Hi! Remember me? It seems like it's been fourteen hundred and forty minutes since I've posted a gig to this blog.
This past Sunday Arnie Newman's Country Club Band and I played a summer evening concert at Heritage Park in lovely La Verne CA. I was third to arrive, after Jason and Johnny, and found the little access road behind the park with the shortest carry to the stage. It was warm and sunny but the row of tall trees on the west side of the park would put us in shade before downbeat.
The sound company had lots of nice gear, kind of overkill for this smaller park, double subs and sticks on both sides out front. We made a lot of noise.
John is looking cool, calm, and collected behind his castle of keyboards. The sound crew helpers were kind enough to tote all of John's gear (so I didn't have to).
I unloaded and parked right where they told me too, next to this historic Sloan Barn by the historic Weber house. This is a local historic spot with tours and stuff. I ended up having to move my truck anyway. Turns out the hot dog vendor needed the space. Oh well. I guess that's what happens when the bass player follows direction.
It's a lovely park, lots of mature trees, a gazebo, some BBQ pits, etc.
And a playground for the little ones.
In the blue shirt is Steve, our sound crew leader and FOH guy. He was very friendly and flexible.
The two young fellows helping out are Dan and Matt, also very eager to assist. It wasn't until Paul pulled up that I realized that he was on the gig to play steel, fiddle, and mandolin.
The stage plot that Arnie sent to Steve did show a steel player but it also showed my bass rig on the drummer's right side. Well, OK. I followed instructions. Guess what. When Arnie got there he asked me to move back to the hi-hat side. It figures.
The event was broadcast (narrowcast?) in the local cable access channel. The production company is supposed to send us a link so we can download the video. Unfortunately it was not one of our more impressive performances. Maybe we can fix it in the mix.
Here's Steve at the helm.
Here's the view from the sound tree. The park is starting to fill in.
Here we are at sound check. The young fellow you see is David. He's from a local "Rock Starts Of Tomorrow" music school. He sat in and played/sang a couple of tunes with us, "You Really Got Me" (Kinks) and "Sweet Emotion" (Aerosmith). He did great.
We're finishing up sound check and the crowd is still arriving.
We tried to keep the show nice and tight but I had a second to take a picture of Amanda during the intro to "Man, I Feel Like A Woman". She looked very cute in her "Feeling Haggard" tank top.
Right after we started the third song of the set all the stage power went out. We still had power to the PA but none on stage. To fill the dead air while the sound crew scrambled Arnie asked me to tell a couple of jokes. I started into my standard repertoire of Dad Jokes and was getting great laughs out of the crowd. It turns out that someone, vendor or camera crew, had plugged something into the stage power and drew too much current and popped a breaker. We were down only about ten minutes and then we finished our first set.
Earlier Arnie had texted me to ask me to print up the set lists because his printer is down. He emailed the sets and I followed directions. Once we got there he decided that this crowd didn't want to hear what was on the set list so he decided to change the first set on the fly and totally rewrite the second set. Guess who had a big Sharpie for him to write with.
The park had filled up nicely. Here's Jason's view from behind the kit just before we start the second set.
We performed another thrilling action-packed set of country music and said our goodnights. After helping Johnny tear down and load out, I was the last one to leave the park besides the sound crew.
The hot dog vendor was blocking the driveway so I had to pull around the back of the barn to get out. On the property there are some cool old vehicles that could use some restoration.
After arriving home and unloading, I enjoyed a couple more of those Stone Imperial Russian Stout brews. I've still got a couple left. Maybe I'll save them for the weekend. I'm leaving for Gilley's in Vegas on Wednesday after work, along with a couple million of my closest friends. It should be a pretty rowdy weekend in the honky tonk. Thanks for looking. I'll see you in Vegas, baby!
Thank you for your indulgence,
BassCliff
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