi City Hall). Everything should be able to be run through that to John’s big amp. We’ll need it. We’ll be playing in a much bigger hall, and one that moreover has poorer acoustics.

If I’d been in charge of the weather (I was not), I probably would not have ordered snow. The snow may have cut down on attendance a little, but there was still a decent turnout. More importantly, each of those people who came is going to tell their friends they should have been there—and maybe next time, those friends will come.

The material? It was a good mix, alternating fast and slow, country, bluegrass, and blues, and changing keys every now and then. There are a couple of songs I wouldn’t do again, because they didn’t go over as well as the others—“The Frog Next Door” and “Vampire Roumanian Babies.” With five hours of material, there’s plenty of substitutions.

Got a couple of requests, too; I don’t do requests at gigs—everything’s carefully scripted out, and I don’t deviate from it—but I said I’d file them away for future reference. Some folks wanted to hear “Leavin’ It to Beaver,” an old Dodson Drifters hit that’s on my first album, and “Naked Space Hamsters in Love.” “Beaver” has a lot of words in it—it’s six minutes without any lead breaks—and moves so fast one has to be really careful when to breathe.

There were a few obvious hits. “Crosses by the Roadside” was one—I’d deliberately not played it in public before the concert (except for a couple of times at the Ghost Hole, practicing with Jeff—and yes, it’s album material. It doesn’t matter that two publishers in Nashville rejected it; this song makes people cry. It works. “The Termite Song” is an unexpected hit, too (that may indicate people are tired of hearing about global warming). Our arrangement of “No Good Songs About the War” is going to be a classic, I think; when Dick’s blues harp plays “Amazing Grace” at the break (turns out the chord progression is the same) and then “Taps” at the end, it’s a real eye-opener.

So… The band is excited, and wants to do it again; the audience is excited, and wants to do it again; and the Arts Center’s Board are (I think) excited, and want to do it again. I think that means we’ll be doing it again.

Oh, and we made money. Not a lot, but more than anybody expected—and I sold 9 more CDs, too.

Joe