I recently played The Hangar at the Orange County Fair with True Willie. This is a good sized venue which can hold about 2000 people. It was a pretty cushy gig with full professional sound, easy load-in, and because I arrived plenty early, not much hassle getting in.
I started this gig by entering the OC Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa via Gate 4 1/2. It was a little like taking the train to Hogwarts.
We moseyed carefully through the behind the scenes area.
We were able to park right behind The Hangar. You can see other acts loading out and in. It was a bit of a cluster to get the cars arranged so everyone could get out and we could stay.
You can see a little modular building there in front of the cars. Those were our green rooms. As I was waiting to park, these strange creatures entered the building. We are near the kids zone here.
Once I parked I hung out backstage and listened to the last two bands on the day bill. The 80's band, Like Totally Fer Sure, was fun and the band that followed them, Ray Goren and The Soulfixers, were four kids (seemed like late 20-somethings) who are really, really excellent musicians. I enjoyed their set a lot, cover music but well done with their own spin.
While the band played I walked around to the monitor desk and introduced myself.
Then I walked out front to take a picture of the 80's band and the crowd.
When the last of the day bands were done the Hangar was closed and readied for our show. T-Willie and I have a quiet moment for a selfie.
This is Kevin, the FOH guy, and he seems really happy to be mic'ing drums right now. I liked this guy. He has a dog named "Bass".
Dave makes some tweaks to his kit. He brought out the full Willie kit tonight.
John has his keys all set up. John's been having back issues lately so we all join in and help him schlep his gear. Let this be a warning to all you kids out there.... Don't get old!
Mike and his pretty tobacco 335, I think it's a '68, go over some intros with T-Willie.
Mike brought out his '62 Fender Twin for this gig. The Mesa Boogie is backup.
I don't know what old movie the crew was testing the projector with but I thought it was grand.
Since we had such a fabulous sound system I brought my small rig.
T-Willie gets his monitor mix dialed in. It was just a little inconvenient to sound check with the doors closed. The place sounded like a hangar. But as soon as the doors were open and there were bodies in the place it sounded terrific on stage.
Here's the view from my mic. There's a lot going on at the FOH. I think I'll wander up there and see.
There were crews cleaning the floor, lining up the chairs, and generally getting the place spic-n-span like they were expecting something special to happen. This screen by the FOH let us know the schedule in the venue for today.
This is more than FOH, it's full-on control room.
Here's the view from the FOH mixer.
Next to the mixer was a vast array of lighting and video gear.
It was impressive to see how it all came together. The whole crew was very professional, knew their gear, and knew how to use it well. Here's another shot of the stage from the back of the house with the lights up.
The sound system was HUGE and could have easily filled an arena of 10,000. After our sound check we retired to our green rooms. There were two of them.
Inside was cool, as in air conditioned, and had most of the comforts of home.
We were treated to a nice selection of deli meats and salad plus a fridge full of sodas and water.
After a bit of supper we still had more than an hour before showtime so I wandered out front to see what I could see.
The Hangar doors are open but you had to have a ticket to go inside and sit down.
I caught T-Willie on the big screen.
Here he is backstage warming up his nose.
Mrs. BassCliff came to the gig with me.
Here are all the lads just before we enter the building.
We still have a few minutes so our photographer, Dave, gets some close-ups of T-Willie.
I stick my phone out from behind the curtain to see the room starting to fill up.
Then it's on with the show!
It looks like about 70% of the seats are eventually filled. There were twice as many people outside watching the show while standing. Everyone had a great time. Mrs. BassCliff said the crowd was really enjoying the show.
I snapped a picture of John while he played the intro to the ivory-scorching instrumental "Mama Screw Your Wig On Tight".
I didn't take a lot of pictures on stage during the show, I had to be discreet, because I didn't want to seem like a tourist. After the show the fans lined up to take pictures with T-Willie.
This is the drummer's wife, Ruth, manning the merch table. It's only CDs and she sold almost twenty.
Since nobody wanted to take my picture I just packed up my gear and rolled it off the stage.
There were just a few notes during the show that I would like to have back. And on a whim we tried "Bobby McGee" without ever rehearsing it before. Willie does it a little differently than any of the females I've ever performed it with. At one point I went West when Willie went East and the whole thing almost went South but we eventually got back on the tracks. Nobody seemed to notice. (We fooled'em again!)
It was a really fun gig. I felt like a part-time small town rock star. Don't worry, I won't quit my day job. Thanks for looking! Please continue to share your gigs. I love it.
Thank you for your indulgence,
BassCliff
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