8/12/17
Songlist:
Sundown**
Do It*
Mystery Girl
Ring Of Fire#+
Medley: Sweet Home Alabama/Werewolves Of London*#+**
Let's Work Together Blues +
Dead Flowers/
Everybody's Talking#
For What It's Worth+
Logic And Lies/
The Life We Lead
All Along The Watchtower
Get It Over With
Rock Me Baby#+
*debut
With:
** Tony Nickels-Percussion and mandolin
+ Zachary Nickels-Electric Drums
# Steve Black Wolf-Backing Vocals and Guitar
Joe Joyal-Bass
In reality, everybody was playing tonight. If you were not in a band, you were either one band and heading down the road and going to another bar and supporting that band. So I didn't expect much of a turnout at the Long Branch which has become my favorite place to do a acoustic jam. Tony Nickels has been a very good supporter of my acoustic music and I'll do my best to help him out in the waning months of summer, although I'm bound to see Julie And The Mad Dogs come September 1. Alas, only four other folks showed up, and Tony's dad was playing the electric drums. Oh I was offered to play them but I told Tony I am not a fan of them. Ever since my last attempt to play electric drums I had no interest of playing them. But I do give Zach Nickels kudos for having them sound good. I would have never known Zach to be Tony's father, he looks very youthful.
For the songs themselves, a new cover of Do It (Neil Diamond's song BTW) and what turned out to be just messing around I ended up doing a medley of Sweet Home Alabama with Werewolves Of London thrown in for shits and giggles. When there's not much of a crowd you can mess around with songs although I missed a few lines of Sweet Home Alabama. I basically got on stage late but ended up doing like almost an hour of songs. Certainly the most time I ever spent on stage in one setting. Tony requested All Along The Watchtower so I did that one. Logic And Lies went into The Life We Lead. With Zac Brown on drums, we improvised on the spot a slowed down version of Let's Work Together and I threw in a bunch of guitar riffs at the lead break to counter his's drumming. It's so nice to have somebody who can play drums and adapt to the way that I play. I'm still learning how to interact with other musicians but for the first time, Zac did a marvelous job on the songs we did. For a rousing encore and me closing the jam down, Steve and Zac joined me on Rock Me Baby, simply of the fact that since we had a drummer in the house why not use him. And so we did.
Whittier Acoustic Jam-David Lam Host 8-13-17
Songs:
Simple Man
Love's Guessing Game*
Can't You See*
Sundown
Hot Rod Lincoln
A Stranger To Himself
The First Cut Is The Deepest
Yakety Sax*
Teri My Love
Everybody's Talking
*Debut
With
Jeff Overly-Sax and lead vocals on 1,3,5
(Jeff Overly: Photo by Paul Delisle)
Jeff came up from Ft. Madison to spend the weekend going to certain jams, but since he was here I helped him on guitar on the the Simple Man, Can't You See and Hot Rod Lincoln. In essence it's easy doing the songs since they have the same chord progression throughout the songs. And we both did the Simple Man song when he was here a couple weeks ago, Hot Rod Lincoln first time I played on guitar, last time I was on drums. I think we had a few more people showing up despite many things going on around the area (JC Project doing the Pink Floyd project at the Paramount, Cocked And Loaded at Tailgators, Dunshee Moon at CRL, The Merles in Stone City, Crazy Delicious at Springville Fun Days, Linn Country All Stars/Joanna Connor at Czech village), but still Jeff and I came up with 9 songs and an attempt to do Yakety Sax.
(Photo: Chase Feagins. Jeff plays in East Of Omaha, a band that has opened up for the likes of George Thorogood and others, He kinda looks like Captain Beefheart but doesn't sing like him thank God. His day job is math teacher at Burlington High School. The kids really like him a lot.)
For my songs, a debut of Love's Guessing Game which Jeff did a extended sax solo on the song, Which became the theme of the night. Most of the songs that we did, were extended a few bars by Jeff's sax solos. Love's Guessing Game is a short song in the first place but when you got a quality alto sax player why not take advantage of it? Stranger To Himself was taken out of mothballs for the first time in months and it's was a bit clumsy. Likewise Teri My Love. Usually around 9:15 people began to call it a night but we continued on till 10 and concluded with Everybody's Talking, another extended song. It should be interesting to see what Jeff and I come up with tomorrow at the Rumors Jam.
Rumors' Wess Side Jam: Terry McDowell Host 8-14-17
With
Mike Clair: Lead Guitar
Jeff Overly: Bass Guitar And Vocals
R. Smith: Drums
Songs;
Hot Rod Lincoln
La Grange
My Head Is In Mississippi
The final day of the Smith/Overly Jam Tour, concluded with a three song set, beginning with Hot Rod Lincoln, this time with me behind the drums and Bear Clair doing the lead guitar. Jeff was fairly busy playing through out the first hour. I didn't get there till after 5 PM, due to me at the Cedar Rapids Kernels game to which they came from behind 6-3 with a 4 run ninth to defeat the Quad Cities River Bandits. Usually when I show up, Quad Cities seems to win the games and it looked like they did, when they hit a grand slam HR and another guy hit one too. But I did mentioned that I would not be at the jam till the game was over.
Since I was late getting there, plenty of drummers took the stage before I did, Rocky Smith backed up Mark and Belinda to which I missed out playing Fever. Mike Lint ended up playing Rocky Mountain Way (with Jeff singing it) with Dave Bonham and Tim Wiley on guitars. I don't think Mike wasn't too happy about going up so early and being the drummer assigned to Mr Wiley Kat. The consensus is that Rocky Mountain Way is one of my songs that I play drums only too, but that's just not true. It's kinda tough to keep that blues beat Joe Vitale does on that song and if you don't go overboard then chances are you can make the song rock. Over the years that song brings out the good and the bad in me, the early years of the bash and crash have given way to a more "subtle" approach but of course I love to do the cymbal accents and drum rolls at certain parts of the songs. I had to smile when Mike apologized to me that he had to do the song and it wasn't his best effort, but I told him not to worry, it's a jam and I don't find fault if he plays around with the beat and drum fills. Sometimes if you try to do too much then the song can turn on you; I know this for a fact as I did the same thing he did way back then. Only his way of drumming wasn't as over the top and careless like mine was years ago. He actually did quite well. I think I was more disappointed in not backing up Mark and Belinda on Fever, which I tend to ID more as one of my must do songs, but again it's first come first served on stage and there were four other drummers before me. Certainly we had Ken Webb playing bass earlier but the intention all along to hang and jam with Jeff Overly. He came all the way up from Fort Madison and made the effort to participate in these jams. Which was the reason why I put the Whittier Jam first before anything else. There was much going on in the area. Ron LaFleur was in Waubeek, The Merles were at Stone City, Crazy Delicious was the street band for Springville Fun Days and the big event was Bear's JC Project doing the Pink Floyd Tribute at the Paramount. I heard great things about that show. I figure if Jeff is going drive all the way up here, then I'll find the time to jam with him.
Hot Rod Lincoln was the highlight of our jam, La Grange was kinda clunky and I simply didn't know My Head Is In Mississippi but Jeff could sing it. Bear didn't know Rockin In The Free World nor Dead Flowers so the final song was done by default. So that was improvised on the spot. Considering it all, I'm surprised it did turn out as well as it did.
NOTES: It was the first time that I have seen T Ray Robertson in about a year and a half, he was host of the Wrigleyville jams and then basically kinda got into production work, we shook hands and said hi. Dave Bonham also showed up but we didn't chat, Tim Wiley was there and in usual style, left the building after his set was done. The background girl singers to the JC Project Pink Floyd Show showed up to do a couple songs toward the end. Rocky Smith also showed up for the first time in half a year too. Mike Clair said the the show last night at the Paramount was great but the amps were sucking up the electricity to the point that lights were dimming around the block. You had to be there. Wish I could have been but it came down to priority and this weekend, the Viola Gospel Bluegrass Festival was going on Saturday Afternoon so I stayed close to home. After all it was across the street. Later, the mandolin player from the Jones Boys (or was it James Boys? one of the two) showed up at the Whittier jam and did about three songs. He lives in Guthrie Center, two and half hours from here.
From Jeff Overly
I had a great weekend of jamming in CR this weekend! Whittier Acoustic Jam on Saturday night was fun...just a bunch of mostly local people getting together and sharing their music in a relaxed setting. My first time there, but I expect I'll be back. Then Sunday at Rumors, more of a classic rock jam...got to play my BASS for the first time in CR, and sang some fun songs- Hey Joe, Simple Man, Rocky Mountain Way, La Grange, My Head's In Mississippi....and Hot Rod Lincoln! And yes, I definitely expect to be back when I can make it work! Actually, did Hot Rod Lincoln at BOTH jams. Saturday night with me on sax ( playing the guitar solo parts ) and my friend Rodney Smith on guitar, Sunday with me on bass, Rodney on drums and 'Bear' on guitar ( the guy from the Pink Floyd Tribute band that had played CR Saturday night...). So I got to play two different instruments on it on consecutive days, and so did Rodney....ironically, after FOUR performances two weeks ago it feels like a relatively light weekend, though I kept pretty busy with other stuff ( visiting, shopping etc.). Seems CR is becoming my second home these days
From Steve Black Wolf on life itself. (Some beautiful thoughts there)
I've come to feel that it comes down to how you treat yourself. It's nice to know that there are people around you who love you, care about you, but if you don't take care of yourself, if you don't cut yourself some slack and just be nice to yourself, life can be a hot mess. I think that most of us who do this "jam circuit" here have at one time in our lives believed that someday, we'd all be rock stars. For whatever reasons, it didn't work out that way. But we're still at it, because it does *something* for us - I don't know what that something is for anyone but myself, but I know that in my case, I can't be happy in general if I don't have that outlet.
You're right, we're getting older. That means having to recognize limitations when we run into them. My bike is going to be going up for sale soon, because it's becoming a bit too much for me to handle now - I don't have the strength or stamina that I did when I was 30. And honestly, that's okay with me. There was a time when I thought - truly believed - that I wouldn't make it much past that magic three-oh. Well, here I am, still kicking.
I've had a few brushes with death in my life, but none as immediate and present as cancer. And while I didn't win the war, I gave it enough of a fight that it's going take it while to come back for me.
We go through our lives, it seems, always wanting more. More things, more friends, more love, more sex, more "meaning." But you know, just living a quiet life, doing things that are necessary, as well as doing things that are purely fun; that's enough "meaning of life" for me. I've made some amazing, beautiful and loyal beyond words friends since I've been in Iowa, most of them while playing at the jams.
Being good to yourself, sharing time with friends, being the best person you can be, and helping others out when we can... That, to me, is the meaning of life, and the key to being happy.
And yes - you're one of those friends I've made here. Love you, man - and I'm pleased beyond words that I met you, got to know you, and have had the opportunity to get up on a stage with you.
Blues Jam-Parlor City 8/15/17
With:
Tim Wiley-Guitar
Adam Dinschel-Guitar
Tom Giblin-Organ
Nick Lenicka-Harmonica
John (Big Mo) Heim-Bass and vocals
Drums provided by Eric Douglas
Songs:
The Monkey
One Room Country Shack
Choo Choo Cha Boogie
(Big Mo Photo: Tim Crumley)
Probably the most jazzy set I ever played. John Heim can sing like Howling Wolf and he's been a major blues figure on the CR music scene for many years. I have jammed with him once, and this time out I was in awe in the way he plays and sings the blues. The challenge was to play the blues but with a more softer approach. I have been dealing with headaches and the opening drummer, a nice guy was really pounding the drums and I told Gibby that I was aiming for a more mellow sound. So on this set I used the hot rods. In theory, playing hot rods actually does make a song swing much better while playing a more mellower style. It came damn close to jazz and I heard from Dan Johnson that whatever I was doing was swinging and really tight. I'm guessing the host drummer Eric and Bryce Janey also had nice comments too, I did notice Bryce watching closely on the stuff I was doing. Nothing really out of the ordinary on The Monkey, it was straight 4/4, One Room College Pad was a slower blues although I threw in some Texas shuffle on Adam's lead guitar break. And did managed to figure out John was doing a Louis Jordan song at the end but I did catch the staggered beat at the next to last ending of song. Even though it was a bit of jam, John was animated in telling the guys what chords to play and it was a bit imitating, John has been doing these songs for many years and knows what people should play even if Tim or Adam didn't quite know the song. Most of the songs I didn't, I basically followed John's riffs and kept time, but I did play around with the beat on the songs much later on. I have jammed with some of the finest bass players around town, but I have to say that Big Mo might be the most smoothest player I share the stage with. And he could swing too. Very professional as well. He taught me a few things during this set.
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