Artisan Sanctuary Showcase 11/30/17-Solo and Otherwise

Songs:

Spoonful
Mercury Blues
Be With Me
Drawn In The Dark
Fever

Encore  (With Kimberly Trevallion)

Gold Dust Woman
Kansas City Blues (attempted)
Fire
Poor Poor Pitiful Me

Photos by Jim Jacobmeyer

I really didn't intend to do much outside of a block of four songs and off to do other things, but since Kim was in attendance and was looking for a guitar player to help her, the only thing I could come up with was Gold Dust Woman, and Kim's version is more Halestorm than Stevie Nicks, which kinda threw me off course.   I know Julie is Fleetwood Mac and we have done it enough to play off each other toward the end.  Kim, on the other hand, is one of the most powerful vocalists in this town and she's very schooled in the blues. She lit up the crowd on Gold Dust Woman, hitting the higher octaves and back to the chorus again.  Alas, I didn't know the songs she did best, You Got A Friend or Drift Away, actually I did.....if I played drums. I used the capo on the 4th fret on Fire, to which it sounded like the Pointer Sisters than Bruce and was in her vocal range and Poor Poor Pitiful Me, a compromise at the end after she was going through my songbook of songs I could do.  I think in the near future if we share the stage again I'll need to work on Drift Away or Cold Shot, or simply go to see Blue Scratch and check out their songs and figure what to do next.

Spoonful and Mercury Blues were reprise d from the Checker's gig and both sounded pretty damn angry.  I told the story of Be With Me, to which I was so smitten with somebody that I wrote a song and sang it for her and while she thought that was a sweet gesture, but still didn't want nothing to do with me and to which I yelled out BITCH at the end and folks got a good laugh out of that.

The story behind Be With Me, was our guitar player broke up with a cool woman and I thought I would ease her pain by writing a song about asking her out and seeing if she would get the message. She did liked the song but by then, she was dating somebody else.

I ended up my segment by playing Fever and not Logic And Lies which Jim Jacobmeyer was going to request as a encore number, but I ended up accompanying Kim on three songs, so I didn't see the need to play that song.  But I have to the next time we meet up.  I did notice the cd that I gave Jim to hear was on the table waiting for somebody to pick up.  

(Let's see what this button does, Philbo, working his magic)

Patrick Lower, who usually does sound was very sick so Phil Bo King  took over for sound and gave me a bit of echo that would keep feeding back into my ears so I had to back away from the mic. Craig took pictures, Colton once again sang great and he needs a band to back him up.  Mike Lint is a good singer to Karaoke stuff, Colton is better.  That's saying something.  We might have to learn to do some Bon Jovi songs to get a real band behind Colton.

Checker's Acoustic Showcase 11/29/17

Songlist:

I Won't Back Down
Fire
Spoonful
Mercury Blues
Boom Boom (Snippet)
Everybody's Talking
Jet Airliner
For What It's Worth
Gold Dust Woman
Come Together
Summertime Blues
Man Of Constant Sorrow
Love Song
Stand By Me

With
Steve Black Wolf-Lead Vocals 1,14
Julie Gordon-Lead Vocals 2,9.10,12,13
Tony Nickels-Percussion

And

Carl Meiners
PJ and Pam Harrington
Craig Mccune

And the regulars at Checker's Tavern

Let's Jam Hosted by Julie Gordon/Steve Black Wolf


Do we dictate on how the jam is going to be if we play it rough and mad?  I think it brings out the best in the other jammers of course.  Things didn't start out very well since the the GD cup of tea I had in the car tipped over and I ended up getting a wet seat.  I can't get a decent day no matter what I do.

Dave Bonham caught the flu, so Steve took over and helped Julie and I supposed I added something to the equation.  Steve took care of the Tom Petty song and Julie did Fire, which thankfully her vocals were a big upgrade than the toad croak I did Friday Night.  I have to say that tonight's performance was a lot more inspired than what happened over the weekend.  And the songs were made up as we went along, even when Tony was playing the pocket drums on Spoonful, he even managed to follow the choppy to straight beat on the lead part.  Geez another lead guitar specialist now playing coffee cans behind me, just like Rich Toomsen.  I'm supposed to be playing drums.  I worked on Mercury Blues this afternoon and managed to remember most of the lyrics, in fact I didn't use my cheat sheets tonight.  The first couple songs were improvised on the spot,  Spoonful and Mercury Blues   Julie was used a lot during my set, she sang backup on For What Its Worth and went along on Gold Dust Woman on the extended ending.  And of course Come Together.  We did work on Fire Sunday Night and was mostly in the neighborhood of how the song went tonight. She is such a lover of music, when you find the right song for her, she can sing the hell out of it.  She did reach deep down inside on the finale of Gold Dust Woman.  After Summertime Blues, I went back to playing on the side, and didn't know  how Love Song by The Cure went although Man Of Constant Sorrow worked better.

I really pounded on the guitar, the repetitive  two note riff to Spoonful, and the odd time bar chord to Mercury Blues really were the highlights and it was great to have Tony join the jam on a rare occasion, he does the Long Branch Jam on Friday Nights to which I have to take a rain check on. I do like my Guild guitar better than the Ibanez, I'm sure the Ibanez would have had half the strings breaking on tonight's gig.

Afterwards PJ, the owner of the Checkers complimented me on the way that I play, which I was very humbled to hear.  Thought about asking him if I was good enough to have The Townedgers play Checekrs in the future, but I would need more songs,more polish and a actual band to boot.  Oh, and more ambition wouldn't hurt either.


Notes;  Carl was under the weather and decided not to play on stage.  Steve was finally getting over his cold and Julie was still dealing with her cold but despite that,  she was in a perky mood....Although the Rumors Jam the past few weeks have been packed with jammers, the weeknight jams have been single digit performers. Basically it was Julie, Steve, Tony and myself doing the songs and playing.  Of course Steve was telling me to hurry it up while I was grabbing a taco salad for supper and the jalapenos packed a wallop tonight.

Long Branch Acoustic Showcase-Electric Solo

Song list:

Sweet Jane (Abbreviated)
Fever
Fire*
Logic And Lies
Drawn In The Dark
Midnight Rider
The Last Time
Tulsa Time
Light My Fire
Just To Satisfy You
Dead Flowers
Switch Board Susan
Poor Poor Pitiful Me (Abbreviated)
Everybody's Talking
Keep Your Hands To Yourself
Sweet Home Alabama/Werewolves Of London

Tony Nickels-Percussion and mandolin

*debut

Not exactly a memorable night.  It was just me and Tony doing the showcase tonight and I ran out of gas after our off the wall attempt to do Sweet Home Alabama.  It was the second straight week of gone electric and Tony loved the sound of the Tele.

For some reason I couldn't get into Sweet Jane nor Poor Poor Pitiful me and scrapped them since I couldn't register the riffs on the latter song and the former needs more polishing.  There was an attempt to cover Fire but that didn't work as well either.  However one of the patrons still hanging around complimented me on a good job on the vocals.

I don't know what happened along the way.  I did stop and see Doug Spinler's band Palamino and wished PJ at Checkers' a happy birthday and had Chinese at Crossroads Bistro.  Probably the no shows played a role of not being as inspired and my voice kept giving out too.

If nothing else, Tony was glad to see that I made it.  And that the night was more bearable to him too.

Rumors Jam-Triple Guitar Attack 11/26/17

Mike Clair-Guitar
Brook Hoover-Guitar and vocal on Triple Guitar Attack Jam
Tommy Bruner-Guitar
Dan Johnson-Bass
Ernest The Soul Man-Vocal on Bring It On Home
R. Smith-Drums
Terry McDowell-Host

Songs:
Bring It On Home
Triple Guitar Attack Jam


Another packed crowd and a whole lot of jammers but I managed to do the last two songs before Comfortably Numb ended the show. I don't think Terry was in the best of moods, we didn't speak much except when he introduced me to the stage after I relieved Trevor Worcel when  Ernest did The Twist song, but I got to do Bring It On Home.  Thankfully Brook Hoover ended my segment with a 7 minute long jam song to which everybody got to do some showing off as well. I Threw a few dollars in the tip jar to show my appreciation   Thought about going home to watch a DVD and take a nap but Julie was up there and we decided to go over to her place and jam to a couple of songs.   I'm not sure if we attempt to do Fire at her jam but we'll see.

Patrick Geisland's band did about four songs including something called So Long, which I thought was quite catchy but I noticed that the ride cymbal stand was knocked over during a song, which didn't please Terry at all, (can't blame him).  Dana Rocky Smith and Bird did five songs together, then Herman Sarduy did a couple songs, then Rob Haskill before Terry returned with the Rock Brigade and did three lengthy songs (Stranglehold, Fly Me Couragous, I Don't Know). Notables up there beside Julie and Dave Bonham were Ed Butler, Nick Lenescka, Brenda Snow and her friend, Tami Soukup, Kim Mishmash, Lana Oliver who got married, Rick and Andi Clay, Troy Mitchell to name a few.  Troy opted not to play but Rick did a fantastic job on Stranglehold.   I would have gone to the Stone City Jam had Brook Hoover not up there and I'm sure Terry wanted to kill Pat after his drumming expose, but Pat is one of the hardest hitting drummers around.  Perhaps next time Terry may have to mention to Pat to bring his own drumset up there, since I'm sure he'll be replacing the drum heads once again.  I might have gotten a earache out of all this but I did think that Pat and his band did a rocking job on their mini set.  Kenny Webb played bass on a few sets.

Notes; Julie sang with Ed on Jolene.  Ed also did Sultans Of Swing to which the Hermanador messed up the final verse and chorus.

I think Ernest lobbied hard for me to play his songs. I'd love to play The Twist song with him in the near future.  But that hasn't been the case.  It's Terry's jam and those who there early get on stage early.  I'm there to support the cause.

There are photos taken and Kevin Simnacher took a video and some pictures but there are none of me playing drums.  Don't think it's worth the time nor effort to post anyway. Look hard enough and you'll find them on You Tube.

Checkers Acousta Crabby Showcase-Mark Awad Returns

The songs:

Poor Poor Pitiful Me
The Race Is On
I Won't Back Down
Fever
Summertime Blues
Tulsa Time
Just To Satisfy You (Snippet)
Love's Made A Fool Out Of You
Everybody's Talking
For What Its Worth
Let's Work Together
First Cut Is The Deepest

With:

Mark Awad-Bass
Willie Morris-Guitar
Donna Jo Eisner-Backing Vocal (For What It's Worth, Let's Work Together)

And The Sirenz

Cathy Hart
Lorie Parker
Barb Myers

Photo: Cathy Hart
Barb Myers, R. Smith, Lorie Parker, Willie Morris, Donna Jo, Mark Awad



Checker's Bar 11/22/17  Hosted by Hart/Parker

Interesting night to start out with.  I wanted some great Chinese food so I had supper at Crossroads Bistro and there was Rick Clay and Troy Mitchell from Four Day Creep with Rick's wife Andi and their daughter.  A friend Jason popped up later.  Troy and Jason ended up getting some of the hottest food out there and it was so spicy hot that Troy ended up hiccuping after a while.  Nice of them to invite me over to their table for a while.  They were off to Dennis McMurrin's birthday bash and from what I heard the place was packed.  Happy birthday Daddy O!

Since it was Thanksgiving Eve not a lot of jammers showed up but for the first time since the Cabin Jam at Troy Mills, Mark Awad came out and played bass on my segment along with Willie who is part of the country band The Gamblers.  Cathy was dealing with a cold and didn't sing much tonight. I played the Guild while standing up, it's hard to do when I don't have a guitar strap and had to basically hold my guitar in a death hold.   This was the first time that I jammed with Mark since the Cabin Jam in Troy Mills this summer and it was great to see him again. He added a bass solo to For What Its Worth and Willie did an extended guitar solo on Everybody's Talking.

Nothing really new and I'm getting better at covering up the mistakes to the words.  I still can't figure out how to sing The Race Is On but I do okay with the chorus. Steve Black Wolf was missing tonight so I did I Won't Back Down.  Without Belinda or Julie around, I end up doing Fever in a boogie sort of way.  Carl Meiners wasn't around and he might have migrated to Arizona for the winter. With Abigail Bunker, we had the same amount of players as we did last week, 8.

Next up: The Long Branch on Friday.

Rich Magoon Celebration Of Life Jam

Rumors-Wess Side Jam  (Brenda Snow-Photos Credit)

With:

Dan Hartman-Lead Vocals and Guitar
Tommy Bruner-Lead guitar and vocals
Jeff Mattison-Lead guitar and vocals
Mitch Smith-Sax
Bart Carfizzi-Keyboards
Steve DeForrest-Bass
R.Smith-Drums
Terry McDowell-Host

Setlist:

Ramblin Man
I'm Ready
Don't Be Cruel

Notes: Rich Magoon was a regular at Rumors till he passed away from cancer last week.  So a celebration of life took place during this special jam occasion.   The place was crowded and plenty of jammers were there.  I still have not figured out how to play Ramblin Man but keep a straight beat and nobody will notice much.  A nice guitar duet between Tommy and Jeff (who replaced Mike Clair since the Bear and his wife had the cold/flu crap.  Nice to jam again with Steve DeForrest on bass.

People bought enough food dishes for me to grab a couple sandwiches and some brownies, to which Joe Hutchcroft said be careful they might be spiked.  Told him if I start seeing rainbows and unicorns within the next 15 minutes to be afraid.  We got a good laugh out of that.

Logic And Lies Live At The Sanctuary

Songs:

It's So Hard
Drawn In The Dark
Let It Go
All We Are
Realitesville
Dear Lisa
Teri My Love
Logic And Lies

(Jim Jacobmeyer: Photo)

The idea of going electric has been etched in my mind for a while, but for the first time ever I did just that.

I didn't expect to acquire another guitar but the situation presented itself while I was at the Maquoketa Pawn Shop.  There stood in the aisle was Fender Telecaster, I had two Strats and both still are played and loved but I fell in love with this Tele and it was a US made guitar, the clerk mentioned it was a 99 model.  So I figured why not, and decided to use this as my electric debut at the Sanctuary in Marion.

Jim gave me the chance to work a hour long set but I decided to do a half hour set before closing.  Ed Butler popped up from Riverside to do a  couple numbers, Alex Tuna did a couple numbers and Colton and Pat Lower did some karaoke.   Colton is a very good singer of Karaoke and Jim and I talked maybe doing a project with Colton doing songs with honest to goodness real instruments.

My Electric set was a mixed bag and I picked the wrong amp for that.  I used my old Telisco amp that my folks gave me for Christmas about 46 years ago.  It's not loud, and it plays cranky, plenty of fuzz tone to it.  My folks only paid 29.95 for both the guitar and amp that they got from K Mart and the guitar died a long time ago. Despite some snap crackle and pop on the knobs the amp plays fine.  It made all the songs sound like punk rock, even Teri My love had a bit too much overdrive to it.  Even though I worked on the song Logic And Lies, my mind drew a blank and I had to start over again.  But this song have gotten quite a bit of a boost from the Sanctuary faithful and they seem to enjoy hearing it.  Some notables who showed up, Phil Koening from the Waubeek jams, Ed Butler from Riverside, Alex Tuna and Becky who used to sing in Blues Zone years ago, she played more folk than blues.  My set was simply noisy and a bit too much punk rock.  A rethink is probably needed next time if I go electric.

Interesting night though.

(Below: Fender Telecaster bought today at the pawnshop for 800 dollars.   It's a made in USA version made in 1999. It's seen a few gigs but it does sound great despite the 20 dollar amp that I used at the Sanctuary)

Checker's Acoustic Showcase-The Philosopher's Stone

Set List:

The Race Is On*
The Kids Are Alright*
Fever
Poor Poor Pitiful Me*
Let Your Love Flow
Light My Fire/I Always Wanted To Be With You/Cinnamon Girl
Gold Dust Woman (Julie Gordon; Lead Vocals)
For What's Its Worth (Julie Gordon Lead Vocals)
Little Sister (Julie Gordon: Lead Vocals) *
Everybody's Talking
Sweet Home Chicago (Julie Gordon: Lead Vocals)

*Debut

With:

Julie Gordon-Host, vocals, guitar and percussion
Dave Bonham-Host and lead guitar
Carl Meiners-Guitar and vocals
Skip Richards-Bass and Vocals
David Boston-Sax
Donna Jo Eisner-Backing vocals and percussion
Tim Canfield-Good Vibes

Notes:  There were a few more songs that I played guitar on when Carl Meiners came up on stage and there were a few songs that Julie and Dave did that I wasn't familiar with so I stayed unplugged and off the stage.

I noted the four songs that Julie sang on.  I'm sure she did a few more (Born On The Bayou, Green River, Seven Bridges Road) and I know Carl did some songs that I didn't note (Folsom Prison, Loving Her Was Easier, Sunday Morning Comin Down, Swinging Doors, a couple others that I don't know the name of the song) and Skip did Mustang Sally (?) and Hang On Sloopy.

While The Checker's Showcase wasn't as radical as the Long Branch Showcase, I did play around with the boogie version of Fever and then did a strange medley starting out with Light My Fire which went into I Always Want To Be With You and then finishing up with Cinnamon Girl to which Julie joined me on the second chorus.  I was still dealing with the after effects of having food poisoning courtesy of Taco Bell the other night and it was so dry there, I had to deal with a dry throat.  Not very well since the unsweetened Tea wasn't helping things either. I was losing my voice on Let Your Love Flow which was why I decided to go with the medley and thankfully Julie bailed me out on Cinnamon Girl, by then I had no vocal range whatsover and I needed  to save my voice for my gig tomorrow night.

There were three new debuts of cover songs. Rough go through versions of The Race Is On and Poor Poor Pitiful Me and The Kids Are Alright to which Julie took part of a video of that song.  While I enjoy playing The Who songs, they do sound better with a electric guitar. Hardly anybody paid much attention to the line, "I met a girl down at Checker's Bar instead of the Hyatt House".  For the most part my set ended with Julie singing Gold Dust Woman.  Everybody's Talking was chosen my encore number, Skip playing bass to that and Carl playing guitar.

I thought the crowd would be bigger but Mike Clair was sick, Steve Black Wolf had a couple teeth pulled and rest probably either were working or too tired to show up.  I managed to chat with Tim Canfield on drums and guitar for a while. Somehow the talk turned into Donna Jo coming over to talk about going to see America this weekend and she paid 250 dollars to go see Van Morrison, only to get annoyed with that concert.  He was such a moody and pompous bastard she said.   And then it was back to America and the song that was covered by the Captain And Tenille, Muskrat Love.  To which all parties all agreed that America did the better version.

BTW-Muskat Love was written by Willis Alan Ramsey.

Whittier Acoustic Showcase-Rumors Wess Side Jam

Setlist:  Whittier Acoustic Showcase 11/11/17

Can't You See*
I Won't Back Down*
Simple Man*
Everybody's Talking*
Fever
Teri My Love

* Jeff Overly-Lead Vocal (Can't You See, Simple Man), Alto Saxophone

Rumor's Jam  11/12/17

Mustang Sally
Drift Away

Mitch Smith-Sax and Vocal (Mustang Sally)
Kim Trevellion-Lead Vocal (Drift Away)
Mike Clair-Guitar
Lenny Munn-Bass
Greg Mein-Keyboards
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Backing Vocals
Terry McDowell-Host
R.Smith-Drums


For Saturday, Jeff popped in early and helped out on the first four songs before moving over to The Frog to help out Karl Hudson.  Probably the most folks who joined the Whittier Acoustic Showcase but most of them started to leave after 9 and the final song of the night was Teri My Love which ended at 9:45.  Then I ended up going to see Four Day Creep/Flex to celebrate Tami Soukup's 50th birthday bash.


A lot of jammers and drummers popped in on Sunday at Rumors, despite me getting there about 4:30, I didn't play till quarter till 7  8 drummers were there in front of me.  Jeff had to cut out around 6 to get back home to take care of teacher's things he does at his school.   So, I didn't jam with Jeff, nor Greg and Brenda but Greg and Brenda stayed around to help me on the songs.  First time I got to jam with Lenny, who plays in Crankshaft with Mitch.  Kim from Blue Scratch volunteered with Drift Away.

Notes:  The debut of Jiffy Pop, the new side project of Kipp Wieland played four songs of bubble gum but instead of playing keyboards, he played guitar and sang.  Interesting set of songs, Gallery's Nice To Be With You and The Turtles' Eleanor and It's A Heartache.  Dave Kelsey, who played guitar, was part of the long ago FOAD band that I did with Mike Swearingen.  For a guy that used to be part of MOX NIX and a KISS tribute band, it's sure a long way from the rock and roll to the bubblegum sound of these songs. I'll give them this, at least they had a good sense of humor in singing these songs. Kipp did play keyboards later on with other jammers.  I didn't get to talk to Kelsey, he might have left after the Jiffy Pop played.  I doubt if he would have remembered me 32 years after the fact.

(Tom Krejci: Credit)

(Rick Novak-his FB page, I'm thinking this is the same guy that played in Stone Garden)

Archives:  The Original Stone Garden was a powerhouse band led by Virgil Hanson and Craig Spratt in the late 1960s and early 70s.  After Paraphernalia/Tyrus went on hiatus Mike Swearingen drafted me into a new version of the New Stone Garden Band, with Rick Novak and a bass player I can't think the name of, he could have been the original bass player (Bob Jones perhaps?).  We started practicing in April of 1985 and did about a month's worth of songs before Virgil and Rick had a major falling out and the band imploded.  It seems to the be the way of life for me and all of my band endeavors, only band that never imploded have been The Townedgers.   Novak, was part of Stone Garden around 1975 with Hanson, Spratt, Jones and Steve Jennings.  I never thought on how big these guys were, I wasn't familiar with the Iowa Music Scene till I started playing in 1983.  But mostly a who's who of CR musicians did play in that band, the late Barry Binger.  As par for course, I would be a forgotten footnote to the failed reunion of The Stone Garden Band and I'm sure if you talk to Virgil or Rick, that they wouldn't know me, or if they did, it was that I had Zickos Drum Set, and was the only one playing Zickos in town. Spratt does have some other Stone Garden promo pics on his site.  Virgil could be a sort of  an disciplining dude, but Rick was a lot of fun playing guitar with. We talked about forming a band but nothing came of it.  Mike and I would off and on get together on special projects and jams and I drafted him to be part of the Routers in 1992.  Since then, Mike just does karaoke shows when he's healthy.

Long Branch Jam-The Return of Crabby

Song list: (Something To That Effect)

I Won't Back Down
Fever
Light My Fire
Spoonful*
Not Fade Away*
Everybody's Talking
Won't Get Fooled Again
Good Lovin/I Fought The Law/Switch Board Susan
The Last Time
The First Cut Is The Deepest
What's So Funny About Peace Love And Understanding*
No Expectations
Let's Work Together
Sundown
Cinnamon Girl

With:

Alex Tuna
Zac Nickels
Tony Nickels

*debut

The return back to the Long Branch and this is where I decided that we should jam out and extend the songs a bit more.  Zac Nickels played drums and I thought I would throw a few things his way to see how he responds.  Usually it's the other way around, I'm playing drums and doing oddball things to liven up the mood, it's been that way since The Paraphernalia Tyrus years but never done this by playing guitar and seeing how the other drummer would react.

Turns out Zac did a very good job of playing along and seeing where I was taking the song.   In jam situations when you extend a song, you're playing within your heart and soul.  I'm not a fan of electric drums but since that's Zac's drums I figured he'd play them.  The Fever song was Little Willie John's version with a boogie riff, unlike the Peggy Lee version to which Belinda James sings on.  With The Townedgers, we're building off the one note to go into the jams but since I only play guitar via rhythm it tends to be a bit restrictive.   Therefore Alex Tuna, was tapped to add some lead guitar. I have known Alex from the Artisan Sanctuary Jams of note, and he did play at Rumors one time for a couple of songs.  He does originals, that are fairly long (five to six minutes on average).  I'm still trying to fit in playing guitar and singing songs but I'm also using the musicians that do show up.  There's never a big crowd on a Friday Night, most musicians are out playing somewhere or going to bed early.   In my case I took the night off since Tony was looking for some folks to show up.

I'm impressed that the jammers like to jam with me on the songs that I do.  It's becoming well known that my songs start out as jam songs, somewhat done by the record and then we make it up along the way as we go.  Spoonful was one song that was debuted by using the same two notes over and over again.  Repetition of playing the same riffs over and over might become tedious, but if you throw in a off chord key just to spice it up, the song can still be rocking.  I'm still tinkering with the song itself and throwing a rave up 4/4 beat in the jam part but I was happy with the results.

For Light My Fire, it was extended into a crazy little guitar/drummers duel between me and Zac. The new arrangement was thought up earlier in the afternoon and while I debuted that new arrangement, Zac managed to respond to my odd ball guitar riffs.  I think he played in McPhisto years ago but he has a drummer's knack of adding fills and cymbal accents to the songs.  Just like he did with Won't Get Fooled Again.  He managed to get all the cymbal chokes at the end.  Even though he was a bit early but then again we never played the song before.  It sounded nice.

There was a rough go through of What's So Funny About Peace Love And Understanding, but that was the first time I played it and despite the wrong notes I got good response from the 3 people in attendance.  As for the bizarre medley of Good Lovin/I Fought The Law, that was thought up on the spot.  Nevertheless, this turned out to be a very long set about 90 minutes to the final ending of Cinnamon Girl.   Alex did fairly well of playing guitar on the songs but since Tony had his dad playing drums for last night, I decided to really use him on the songs and see where they would lead.

He really did make me sound that much better than usual.  Not saying it was like with The Townedgers but they're learning and so am I.

Checker's Acousta Crabby Showcase 11/8/17

Songs:

Logic And Lies
Light My Fire
Switch Board Susan
In The Midnight Hour
Everybody's Talking
Tulsa Time
Sundown
Ring Of Fire
Lodi
I Won't Back Down
Eve of Destruction
Good Lovin
Suspicious Minds
Boobieful
Sweet Home Alabama

With:

Steve Black Wolf (Vocals-Lodi, I Won't Back Down, Eve Of Destruction)
Donna Jo Eisner (Percussion, backing vocals, Sundown, Tulsa Time)
Lorie Parker- Lead vocal-Boobieful
Cathy Hart-Lead vocal-Sweet Home Alabama
Willie Morris: Guitar (Vocals:Suspicious Minds)

Wess Side Jam-November 5

Setlist:

Going Up The Country
Amie
Sister Golden Hair
Little Wing
Heard It In A Love Song

With:

Greg Mein-Lead Vocals and Guitar
Brenda Hoskins-Mein-Keyboards and Flute
Tommy Bruner-Lead Guitar
Bruce Bingman-Bass and lead vocal on Sister Golden Hair
R.Smith-Drums

And

Tush

Me on vocals
Mike Clair on Guitar
Dave Bonham on Guitar
Jeff Langenberg-Bass
Mike Lint-Drums

Terry McDowell-Host

Much to my surprise Greg and Brenda showed up to do the Wess-side jam on Sunday and even more of a surprise they personally asked Terry to let me play drums on their songs.   We talked about getting together to jam during previous jams but they got paired up by the wrong drummers that didn't know their songs.  And I was around them both long enough to know what songs they are playing.  Greg is a talented guitarist, he is in Crazy Delicious, a band that I have been priming to see but everything they played somewhere I had a gig of my own.  Four of the five songs that they did were played yesterday in Waubeek.  And for the first time I got to play Going Up The Country.

I think Greg was impressed that I knew the songs they played, the breaks and where to put them.  His take on Little Wing differs from the version that I did with the Wiley Kats, more simpler and they don't take on the coda from Derek And The Dominoes.   Brenda can play flute and the keyboards, I love their version of Heard It In A Love Song.  I thought they would attempt to do The Weight but perhaps they might have played that earlier in the showcase before I got there.  A big surprise: Greg didn't play any Tom Petty.

NOTES: There was a friend of Renee (Wife to the Bear) Brian, I think his name, was supposed to play but the guy crashed and burned and put a few dents in Terry's drum heads. While Mike Clair got him to play Kansas City Blues okay, the dude couldn't make heads or tails out of Wonderful Tonight and had too much to drink.   They were going to do the song Tush but they couldn't find anybody to sing it, so I jumped on stage and sang it.  Mike Lint then replaced Crash And Burn Brian.  Tami Soukup took part of a video of me horsing around on stage and Dave Bonham added a lotta wah wah to the lead. I could probably sing more lead on future jams but I still feel weird without a guitar in hand or behind the drum set.

While Greg didn't play Tom Petty, Karl Hudson did.  You can guess which song he did play.  He also a version of Can't You See with a snippet of Hey Jude towards the end.

Two weeks ago, I jammed with Steve DeForest on the Kyle Oyloe 2 years remembered jam.  He plays in Crazy Delicious with Greg.

Ernest The Soul Man really came on strong with his Twist/Bring It On Home To Me medley, and afterwards he wondered why I haven't been behind the drums. I told him it's process of elimination, I played earlier in the jam and retired for the night, except for that impromptu version of Tush.  Told Ernest that it's Terry's call, and usually Terry can back up Ernest quite well  Being Ernest he talked about getting a upcoming gig and he was going to tap me into playing a few songs.  I told him if I'm not working or not having a acoustic jam gig I'd be happy to.

Barb Myers came up for a rare performance of Rain and Helter Skelter and Bobby McGee.  She has a bigger stage fright than me but I think she did a nice job on Rain.  Joe Hutchcroft helped out on drums.

I really have not sat down and talked to Jeff Langenberg all that much but he's has been a part of my musical trip when I'm fronting a band.  He was part of the Tush jammers with Mike Clair who's been a big boost to my exposure to play events such as Vinton and Rubies Benefit. Jeff is a solid bass player, economical and doesn't do a lot of fancy playing.  He's very good.  In fact I have yet to hear a sub par bass player in my return to the stage.

While last weekend, it was Julie and Ryan getting me back on stage and me associating with them most of the evening.  This weekend it was Greg and Brenda that became the major players.

It was another capacity crowd and lot of jammers along for the ride.  

Weekend Jams-Acousta Crabby Takes Waubeek

Set list;

O Death
Everybody's Talking
For What's It Worth
Dead Flowers
Summertime Blues
The Last Time (encore)

With
Greg Mein
Brenda Hoskins-Mein

and other jammers.

Waubeek sits on the banks of the Wapsipinicon River about 10 miles away from my place.  Last time I went up there I stayed for a brief moment after doing a Waterloo bargain hunt.  This time I figured I'd give this a go.

The place was packed. They had a Halloween costume night and people dressed up.  I'm not big on packed crowds and at times thought about leaving once again.  It's cold, it's November and FB and Company still have one GD fly that kept bothering me last night and a couple had to bring their youngster up there and believe it or not I had to entertain the poor kid at times.  The couple would bicker and cuss and then cuddle up and make out and then bicker and cuss again.  That was a sign of things to come.

The Costume party was weird and surreal.  A lot of the early jammers came up and did original songs.  Most could not sing. Some couldn't play either.  The electric drums didn't help much.  Trevor Worcel and his dad sat in with Ron LaFleur on his set and they did a interesting version of Billy Jean and concluded with A Thousand Horses's Smoke.  And then he threw a tirade about something and left the place soon afterwards. Trevor got picked up by a young woman who danced with him on a song, I think she was into him but Trevor and his dad wanted to go home.   Some guy butchered The Weight, so Greg ended up doing something else, Heard It In A Love Song, the Tom Petty songs.  I could see myself working with him on something in the future.

Once Mr. Bi Polar left the place, the bar begin to thin out and by the time I got do my set, most of the costume wearing people went home and Big Mo and Dakota were in the process of loading up themselves. So what better way to scare off the people, play O Death.  I might put that song in the archives, but I did that song for shock value. I got another jammer (Daniel I think his name was) to help out on Everybody's Talking and For What's It Worth, Greg Mein came up to play guitar and that song turned out the highlight.  I could have played longer but my Ibanez had other ideas and broke a string on Dead Flowers, the second time that has happened this year which is beginning to irritate me. However, since everybody liked my performance a guy stepped in and I borrowed his Martin for Summertime Blues.

Afterwards, the house band and Greg and his wife Brenda came up to do a few songs and I sang backup to Can't You See and The Last Time, to which Brenda and I did a call and response to his lead vocals.  I thought about doing The Last Time but forgot all about it till Greg sang it.

And after that a big fight erupted between a couple of good ole boys from the city, it started at the door and ended up going around the bar scattering people into the night and chairs went flying. For some reason I started singing The Monster Mash. By the time I left that place Two Linn Country Sheriff cars came racing down the road through the fog. However, the folks at FB and Company were so impressed with my performance that they said they would like to see me back next month.  I may take them up on their offer, providing if it's not too crowded and the good ole boys stay in the city.