Blues Rox at Cedar Ridge

 A surprise gig at Cedar Ridge and we had a decent crowd even for COVID issues. 

The usual Spinal Tap bullshit.  Tried using a dolly to move the cymbal stands only to have them fall out, not once but three time and I lost part of my hi hat which really set me off. 

The lack of practice has been noted.  Tho once again, we did well on the blues songs, the classic rock numbers were ragged.  I wish Brian would remember when to come in on Feel Like Making Love or Free Bird and even Can't Get Enough was missed.  Russ thought that Blue On Black was fairly slow paced, but to me it went with the live version.  For a short version of Free Bird, that was extended to around 8 minutes, but Voodoo Chile went for only five minutes since we went over time and Kris lost his vocals and lost interest toward the end.   I think we went over the 7 oclock by about 10 minutes but we were all packed up and out of the place before 8.  Maybe sooner if I didn't have the hi hat malfunction and other spinal tap bullshit that is so common with my band adventures.

The Acoustics of Cedar Ridge was wonderful.  The drums sounded quite well in the cavernous reception room.  The drawback was trying to get to the area from the main room.  The unloading area you had to carry the drums for about a 100 yards.   They had dollys that I used in the early part, but the load out, used a plastic roller that the fucking cymbal stands fell off.  I do need to retire the Ludwig Cymbal Boom stand. the fucking piece of shit didn't hold and my ride cymbal fell a couple times.  My life playing music would rival Spinal Tap.

For this, I bought out my 18 inch Session Dark Crash and used the 17 inch K Dark Crash and 16 inch S Trash Crash.  The K Session Crash has been used on the Townedgers recordings, the 17 inch came from a trade with Rocky Smith and ended up getting a damn dent when the cymbal stand fell and I didn't catch it in time.  Rocky mentioned that it never fit in with his collection when I traded my K Hybrid Crash for his.  The Trash Crash has been used a few times with The Boy Scout Hippies and for a budget line priced Zildjian cymbal, it really holds up well with the K's.  I tend to think that the S crashes do sound somewhat like the Paiste 2002.  Mike Eastman uses the S cymbals for Palomino Band and Tom Miller had them the last time he played.  I'm not a fan of the ZBT's, which is the low priced Zildjian (or perhaps the ZBT's were tossed in favor of the Zildjian I's or maybe renamed Planet Z, which are bottom line and a step up from Cambers).  I don't think I'd be a fan of the I's or Planet Z but if I was starting out, the S series would have been perfect as I worked my way up to the A's or K's. 

For hi hat's I did a mismatch, using the K 14 inch dark crash over the imported 13 inch K splash that has been in my collection since 1984. This would have been the perfect chance to play the dry hats that I bought earlier in the month. I think I subbed one of the quick beat cymbals for the 14 inch dark crash and it sounded okay. 

We played well enough to get a few tips.  Still rough around the edges. But for improvision we did a lot better than we did for the Checker's practice.