THE MORE THINGS CHANGE...

The more things change… well, the more they change, I think. I had an issue of the blog already written, and just the past 24 hours has rendered nearly all of it irrelevant. Instead, here’s what’s going on:

I have a job interview (in Myrtle Point, in southern Oregon, to be their city manager) Saturday, 27 June. They want me all day, and maybe part of the day before. That’s the day of the Garibaldi Museum gig, so the gig is going to have to be postponed (my preference) or cancelled—I can’t let it get in the way of a job. That the band doesn’t have a lead player for that date may accordingly be okay. Maybe another date will work better. I still have to call the owners of the Museum and break the news to them; they’re back East, so I’ve got a 3-hour time difference to contend with.

I do want to take the opportunity to visit friends in Central Point, Phoenix and Ashland while I’m that close (it looks from the map like it might be a couple hours’ drive away), and I’ve contacted them about a visit. There’d be a chance to play music at the Wild Goose in Ashland that Sunday night—I don’t know if there’s anything happening Saturday night (yet—I’ve asked).

And then, I’ve got lots to do here in Garibaldi. On the offchance I might actually be offered a job out of town (I refuse to get my hopes up—it’s been way too long), I would like to get the base tracks (rhythm guitar, bass, drums, and vocal) done for the 12 songs I’ve picked out; I would especially like to be able to take the Tascam to southern Oregon with one of the songs in its little camera-chip brain and get some lead tracks recorded by people down there. The band here can record those base tracks in the course of practicing the material—we recorded two of the last three songs we practiced, and one of the recordings was real good—record-quality stuff. Even without a Museum gig, we still have Garibaldi Days to work on—that’s the end of July.

There are “ancillary” lead tracks I can record for the album here in town, too. It occurred to me at the Friday Night Group’s get-together that one thing that would sound real good on “Naked Space Hamsters in Love” is a musical saw—it lends a very other-worldly tone to the music—and I happen to know someone who plays saw (what would you call him?—a sawyer?). I’ll give him a draft recording (just me and guitar) to practice with—he’d like that—and then just take the Tascam over to his house to record the saw part when the time comes. I don’t know if there are any other “ancillary” parts I’d want to put on any other songs, but if I do, I have a way to do it easily, that I’m sure will work.

More opportunities, maybe: I ran into a guitar/banjo player I know (he was at the unemployment office, too) who said he’s playing roughly five nights a week, mostly in south Tillamook County, but was complaining his partner, who plays guitar, wasn’t interested in that full a schedule because he still had a job to go to. He said most of his gigs are unpaid, but the crowds are getting bigger (a symptom of the Failed Economy I mentioned before) and tips are real good. We traded phone numbers.

And I got banned from Whitby Shores, too—don’t know why. It’s tempting to assume it was something I did (I usually blame myself for problems), but in this case, I don’t think I actually did anything. It’s Len Amsterdam’s Website—he created it, and he runs it, and he can have or not have around anybody he wants to. I do have ways of staying in touch with most of the people I met there; I will have to find another OMD to archive my music at (I do not want to be dependent on Soundclick, with their software problems), but that’s doable, too. I have an account at ReverbNation I’ve never used, and maybe it’s time I did.

Joe