Julie And The Mad Dogs-Rumors 7/8/16-One Year

Band:

Julie Jules Gordon-Lead vocals and good vibes (music director)
Dakota McWhortor-Lead Guitar
Buddy Z. (Dakota's Father on Johnny B Goode)
Kevin Michael-Bass
Mike Serbousek-Sings lead on Johnny B Goode
Some guy that showed up later due to work issues-Drums

Songs:

Stop Draggin My Heart Around
People Are Strange
Knockin On Heaven's Door
Johnny B Goode

For the past three months I have been going to see Julie And The Mad Dogs play, simply of the fact that these musicians are fun to be around with and they're a heck of a great band.  This was supposed the finale of their band, but with Mike saying on board, they will continue to rock through this town off and on.   It's no secret that I love Julie's vocals and the way she can work the crowd.  She's had plenty of years perfecting her craft with The Mad Dogs and The AcoustaKitties and with the late Kyle Oyloe.  It was with Kyle she started the Mad Dogs, with Mike and Kevin on board, Dakota came later after Kyle's passing and with the intentions of honoring his memory to keep the band going.  And in some wicked way, I crashed their party.

I don't think there's much difference between my playing and Mike Serbousek.  I've been pretty close to Mike the past couple weeks, helping him out in West 66 last week and when Julie mentioned about me doing a block of songs, I went with what she had for songs.  Mike plays loud and more to the song, I throw drum rolls around and cymbals accents like the evil ghost of Keith Moon.  And hope that she doesn't throttle me for going all out.  The Stevie Nicks cover, I added four more bars to the beginning, and shouted the count to four, so that Kevin and Dakota can end on the beginning of the first verse.  They have played this song for many a gig and know it inside out, I only started to listen to the song to get a feel on how it goes.  Since I've never been in any bands that actually played this, the first time I did at a popcorn jam, I was nowhere near how the beginning went.  This afternoon for some reason I practiced it, just in case I was called to do this song.  I may have to pull that Stevie Nicks best of out to listen to it once again.

People Are Strange was the first time I played this song ever.  Fortunately, I was familiar with The Mad Dogs' arrangement and it doesn't stray from The Door's Version.   Of course, Knockin On Heaven's Door has been in the Townedgers' song list and I could play it slow.  Julie and company does the Dylan version, the TEs version is G D to A.  But it's nice to hear the harmonies of Kevin Michael and Dakota with Julie's vocals, their version that the song slows down to a mellow ending, whereas the TE's version is more drastic.   But I continue to play around that song during the Townedgers' summer get together.  I'm not sure what's in store should we decide to do a live take of that song in the future.

Which lead to the finale and Mike's chance to sing lead on the Chuck Berry staple.  I think I played it enough times that Dakota and Kevin know where the breaks come in.  Usually Dakota (or this time out, his dad Buddy) starts the riff and dictates how fast we'll do the song.  I know when we tried it in Anamosa last month, that may have been the fastest I've ever done it but this time out, the beat was slightly slower.   And I do get a kick out of seeing Mike having a great time singing this song.  One of the reasons why I show up to support him and Julie and the band.

Mike plays very aggressive drumming, but he manages to get the best drum sounds of what he has.  I sit and tune my set up and my 4500 dollar DW's still sound like cardboard boxes to his PDP set.  I may have to quiz him on if I need to get better drum heads or trade my set in for something more manageable.   After my block of tunes, it became more of a jam session with a few musicians popping up for a more heavier sound, to which things finally wound down with Voodoo Chile   Due to work issues, I didn't make it there till the final set at around 11 30.  To my surprise, Ernest The Soul Man, showed up and we managed to talk for a while.  It was great to see him once again.   But there were a interesting sort of dancers out there, especially one woman who mentioned something about everybody getting naked.  I politely declined, I did enough of that at a bike ride in Madison last month.

Once is enough.

(thanks to Julie, Dakota, Kevin and Mike for letting me have some fun on stage-Much love to everybody)


And with that, it makes the one year since returning back to the music scene.  Behind my wildest expectations I never thought I'd see a year playing drums behind Julie and her band.  One year ago, I was in Wrigleyvile and didn't know anybody and played a couple of Skynyrd songs and hung around and then later on moved over to Rumors and maintained a high profile of popping up on a couple songs with the finest players in town and later on documented the whole thing via this blog.  It's a shame that social media wasn't around when Paraphernalia Tyrus was around, that would have been interesting to read about my thoughts of what was going on back then.  If nothing else, it would have contradicted the R Smith of 1984 and the R Smith of today.  The chances of jamming with these wonderful guys and musicians affirms my belief that  Tyrus was just as good as a band as anybody in town and that Dennis Lancaster was the most underrated member of that band.  We threw him into the fire after other guitar players didn't work out and he rose to the occasion. My life long friendship and association with Russ Swearingen, a bass player very picky with the songs played (Cocaine (the song) makes people get off their butts and dance) but even after years of not playing alongside one another we can still knew each other well enough to play off the old songs we once did.  And the pleasant shock of seeing DeWayne Schminkey at a couple jam sessions, like Russ, he brings a special meaning to my heart as well as connecting the present to the past.  Who thought 35 years later D.W and Russ would still be jamming with me.  Some things never really change.  And it took a mini band reunion in May to get the ball rolling.

While it was fun just to mess around with the beat, I had to once again practice on my own to recapture what I used to know and how to play.  And to research songs that I wouldn't listen to originally just in case somebody sprang them on me during jams or band sit ins.  The players may change but the music will always be there and of course great players will come to replace the great players who moved on.  In a day and age of Corporate Crap music, I'm very surprised to see how many bands continue to play the old time rock and roll that I grew up listening to.  But it also surprises me to hear how many bands do play What's Up.  I never envisioned myself to listen to that song, much less back up Tiffany Zweibohmer, a super drummer herself, on a Sunday afternoon.   That speaks volumes of how I finally managed to get my drumming back to where it used to be.   It's still not a pretty picture to see me throwing off the wall drum fills or cymbal accents but if it adds some sort of originality and getting people to dance, then that's the best compliment of all.   It's not rocket science but a great drummer will get people to dance.

While there many musicians out there, there's a select few that became good friends along the way through various weekend jams and otherwise, which you formed a bond between one another.  Terry McDowell, Tommy Bruner, Dan Johnson, Tim Duffy and Julie Gordon all figured greatly into this. Since I managed to show up at gigs and jams they have been very gracious and tolerant in letting me sit in and pound on a few songs.  And a musical bond gets formed at some point.  There has to be, otherwise I would have been thrown out of the bar months ago.  Sharing the stage with Jess Toomsen, talking tunes with her hubby Rich, rocking out with Ernest on The Twist, having Kevin Schamacer taking the most recent pics of me playing drums.  Or backing up Mike Serbousek on Johnny B Goode and talking drums with him afterward. It's these things that have made this year of drumming something to remember by.  Why did it take so long to come back from a self imposed retirement, I really can't say.  But I think it's better this time out to actually do it, then waste away another year thinking what if.  The only difference is that Terry, Tommy, Dan, Julie all live for the music and stay very active in playing in bands, for me since I have an evening job playing for the fun of it whenever time allows...or until I start working on The Townedgers next project.

One year, another revolution around the sun and we've come full circle.   What will the second year have in store for me?  It's hard to say where I'll be at or become a distant memory.  The hope is that I made a good impression on those that I share the stage with and that they had a good time with me playing the drums or singing  to Born To Be Wild or trying to play guitar to one of my own songs.  It's been a good ride so far.  As long as it's fun, I'll still be around a while longer.