Popcorn Jam 1/29/17 End Of Month Thoughts From Crabby

With:

Julie And The Mad Dogs-
Julie Gordon-Guitar and Backing Vocal on Ain't No Sunshine
Dakota McWhorter-Guitar
Kevin Michel-Bass
Mike Serbousek-Drums and Vocal on Johnny B Goode
Ron LaFleur-Guitar and vocal on Ain't No Sunshine
R.Smith-Drums otherwise

Songs:
Ain't No Sunshine
Johnny B Goode


And:

Tommy Bruner-Guitar and vocal on Crossroads
John Hernandez-Bass Guitar
Herm Sarduy-Drums and Vocals (Hey Bartender, Some Kind Of Wonderful)
Terry McDowell-Drums
Rodney Smith-Drums

Songs:
Hey Bartender
Some Kind Of Wonderful
Crossroads Blues

I'm not a fan of the duel drumming set up.  The usual constant bitching from the other drummer.  Typical shit: You play too fast, you play too loud.  How could you tell Herman?  All I could hear was from you.  Don't get me wrong, I love sharing the stage with Herman but his ego does tend to get in the way it seems.   The reason why he can't hang around bands it seems.  Outside of dropping a stick on Some Kind Of Wonderful, (I had a spare stick waiting on the bass drum), I let Herman do most of the hard work drumming and soloing.  Herm could do the double high hat accent on Some Kind Of Wonderful, I can't do that very well so I played a straight half beat and colored outside the lines of Herm's drumming.  I think it worked to my advantage on Crossroads Blues to which Tommy Bruner did it as a straight funky blues.  But after that, I bailed out, I was fighting a major headache and really didn't want to subject my ears to Trevor's bash and crash today.

So I went to Cooters to see what the acoustic jam was all about and was disappointed by the results. They did a Black Dog medley of sorts and then took a long break.  To which the bartender was trading F bombs with a pissed off patron whose boyfriend got thrown out of the place.  I don't have a good history with Cooters and that may have been my only time of showing up at that acoustic jam.  I'll stick with Checkers or Stone City.  With time on my hands I hung around Half Price Books, found a few forty fives and a book to read and then off to Red Robin for my free birthday burger. Next time I'll order water (soft drinks are 2.99)

Plus the Acousta Kitties and the Checkers crowd is a bit more welcoming.   Plus I love the Acoutsa Kitties.

(Jean Gilmore: Photo credit)

Tommy Bruner had a close call on Friday, he suffered a minor stroke and was in the hospital for two days, only to get released and he made it to the jam.  The man is dedicated to music and playing.  God bless him.

Friday Night, I showed up late to Hot Shots to see the return of Julie And The Mad Dogs and managed to back Mike up on his song.  It was the first time I got to jam with Ron LaFleur on Ain't No Sunshine.  Enjoyed jamming with him.  But I think the long lay off kinda made the band rusty. Mike sounded good on drums though.  I did talked to him about the implosion of the project with Ron, all the while he was in the bar.  We complimented on each other's playing.  At the end, somebody gave a Tequila shot to Mike and he ended getting sick afterwards.   I can't do that crap myself either.  Me and Mike did talk about music and perhaps if he was up to it, do something with me on guitar, but only for fun.

Saturday, Russ and Deb were kind enough to pay for my birthday supper and got me a crab paperweight which I thought was kinda cute.  Of course we did talk tunes and the band and as always mostly talk but nothing in the foreseeable future.  Russ did mention he is up for a new picture of jamming. Well, pick a date then. 

When most of the Paraphernalia/Tyrus boys got together in 2015, it was a good feeling to get everybody in one place again.  And it did inspire me to start jamming again.  But to get everybody on stage once again is a dream and it's not going to happen.  Mike is retired and hasn't expressed an interest to get together on jam sessions, Dennis is now a pilot and hasn't played guitar in years, DeWayne has his grandkids and a wife to watch over.  I don't think Russ is that interested to play anymore, we continue to talk about doing something with Shawn McDonald but I've never heard Shawn and really don't know what his mindset is at.  Years ago, Russ and I jammed to a guy named John and that might have amounted to something.  We had some fucking good fun that day.  But I think when you get to be a certain age, you'd rather not haul all your stuff out and hope nobody steals anything.  in 1984, I bought everything out of the basement to do the OK Lounge show.  Nowadays, I might do the Jon Wilson method and take one snare, bass drum, cymbal and high hat to a gig.

I am an oddball musician.  I'm not interested in hair metal or grunge or modern rock, my specialty remains garage rock, originals and music I grew up with and I have dived back into the older songs of long ago and far away.  What else to explain If I Were A Carpenter or Spanish Harlem Incident or I Feel A Whole Lot Better.   When you work evenings, playing in a band is based only on weekends or nights off.  Certainly from my positive reaction from the crowd at Checkers when I did my songs that perhaps I should have done this years before.  I prided myself on being a damn good drummer, despite the usual crabbings from others of playing too loud or too fast.   I guess you can't win or find a happy medium upon this, so I sit there and manipulate on how to counter the other dueling drummer.  Sunday night, I simply decided to counter what Herman was playing, by keeping it simple or throw half rolls to his beats on Crossroads Blues.  Whatever I did must have worked, people still complimented me on my playing.  

And it should not be a me versus him mentality, but rather to compliment one another on enhancing the beat.  I don't think John really wanted to play the bass but he was a good trouper and played along.  But I think I followed him out the door after we got done playing.  And I think after a while you get bored with the same ole songs and the same ole criticism (thank God for spellchecker), we are who we are. Some adapt but some who been used to their own way tend to hog the spotlight and want things all for themselves.  And so I let them sweat more than I do,  Herm is awesome on Hey Bartender and he did play more cleaner than I, since I wasn't familiar with the song and only did one time before in my life time.  But this is not an audition for another band, it's a jam and it's supposed to be fun.   You would think.

I think the next Rumors' Duel Drumsets will be me taking part along with Terry, or that's what Terry has mentioned to me.  It will the first showcase for the Tama Set that I bought back in August and I'll dust off the Paiste cymbals that I used at Wrigleyville.  If Trevor wants to bang on the set or if Terry wants to, I won't say no.  But I'm very particular with the Zildjian K's so they'll be staying home.  By then I will have a working set list of 20 songs that Terry or Tommy can play, maybe perhaps Brook and Dan might take part.   It's a ways off but I'd say it's a 60/40 chance it may happen.

And Herman would be invited to try my drums out too.

And now a few words from Tommy.

I can barely find words to say thank you to everyone who showed up at the Popcorn Jam yesterday. Terry McDowell, James Gritman, Herm Sarduy, Rick & Andi Clay, Rodney Smith, Karie Skogman, Brook Hoover, Ian Jacoby, George Melichar, Danny Byal, Jean Gilmore, Kathy Runneals, Steve Black Wolf, Steve Harrison, Chad Johnson, Shari Bullard McDowell, and anyone I may have failed to mention . . . . having you all there was better medicine than I could have imagined. And of course Brenda, who is an absolute rock beyond all belief.

The good news is, full-function has completely returned. The neurologist says there is absolutely nothing on the MRI to indicate any further issues at all. She said as long as I take the prescribed medicine, lower my cholesterol and stop smoking gradually over the next couple of months, I can count on a bright future, and that with that particular prognosis the very best thing I can do is get right back on the horse, which is exactly what I'm doing and will continue to do. Yesterday I really learned how great it is to have friends who are there for you when the chips are down. To those folks and all the well-wishers, again, thank you so much!!

I also want to give a shout-out to my friend Kevin Burt who had the exact same thing happen this weekend. Apparently he is fine too which is good, because hearing his voice is one of the things in life that I love.

The Historic 1982 Sessions

Lineup:

Mike Swearingen-Vocals
Doug Bonesteel-Guitar
DeWayne Schminkey-Guitar
Russ Swearingen-Bass
Rodney Smith-Drums

Songs:

Rock Me Baby
Take It On The Run
Lovin Touchin Squeezin
Heavy Medication (Dewayne's song)
Highway To Hell
Rocky Mountain Way (Two takes)

Recorded Jan 28, 1982 at Maier Studios Marion Iowa

Produced by the band
Recorded by Don Smith

35 years ago, the beginnings of Paraphernalia was taking shape.   It was kinda of hard to do with Russ being in the Marines and getting time off was a problem in itself.  Somehow between his furlough we did managed to get some recording here and there.  In Summer of 1981 while recording The Power Of Positive Thinking, my 1981 solo album, we managed to get together to do two songs, Come Together (the Beatles) and Rock Me Baby (Version 1) and then in the fall another get together to do another version of Rock Me Baby. Somehow we managed to sound very competent.

As time goes on, it goes to show that like any band starting out, we were trying to find our way and Come Together between missed notes and sloppy beats, was like any garage band starting out but in some ways I tend to look at the song as a nice moment in time when the band was coming together.  It's not always that you get to play in a band with your best friend and other people that you went to school with.  I could barely keep a beat when I jammed with Doug Spinler and his dad for the first time and got a nice rush of sharing music with other musicians.  Doug Spinler has always been one of the best guitar players that I have known and we were good friends.  I just didn't really get into his type of country music, nor did he with my garage rock.  Doug has managed to carve out a remarkable country career with local bands, from Airwave to Panhandle Country to part time work with 5 Of Hearts.  And maybe some day I'll get to jam with him again.  Things have changed since the 35 years of the last time we jammed together.

So Doug was traded for another Doug, in Doug Bonesteel and he became our de facto guitar player. And he knew Dewayne Schminkey so we had two guitar players at hand now.   Russ knew a cousin, Mike who played in Cruise and a few other bands. So basically we had a band but practice space was few and far between and I had to make arrangements to get the basement to do recording with said band.  I give my mom and dad credit for putting up with the damn noise.  I had the thought of doing a full album of songs, but as we all know doing the songs themselves take time and effort to practice on them.  So finding this out the hard way, we simply had to settle on the songs at hand.

In 1981 I moved out of the house for a while, the usual teenage vs parents thing and my place was about three blocks from home, walking distance to and from work. The drawback of apartment living was that I couldn't play drums at all and managed to sneak over at the house and practice a while then go back to the apartment, turn on the tv and fall asleep. This lasted about three months and I returned home to annoy my parents for another few years.  In essence the basement was renamed Maier Studios to get people thinking I recorded at a plush place.  But in reality we had a couple reel to reels, some great cheap Radio Shack microphones and plenty of ambition.

I will say there was a lot of anger issues with me and it sounds like it on the album.  Cymbals crashing everywhere while Mike tried to settle me down with Rock Me Baby.  Which he did for the first two verses before the oncoming crash bash came along.  And that's the thing that sticks out, hearing my dad complain about all those cymbal crashes and overdrumming.  Hearing upon it today I tend to agree that I blame that on youth gone wild.  But everybody has to start somewhere.

As time goes by, the songs are basically forgotten unless I bring them up by playing them and only Rock Me Baby and RMW Version 2 are the songs get played.  We blew Mikes voice out on Highway To Hell and he was barely hanging in there on RMW2.  The latter song would get remixed and put out on the 1982 Bizarre Behavior album (on reel to reel only).    But I think the legend behind these songs are more worthy than the band itself.  Without Russ, we became The Open Highway Band and practiced a lot over at Dewayne's house and we did eventually play at the Pink Elephant in early 1983, around the time that the San Diego Chargers got beaten by Miami in the rematch from a year ago. By then Randy Hartwig and Dennis Lancaster would come in to take Russ' place while Russ was serving in the Marines.   And in the meantime I kept sleepwalking my way through life.  But there were fun memories.  Memories of the guys playing guitars on the open end of the station wagon going through Marion.  Memories of scaring the bikers out of The Pink Elephant with country music. And the thrill of hearing our songs on the player.  Eventually, when Russ got out of the service that Paraphernalia would take on a new meaning and new direction that would last for a year and two months.   But this session that took place 35 winters ago would shape the sound of yours truly.

For better or worse.

1/25/17 Acoustic Jam-Going It Alone

Set list: Solo

Get It Over With
The Live We Lead
Ever So Much
If I Were A Carpenter

With:
Mike Frederick
Kathy Hartman Spina
Lorie Parker
Steve Black Wolf
Belinda Christensen-James
Mark Randolph

Checker's Tavern

One month ago, I started doing the Checkers Acoustic Jam to sharpen up my skills and see if I could play guitar and sing at the same time.  Over time I managed to do some choice covers with fellow musicians   But this time out, Julie Gordon stayed home and Skip Richards who played bass wasn't around.

With no other musicians on stage, I finally ventured out on my own and picked the three easiest songs, the first two from the Jubilee album, Ever So Much from Pawnshops For Olivia and then If I Were An Carpenter for the only cover version. With enough improvising I managed to keep the missed notes down to a minimum, although I did have to borrow somebody's capo to do the first two songs.   I forgot to pack mine when I had to go into work early.

The big story was Steve Black Wolf getting a buzz cut from Kathy Hartman Spina during a break. He has lung cancer and started chemo treatment.  It was nice of him to order me up a pizza before I got there.  We had a laugh about that on Facebook earlier.   It was a very small crowd but very supportive bunch of folks.  Even had a few guys commenting me on a good job on the songs that I did.  As well from Kathy, Belinda, Lorie, Mike and Mark to name a few.

But it's going to be my final appearance for a while since I work nights and we are getting busy once again.  If I didn't have a regular job I could do this more often than not but bills need to be paid and in reality quitting my job to do a hobby that doesn't pay would be a wise decision.

But I will say this, to share a stage with a supportive group at acoustic jams, I should have done this years ago. I'm finally happy with the way I sing and somehow things fell into place. It's true that Cedar Rapids has a great support group of musicians here to encourage you to play live.  I've known that from jamming with Terry McDowell, Dan Johnson and Tim Duffy from years past but also from Kathy, Lorie and Julie.  Punishing myself for 30 plus years after the Paraphernalia Tyrus breakup didn't help either but I wasn't ready back then.  But with a small intimate crowd they made it easy to sing in front of folks. Abigail is only 10 years old but she can nail Spiders And Snakes  better than most folks.

And with that after doing my set, I ended up playing shadow guitar to the rest of the jammers.  First time I shared the stage with the guitar and I still think while playing guitar is great, I'm more happier behind the drums (or congas).   That might come into play if I go visit Julie And The Mad Dogs and spell Mike a while on drums.  But it's a wait and see although I did promise I'd show up after work.  Next up will be the popcorn jam, or next acoustic set in Whittier next month.  We'll see what happens then. 

And Now A Few Words About Dan Johnson

Dan Johnson is a great musician.  He's a leader, he's a teacher and he can lay any type of bass riffs down and is fairly easy to follow.  He's been a part of the Iowa Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame and now he's now part of the Iowa Blues Hall Of Fame.

I love sharing the stage with him and look forward to jam with him in the near future.

Congrats D.J.

Various Jams 1/22/17

With  (At Rumors)

Kevin Sinmacher-guitar
Bart Carfizzi-Keyboards and vocals
Robert Wallace-Vocals (Never Been Any Reason)
Mike Lint-Vocals (Ain't No Sunshine)
Terry McDowell-Ringleader
Kenny Webb-Bass
Nick Lnenicka-Harmonica

With the songs: Never Been Any Reason and Ain't No Sunshine
https://youtu.be/qlomiX2GHxY


At Checker's Tavern  Julie Jules Gordon Benefit With The Acousta Kitties.
Featuring:

Dan Hartman-Lead Guitar and Vocals (I Saw Her Standing There, I'm Ready)
Rick Gallo-vocals and bass
Steve Black Wolf-Guitar and Vocals (Knocking On Heaven's Door)
Belinda Christensen-James-Vocals (Blue Bayou, Fever, Oklahoma Cowboys, It's Been A While)
Mark Randolph-Guitar (on the songs that Belinda sang)
Jeorgia Robison-Bass (on the songs that Belinda sang)
Kathy Hartman Spina and Lorie Parker-Vocals (Fishin In The Dark, Little Liar)
Buddy Archbrenner-Guitar on various songs
John A Shaw-Guitar and vocals (Story In Your Eyes, A Vance Gill song, couple others)
Rich Toomsen-Bass (various songs)
Jay Dean-Bass Guitar
Joel  McDowell-Bass (Story In Your Eyes a couple others) 
The woman that plays tambourine-Donna Jo Fairley Elsner
Barb Myers-did drawings.

Needless to say the Julie Gordon Benefit went fairly well.  Plenty of people showed up, and plenty of people played.  I managed to hog all the jammers segment by playing drums (Delayne from Wooden Nickel Lottery, spelled me for a couple songs, they played earlier) but the only other drummer up there was from Blue Scratch and I don't he was that interested to play. So I managed to pound on his drumset (sorry about couple of dents on the drum heads, I'll owe you new heads next time we meet).

I'm not sure of all the songs that I played on stage, but I did four songs with Dan Hartman before he moved on to Cooters for the acoustic jam there and four songs with John Shaw who was in town, first time I jammed with him since Wrigleyville and I followed him on Story In Your Eyes. It was also a first time that I jammed with Joel McDowell, who's better known for playing in the Meekats.  John Shaw tends to play more country songs than I'm used to, and he dusted off a Vince Gill song I had no idea how it went so basically went for a straight four four and kept things going on Story In Your Eyes.

While Blue Scratch was playing on stage, I managed to head over to Rumors to be part of the Popcorn Jam although I did get there very late and didn't think I was going to do any songs, but they managed to do Never Been Any Reason and Ain't No Sunshine.  Could have done Burning For You but that was nixed at the end.

The Wapsipinicon Dreamers

So who are the Wapsipinicon Dreamers?

Are they a legit band to take over where the Townedgers left behind?

Or are they just a band covering songs that they want to play?

Originally, Chris Dutcher was slated to be the other important member of this band when he approached me on doing a side country project in 1992, to which he stayed around long enough to contribute Couldn't Tell You and then bugger off after disagreements of the direction of the band.  However, I kept the concept of the band going for the longest time, when I thought it would be the right time to do this project, I'd get cold feet and whatever got done became The Townedgers next album.  Long Time Forgotten was slated to be a W.D. project.

After recording Jubilee, I tend entertained the idea of doing a country project with simply cover versions of seldom heard songs.  Not that Dead Flowers is seldom heard, hell it's performed at every jam session out there.  But The Wapsipinicon Dreamers name is a play on the Ozark Mountain Daredevils name, while those fine folks came from around Kansas City or more like Springfield Missouri with the Ozark Mountains in mind, The Wapsi Dreamers is a play on the Wapsipinicon Dreaming album of 1986 but in essence taken from The Wapispinicon River, which flows through this area, (since I'm based out of Stone City, the river winds though town, as well as Matsell's area and Anamosa but the Wapispinicon River has been one of Iowa's most scenic rivers outside of flood season.

The intention was to deliver a country album of sorts but after hearing the results, it's basically The Townedgers's music and sound in a way to bullshit you into thinking it's a country album.  It's more garage rock if anything else.  Plus I wanted the songs to be under 3 minutes, people attention spans tend to wonder after 3 minutes it seems. Sessions started on December 16, 2016 and concluded ten days later, with drum tracking lasting three days.  Most of the songs came from ideas and off the wall discussions with  fellow musicians about playing at future jams and possible gigs at some hole in the wall bars around Anamosa and Cedar Rapids  but over all it was supposed to be a fun album to do.  Which it was till I started fighting with the guys on some songs.  Solitary Man, we did about 15 takes and said the hell with it.  Then did a different and much better version the next day.

The songs themselves:

Fly Away Home (Ozark Mountain Daredevils)  I worked up about 10 OMD songs before we settled upon Fly Away Home, over E E Larson (Too weird), Beauty In The River (too complicated), Standing On The Rock (Too simple), Look Away (didn't like the chords structure) and If You Wanna Get To Heaven (no Harmonica players in our band).  It's a simple folk number than be done as a bluegrass number.  It was done in two takes, which explains why my voice kinda gave out on the final chorus, plus this time of year, it's so dry and I was battling allergies.

If I Were A Carpenter (Tim Hardin/Bobby Darin)  It's easy to see the basic D C G chords and you can work 100's of songs using this chord structure. I would have opted for Bob Seger but that was too over the top and decided to go with the original version but changed the line of Would you have my baby to would you be my baby, since I thought the original line was puke inducing. Plus we took out a verse.

Oh Death (Traditional folk song, done by Camper Van Beethoven and the Kaleidoscope)  More the latter than the former but after knowing many many folks that passed away in 2016, I started singing this song off and on, in  a ominous vocals.  Thought there was more to the CVB version but upon hearing it, it really wasn't.  We all hope to be spared for another year but in reality there will be a time that none of us will be around.  We hope we have another year to live.

Splendid Isolation (Warren Zevon)  Another song picked out by blind association, I love Warren Zevon's music but didn't want to do Werewolves Of London and Turbulence had a Russian lyric that I couldn't sing, so I went wit the moody Splendid Isolation, which there was a slight change of place for Michael Jackson, going to Neverland on my version and somehow singing like Warren Zevon.  A dry house will do that to your voice.

Stranger To Himself (Traffic/Fairport Convention)  A blind arrangement of the Steve Winwood song done differently.  In fact, once we got done with this song, ours was not even close to the original song.  Originally, I wanted to write an original version of Stranger To Himself but Geoff Redding thought up different chords and the words fit and was improvised.   Done in two takes all total.

Spanish Harlem Incident (Byrds)  A note for note copy of the Byrds song.  Mel Strobie thought up that interesting Be My Baby type of guitar riff through the song.

The Life We Lead (The Townedgers)  Of course I'm going to cover my own song. Our third attempt and this is more leaner and meaner than the other two and done much faster.

Fox On The Run (Manfred Mann/Tom T Hall)  By the time we started work on this song it took about 12 takes and trying to put all four chords into order almost made me want to shelve this song.  And still in search to simplify this.  Although Manfred Mann had a small chart showing with this song, our arrangement is more toward the bluegrass version.  No, it's not The Sweet's version, that's a different monster upon itself.

Baby Wanna Dance (The Townedgers)  Another borrowing from the TE catalog and Town's Edge Rock, Geoff' gave a more laid back guitar riff then the garage rock version of said song.  And the reason why I did this song...I could remember the words without looking them up.

My Babe (Little Walter)  It's in F, but I capo the forth fret to finally be in the neighborhood of this song.  We couldn't figure out Walter's version and stumbled upon this arrangement.

Solitary Man (Neil Diamond/The Sidewinders)  I love Rich Hopkins and The Sand Rubies/Sidewinders band to the point that when we did this song, that we would do it like the Sidewinders version.  Again my voice wouldn't let me hit the higher notes on the chorus so I made ado with a mid range vocal.  The first version of this song took 15 takes and I still wasn't pleased with the result.  The Second version took about 5 takes and was good enough.

Diddy Wah Diddy (Bo Diddley/The Remains)  Bo Diddley is the best, but our version is more to the fast tempo of The Remains rather than the blues boogaloo of Captain Beefheart although I used his lyrics.

Let Your Love Flow (Bellamy Brothers)  My favorite song of 1976 and while playing The One That Know Me Best, Geoff remarked that the chords of that song would fit perfectly for Let Your Love Flow.  Once discovered he was right, I printed off the words and recorded it.  Took two takes to complete.

You Can't Touch This (M C Hammer)  Not the whole rap song mind you but rather playing a repetitive riff and say Can't Touch This when I felt like it.  We had about 2 minutes of recording tape and this got laid down quickly.  It's only 1:40 long.

Dead Flowers (New Riders Of The Purple Sage, Rolling Stones)  While listening to the outtakes that became 2009's Townedgers Country it was painfully noted that we played that song too damn fast and it needed a slower beat.  Plus I was singing it at the local jams and even in my time with I/O, the 2009 reunion with Russ Swearingen that eventually the wheels came off and the band broke up after the guitar player went elsewhere (forgot who his name was but he has played around the CR area from time to time) The W.D. version took about 10 takes and I was beginning more frustrated the more we worked on it.  We called it a day and then try again to record it, which after 6 more takes finally got the version that I was looking for.  In essence it's a demo and my reminder on how to play it at the local jam session when I get time off work.


So that's The Wapispinicon Dreamers.  A 25 year dream that became reality in 10 days and 15 songs totaling 42 minutes. 

Popcorn Jam 1/15/17 Ice Station Brookie

Lineup:

Brook Hoover-Guitar
Tommy  Bruner-Guitar
Dan Johnson-Bass
R.Smith-Drums
Courtney Trimble-Vocals (Rhiannon, Bobby McGee)
Nick Lnenicka-Harmonica
Tom Listebarger-keyboards 

Terry McDowell-Host

Songs:

Rhiannon
Me And Bobby McGee
Not Fade Away  (Brook Vocals)
Cocaine Blues (Brook Vocals)
Sleep Walk
Suzie Q (Tommy Vocals)
Beer Barrel Polka Number 2 (Brook Vocals)

(Photo: Laurel Henshaw  L to R: Brook Hoover, R.Smith, Dan Johnson, Tommy Bruner)

A short turnout today.  I think the forthcoming winter ice storm scared a few folk away but I thought it was one of the most varied and interesting jams of late.  Featuring the hardest working guys in town (Brook, Tom, Dan, Tommy had eight gigs in four days, Dan plays every other day), but somebody stole Brook's mic with the blue lights on it at some gig (CRL one thinks) and he was missing it.  He showed up with a Gibson Les Paul and played that instead of the Rickenbocker at Parlor City last time we jammed together.  This was the first time at Rumors that Brook took over the song list, basically during my tenure up there, which included a Beer Barrel Polka to which he wore my drum playing out towards the end.  No excuse for a 5 minute polka but I went with wherever Brook took us.

I got there late.  I dropped off a bunch of CDs at Half Price Books and got 40 dollars and some shelf space for the three stacks of CDs waiting to be filed away.  Then off to the recycle center and bid farewell to my humidifier that died two days ago.  Since it was a nice afternoon (32 degrees) I decided to do a walk around Cedar Rapids before heading to Rumors.  I felt better this time out than last week when I was dealing with sore hands and wrists from packaging work and Terry managed to get me up on stage after I walked in the door.    Earlier on Saturday a fellow jammer came to complain about not being able to play right off the bat, a fellow from New York, who did jammed late one night and did a amazing version of All Along The Watchtower and managed to get a band going with some of the guys from Julie And The Mad Dogs.  So far in his half year of being here he's managed to piss off a few players with his demanding practice and his methods.  After his Facebook posting of suggesting a sign up list and him demanding special treatment, I had to reply back and telling him I had no problems of jamming, that it was he got there at 4 and then left at 4:30 when told how things work around here and to be patient.   He certainly hasn't been patient it seems.  Perhaps maybe it's best that he go back to New York state, arrogance and bad attitude won't get you very far here.  He's not winning many friends here.

Courtney returned back to the stage and we did two songs with her, Rhiannon and Me And Bobby McGee.  A lovely girl and she can wail on the vocals for sure.  Then Brook took over and started playing Not Fade Away, it could have been Bo Diddley or the Grateful Dead but I actually playing to the beat of my own song Well All Right or Mo'rockin Roll.  The shave and a haircut, two bits Bo Diddley beat.  I noticed that Terry did replace the drum heads and they sounded a lot better.  Nevertheless Brook Hoover is lot like me in terms of off the wall music, he can do just about anything and of course the Surf Zombies and Meekats, having Kyle Oyloe around added a element much different than the usual bar band songs everybody knows.  In the 1990s The Meekats were the alternative boys in town and perhaps if I was better known and not working a regular job might have added something to their music but the original drummer was better suited to their songs.  I just got late to the party and not knowing Kyle sooner, or going to jams.  I'm trying to fix that.  Still out of folks in town, I'm more closer to Brook than say Dan or Tommy in terms of knowing music of the 60s and such.  Brook will keep you on your toes, the trick is to figure out what he is playing on guitar or for a song and go with that,  Dan is also very good at picking up on songs too, likewise Tommy.  These three guys play for a living and can adapt as quickly.  Like Susie Q, I can do it CCR style or blues style or Dale Hawkins and it took me a while to settle on a beat half CCR and half blues swing and add some sort of drum counterpart but not overplay and let Tommy and Brooke sort out the guitar lead and give the Keyboard player some soloing and the harmonica player too.   From what I heard, Brook played Beer Barrel Polka earlier in the jam and trotted it out again.  Which turned out fine for about 4 minutes and 50 seconds before it became me trying to hang on and finally threw in the towel after the ending.  I don't think I worked that hard playing Vehicle last week and could barely play.  But I did play more this time out, doing 7 songs and hanging on the stage for about 35 minutes.   Some pretty good jamming by the gang and was glad to be a part of it.

And Brook did find his Shure Mic. He had it stored away properly after a gig.

Popcorn Jam 1/8/17

Lineup:

Tommy Bruner-Lead Guitar and Vocals
Bart Carfizzi-Keyboards and Vocals
James Gritman-Bass
R.Smith-Drums

Terry McDowell: Referee 

Songs:

Two Tickets To Paradise
Beast Of Burden
Vehicle

Playing with sore wrists from overdoing it in Packaging, repetitive work of turning books right side up to auto tab, I was surprised I could keep the beat and do some drum rolls.  A shock was Bart pulling out the Ides Of March song but I managed to find the beat and keep on it.  I would have opted to play Hush instead but Bart saved that at the end when Terry got back up to play. Or even born on the bayou.

Highlights was Lorie Parker and Barb Myers paying a visit, Barb dusting off What's Up (done country style) , Joe Hutchcroft playing and singing Born To Be Wild and of course Trevor coming out to play loud drums on his set, not knowing very well of the Greg Kihn Breakup Song, he played a slow and meandering beat.  Another surprise, Bob Gleason jamming with Terry McDowell, Bart, James and Tommy on Midnight Rambler.  All told, 7 drummers showed up.   I was fine with the three songs I played since I was dealing with carpel tunnel issues.   Mike Lint was absent on this jam session.

I did not do any guitar playing Saturday but managed to plunk on the strings this afternoon.  The intention is to do that Wednesday at Checkers.  Trying to type the blog and keep up with music is taking a toll on my hands and carpel tunnel, I can barely have the patience to type this in the first place.

Despite my issues, I managed to get some folks out on the dance floor and even on the misstep beginning of Vehicle managed to get some nice compliments from the patrons.  Playing Beast Of Burden is one of the easier songs this time out, I didn't have to cymbal accent like I did on Paradise and Vehicle.   Bart was suffering from severe back pain but managed to hold it all together.  Not bad for somebody and Tommy coming back from playing a 20 minute gig and driving 8 hours to Topeka Kansas round trip yesterday.  Don't know how they do it, but it's all for the love of rock and roll.

Or a better paying gig elsewhere.

Checkers Acousta Kitties Jam 1/4/17-Bargains And Music

Songs:

Diddy Wah Diddy
I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better
Dead Flowers
Games People Play

With
Skip Richards-Bass and lead vocals on Dead Flowers
Joe Hutchcroft-Backing Vocals on Feel A Whole Lot Better
Steve Black Wolf-Backing vocals on Feel A Whole Lot Better and Games People Play
R.Smith-Lead vocals and guitar on above songs, Congas on the Bottom Numbers

Abigail Bunker-Vocals on Bobby McGee, Spiders And Snakes
Belinda Christensen-James-Vocals on Stormy Monday, Fever and Blue Bayou
Mark Randolph-Guitar on Stormy Monday, Fever And Blue Bayou

The Acousta Kitties-Support, and good vibes.

For my final performances of the winter jam circuit, I wouldn't think they were ground breaking as such but rather having fun. There's hope that I'll show up next week for Lorie's birthday surprise but that will be a last minute decision.

Today was my dad's birthday, he turned 78.  Stopped at the shop wished him a happy birthday and then off to Iowa City to do some bargain hunting and passing the time before heading back to Checker's.  I have been surprised of seeing actual drum sets at the local Stuff Etc and Goodwill in Coralville, to which somebody donated a Yamaha Stage Custom and Goodwill had it for 249 dollars, which is not bad of a deal.  The drums were made in Indonesia, rather than China and I think they are a step ahead of the old Yamaha's that were a beginners' model but it did provide some nice recordings for me back in the 1990s and early 2000s.  A shell pack, but I'm thinking some of the drums were missing and there some missing stands and it did have a hi hat stand, no cymbals though.  Had I not bought the Tama set last summer, I would have gotten this set, I do like Yamaha Drums a lot.  But I didn't need another dust collecting drum set around here.  I still need to piece together the Tama set and have yet to make room for it in the basement.

For those who know me, I am a record and CD collecting hoarder and I love all sorts of music and continue to look for the hard to find.  And continue to find off the wall stuff.  I know bargain hunting has held me back in playing live gigs, I always been a record collector first, a drummer second and guitar player third.   Sometimes I'll find a whole bunch of stuff in one setting, sometimes I don't.  I do plan to thin my collection when the weather gets warmer.

For tonight, I started with Diddy Wah Diddy, first time I did that song live and then went the tried and more familiar, letting Skip sing lead most of the time on Dead Flowers, he loves to do that song and sing it.  For Games People Play, I did the lead with Joe and Steve adding backing vocals.  The honorary Kitty, Abigail has really come into her own as a singing sensation and she's only 10 years old.  She's done Me And Bobby McGee for so long that she needs no cheat sheet to sing it and doesn't oversing it unlike the person who did sing the same song Sunday at Rumors. 

After Games People Play, I turned it over to Belinda and Mark who started out with the bluesy Stormy Monday with me back behind the congas again.  After Blue Bayou, I retired for the night and stayed in the background strumming along to some of the songs they played.  I could actually play Sweet Home Alabama on guitar now.  Easier than originally thought.

Below: Lorie Parker's Birthday Party 1/11/17.  I didn't play guitar that night, I was under the weather and was content to play the bongos  for an hour.   Even Terry McDowell and Tommy Bruner showed up to wish Lorie a happy birthday.  Julie Gordon was pretty busy shooting pictures. Here's one of them.

Rumors Jam 1/1/17 Who Goosed The Soparano

Lineup featuring.

Ed Butler-Lead Vocal and guitar on (Wicked Game, Jolene) (pictured above)
Tommy Bruner-Lead guitar on all songs
I played drums on all songs.
Troy Harper-finally got back on stage to play bass after Wicked Game
Mike Lint-Sang Ain't No Sunshine
Sippie (Ernest) Bynum sang on The Twist and Bring It On Home
Nick Lnenicka played harmonica on Bring It On Home
Aaron Barltrop-vocals on Roadhouse Blues
Courtney Trimble-Vocals on Bobby McGee and Mercedes Benz.

Terry McDowell took notes and arrangements of players

Songs:

Jolene
Wicked Game
Ain't No Sunshine
The Twist
Bring It On Home
Roadhouse Blues

So we begin another year......

This jam was the only one going around town.  The Cooters Acoustic Jam wasn't going on and Dan Hartman came over to do about 10 songs from his KICK IT band and playing with Herm Sarbuy on drums for the first time since Herm left that band.    I didn't get to Rumors till after five, I was doing my Sunday Afternoon walk around Downtown Cedar Rapids, since Temps were over 32 degrees and it didn't feel like a winter day.  It was also the first weekend that we didn't have any snow or below zero temps unlike December.   I was disappointed of going to Green Square Park and seeing somebody breaking at least five of the colorized lights before hand.  You can't have nothing nice in town, some dumb fuck will come along and destroy things.  Sad fact of life we had to deal with.  So I sat there watching the remaining light flicker on and off, disgusted with mankind.

Tommy did a wild weekend with the Past Masters, driving 500 miles from a snowbound Wisconsin out of the way casino to a place in Burlington and only had very little sleep in the process along with his girlfriend Brenda, to which I gave them a copy of the latest project I was doing.   I think it was a fun jam and I didn't intend to play all that much but Terry paired me up with Ed Butler, who did a interesting choice of covers, I don't think too many guys ever cover Jolene and I didn't figure out Wicked Game till I caught wind of the lyrics later on.  Basically, a slow and quiet beat, nothing less nothing more.    A couple of women came up to do songs, one woman warbled her way through Fever (Belinda Christensen James need not worry, she still owns that song) and a blonde came up and did a thorough deconstruction of Bobby McGee, (Abigail need not worry either) but I admire anybody who can jump up on stage and try to sing.  Takes a lot of effort and drive and encouragement. I'm sure their boyfriends were proud of them too.   Somebody goosed the soprano. The boyfriend of the Fever singing chick came up and did Roadhouse Blues and Tommy was not too pleased of the way the dude was tripping over Tommy's microphone.  And so it goes.

Mike Lint wasn't exactly pleased of the drum songs he got to do, I think he did about three songs and sang on Ain't No Sunshine to which I would turn the drum stool over to him after Roadhouse Blues.  But the highlight was getting to back up Ernest the Soul Man on The Twist/Bring It On Home and the man worked out some mean twist moves during the song.  It started out shaky, I don't think Troy was used to play on stage with Ernest, Dan Johnson is perfect for when Ernest hits the stage, and then slowing it down on Bring It On Home.  Hell, on The Twist, Ernest got everybody and all them girls up on the dance floor.  I'm glad I provided the dance beat on that. 

I was satisfied with the end result but Terry kept me up there for one more song and then I finally motioned Mike to come up and play drums for another song before Terry concluded things with Comfortably Numb.  But for added surprise, somebody bribed Troy Harper to do a one man bass/drums arrangement of Black Betty the Ram Jam song.  It's been said Troy has done that before and better but I thought considering the situation he fucking rocked on that one.

And that was that.