This was a terrific gig on Sept. 19, 2015. That Saturday evening, the KRB played a fundraiser for the Michael Hoefflin Pediatric Cancer Foundation's "Evening Under The Stars" at the Robinson Ranch Golf Club in Santa Clarita CA. This was the 22nd annual fundraising event and raised over $150,000 this evening.
Santa Clarita is nestled in the mountains north of LA along Highway 14, the Antelope Valley Freeway.
Once I got off the freeway I didn't have any trouble finding the event. There were signs everywhere.
This is the entrance to Robinson Ranch Golf Club. "It's not a private club, it just plays like one."
The event was being held on the 18th fairway. We were told to find the hole in the fence and drive through. My Astro van barely fit on the golf cart trail.
I made my way to the stage to unload. This is one of the nicest outdoor stages we've played.
I start putting my gear on stage and snap a picture. It seems they are expecting a good crowd. The tents you see behind the FOH are full of silent auction items. The tent to the right was food prep. There were a couple of other support tents on the other side of the rise to the right, where our "Star Waggon" was parked.
I'll bet they are pushing a few watts. The production company was top notch. There must've been at least 10 guys in the crew.
They had erected quite a truss with great lighting and a large LED screen behind the stage.
This is Brent at the FOH console, a real pro.
Here's the view from the sound booth.
After setting up my gear I walked over to the Star Waggon to check out the facilities. You also see the generator. It was quiet and supplied all the electricity we needed.
There were two rooms in the trailer. One for the band and the other for the emcee, auctioneer, and their entourage. There was air conditioning, a shower in the restroom, a couch, makeup mirror, fridge, microwave, DVD player and flatscreen TV, all the comforts of home.
It was very comfortable, especially in the heat and because we had to be at the gig so early to sound check before the guests starting arriving at 5:30.
I parked my Astro van behind the Star Waggon, hoping no one would notice. The parking lot was quite a walk away. I wander back to the stage and find Mario and Art setting up.
Jared is helping Mario mic his kit. If you'll notice, they gave Mario a vocal mic that is just like the mic Paul McCartney's drummer uses, a Sure Beta SM56.
(Well, that's what Mario said. I guess he would know.)
Jeff applies some sunblock to his sensitive nose. The sun was pretty brutal during our sound check.
It looks like Art and Daniel are just about ready to sound check.
Here's my sound check amp-selfie. You can tell the sun is just beating down on us.
Hey! Look! My mic has my name on it! Does that mean I can keep it? We all had wireless mics tonight, except for Mario, who had a mic just like Paul McCartney's drummer.
Yes, Mr. Soundman, we are ready for our sound check!
These little EAW Micro Wedges really put out the sound! I was quite impressed. Then I looked at the prices. Whew!
Mario got a Micro Wedge and a sub woofer. It must be nice being a drummer. You'd think that the bass player should get a sub woofer too. Right?
You can see most of us hid our cars behind the Star Waggon. Nobody yelled at us so I guess we're OK. Poor Art missed the turn onto the fairway and the security made him park in the lot.
I'll bet this is a lot prettier in the spring after the rains. We're all hoping that the El Nino shows up so that we do get a lot of rain this winter.
The guests start arriving. This is one of the tents with silent auction items.
This is another tent with silent auction items right behind the sound booth.
To complete the scene, here is the dining area and the stage.
As you can tell, we had a lot of time to kill. So I took a picture of Daniel taking a picture.
This shows you how fancy-schmancy this event was. They had the NICE porta-pottys.
More guests arrive. As the sun set these globes were lit and floated to provide lighting. It was pretty cool.
There was literally an army of service staff. These folks really know how to put on an event.
I thought I would try to capture the sunset. All I managed to do was get a bad picture of some ugly bass player.
We were served supper, the same as the guests, salad, filet minon with mashed potatoes and vegetables. You also see Cindy, our handler. She made sure we were well taken care of. Cindy is an interesting person who used to work at NASA/JPL as a project manager. Now she's retired and just does stuff like this for fun.
Back in the trailer we had platters of cookies and brownies along with water and soft drinks.
This is Andrea Vibe, a friend of the band, who sat in for a number this evening.
We still have time before we go on so we relax a bit and have some more caffeine.
Then we get the word! We are called to the stage earlier than expected. We were scheduled to start about 9:30 but the presentations, speeches, and live auction were over a little sooner than planned. We started about 9pm.
This is Rick Garcia, our emcee. He is a newscaster on the LA CBS station, channel 2. You also see the auctioneer, Mark Drilling, and a lovely young lady holding the current auction item.
The event raised over $150,000. A single jewelry item went for over $20,000. Other auction items included trips, a luxury box for the LA Kings (hockey) season, and a pair of boxing gloves autographed by Sylvester Stallone.
Here is a shot of the crowd while we wait to take the stage. You see the light globes floating above. It was quite lovely.
Jeff took a picture of the rest of the band just before we walked on stage.
It took us a couple of minutes to reset the stage. The drums were on a rolling riser. Our rigs had to be put back in place. But we were ready to go with minimal delay.
Here's Mario in front of the giant LED screen.
Daniel has the most complicated rig, two instruments, two amps, two Pods, two pedal boards, so he was frantically trying to reconnect everything.
But that gives me time to take an amp-selfie with Alex, one of the stage techs. He was a cool dude.
And we're off! We hit'em hard and they hit the dance floor.
The crowd had fun. I didn't get a chance to take many pictures during our performance because we took only enough time between songs to count off the next one.
Daniel is telling us all about that devil that went down to Georgia.
Jeff tickles the ivory, or is it plastic these days? We close with "Don't Stop Believing" so I get to take a picture during the piano intro.
Kelly gives us a nice smile during the encore.
These two ladies hit the dance floor at the first song and didn't leave until the last song was over.
We played until 10:40 and got the word that we were done. Then we all got outta Dodge.
Here are a couple of panoramas I took with my phone.
From the stage.
And from the hill looking back over the event, from the Star Waggon to the sound booth.
Here's Andrea Vibe on stage with the KRB.
A shot of the band.
I had left my house at 1pm, drove 70 miles, we finished sound check about 4:30. Then we didn't take the stage until 9pm. I was home by 12:30am. It was a long day but at least we had some creature comforts to make the whole scene enjoyable. There has been talk about having us back next year. I hope so. It's a cool gig for a good cause.
Thank you for your indulgence,
BassCliff
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