Hey there! Long time, no talk! Before we begin, let me just say that I am lame! There, I said it. I've actually gotten totally off track, with the blog posts. It was nothing intentional. Life has just been busy and my ADD brain hasn't been able to keep up. The band has been staying busy, behind the scenes, with lots of rehearsals.
Honestly, I can't remember if I mentioned it or not (man! I'm lame), but we have a new drummer and a new bass player. Our new drummer is John "Hotch" Hotchkiss. He hails from the U.K. and has lived in the U.S. for the last 10 years. John has that great British accent that just screams rocker! John is an awesome drummer and really brings a unique vibe to our sound.
Next up is Jim McKinney, who is our new bass player. Jim not only plays bass but also plays saxophone. I would definitely like to explore that option in the future. Jim is a great bass player, who has really added to our sound. I'm really looking forward to working with him more and seeing what he brings to the table.
Trey Pope is still manning the keys for us and I am really thankful for that. For those of you that have seen us live with Trey, then you know what he brings to the table, and if you haven't, then come see what all the fuss is about. Trey is an amazing pianist.
As I said earlier, the band has been busy. Mainly rehearsals, to get Jim and John up to speed. This is no knock on their musicianship though. It just takes time to learn 30 something odd songs, especially with half of them being originals. They've both done an outstanding job however, and I fell like our line up is as strong as its ever been. We just finished up another great rehearsal tonight.
I meant to get a blog post up last week, but again, time got the best of me. I decided not to let that happen again this week, so here I am typing, into the night.
We kicked off our spring show schedule, with the new group, last weekend at Earth Day Texoma in Sherman, Texas. This was interesting show to say the least. As far as the band goes, I thought we sounded fine, especially for our first gig together. It was a very low key/low stress environment, which was exactly what we needed. Now, for the interesting part. This was obviously an Earth Day festival. They were having workshops and all sorts of "earth day" things going on.
Jan, the lady that booked us, was really nice and seemed to really like our music, but volume seemed to become a quickly evolving issue. I noticed that the group before us was acoustic based. We were on a big outdoor stage with full PA, but we were the only full electric band that they had booked to my knowledge. A little ways into our set, Roy and I were setting up the next song with some stage banter. I'm pretty sure the song was either "Carry Me Home" or "Island Holiday" because I announced over my mic, "Ok, let's go to the beach!" About that time, I see Jan running up to the front of the stage. She motioned me to Roy and I and said, "that's great, but can we bring the beach down?" She went on to explain that they were trying to have some kind of Earth Day presentation, all the way across the other end of the festival and that we were drowning out the presentation. She also advised that one of the acoustic groups, that were playing inside one of the buildings was also being drowned out by us. I tried to explain to her that we have no say over the volume as it's being controlled by the sound engineer. She advised that she had already talked to him and he advised that he had the PA just about as low as it would go, without turning it off. I told her we would try and turn down the amps a little. They had asked us to try and keep the volume down, before we even started. With that said, I set my amps volume at about 2.5. Keep in mind, this is not a 100 watt Marshall stack. It's a 22 watt Deluxe Reverb. When we practice at John's, I'm louder then that! The sound guy was micing everything anyway, so I wasn't worried about having my amp cranked.
So, she asked if we could turn down a little and apologized for having to ask us to do that. I obliged and turned down to 2. I could barely hear myself at this point. Keep in mind that this was a big outdoor stage.
Later on in the set, Jan had to make some festival announcements, which were handled on the main stage where we were playing. All of the other acts had a 45 minute set, but she gave us a 90 minute slot. We were quote/unquote the headliner, so to speak. They had announcements scheduled for every 45 minutes or so. The announcements were designed to take place in between the bands sets. Since ours was 90 minutes, Jan needed to make an announcement in the middle of our set. When she came up, she told us off mic, "Boy, I'm gonna be in trouble after this." The good thing though, was that she was laughing about it. We had a good crowd listening to us. They all seemed to really be enjoying the music. Hey, we weren't driving people away! I just think that the Earth Day booths and presenters were a little aggravated that we had kind of commandeered the festival for awhile. Jan went on to explain that she wants us back, but that she wants us back for their concert series, that they put on in the park. All in all, we made it through the set, Jan was happy, and that's all I was concerned with. You can also read Roy's blog on the show over here www.royholliday.com/category/blog He details every Sand Dollar Rodeo show here.
The only other time I can ever remember having that many discussions about volume was way back in high school. My buddies Robby and Sol, of the current band KYSER, probably remember this too. We were playing a dance for Robby's school and the chaperon moms were not too impressed with our style of rock. Another buddy of ours, Eric Sanchez, was running our sound and taping the performance. I'll never forget it, as one of the moms came over to Eric and said, "Turn it down!" You can hear it plain as day on the tape. Eric questioned back, "Turn it down?" She said, "Yes! Yall are so loud we can't even hear ourselves talk." We've all laughed and talked about that incident a lot over the years. Sol even took it upon himself to draw a comic strip of the event. Let's just say it was not a very family friendly comic strip.
In all seriousness though, I want to thank Jan and the city of Sherman for having us out. We are looking forward to coming back for a night show.
We will be keeping the party moving along this week, as its time for Mayfest! We won't be worrying about any volume issues here as they pretty much crank you up and let you rip! We will be playing on the Riverbank Stage on Saturday, May 2 from 12:30-1:30pm. Their are plenty of activities, rides, food and drinks for both the kids and adults. Hey, its a fest. What else would you expect, right?
We have some other musician friends that will be performing as well. I would like to give you the dates and times of their sets.
On Friday, May 1st our own John Hotchkiss and Jim McKinney will be playing with the Blue Hat Bans on the Main Stage. Their set is from 4:30-6pm. They play a wide range of popular covers that are sure to get you dancing!
After our set on Saturday, be sure and stay around to check out my aforementioned buddies Robby Kyser and Sol Kanthack. They will be playing with KYSER on the Main Stage from 3:15-4:30pm. KYSER is an original music band. They describe their sound as "simple chord progressions with a ton of texured layers. KYSER has hauntingly melodic lead vocals mixed with rich piano and tight harmonies with throwing in a solid rock rhythm section. Something old and something new." Be sure and check them out, you won't be disappointed!
Moving along to Sunday, our good friends August & J will be performing on the Main Stage from 2:15-3:30pm. Mike Roberts and Jay Patterson, who are also high school friends of mine, are a part of this band. They are also an original band and describe their music as "rock songs with a southern pop sensibility, with influences ranging from Bon Jovi to Train to Wilco. We have played several shows with these guys and they are great. If your at Mayfest on Sunday, do yourself a favor and check these guys out!
For all other information regarding Mayfest, be sure and check out their official website at http://www.mayfest.org Complete event schedules, parking, pricing, etc.. are available on there.
Ok, well that's all I have for now. Next week is Railhead week, so I'll give you the goods on that one next time. Y'all stay safe and I hope to see you out at Mayfest!
