Hickoids (and a bit o' Harvey McLaughlin Trio) 2019Tour Begins

So, off we go. Friday, August 2nd. First stop: Home Sweet Home in Manhattan, home base to my old friend Jonathan Toubin's New York Night Train dance parties.

So, the set up was this: Jeff and Patrick flew to BWI airport and went to Max Jeffers' place in Annapolis to pick up his van, along with some equipment for our dates (drums, amps, etc.). Cody had already gone up on Tuesday to hang with his girlfriend in NYC. That left Rice, Tom, and yours truly bringing up the rear, flying into La Guardia and on to the gig. Of course, as air travel is unpredictable, our connecting flight in Dallas departed late, about 45 minutes.

Still, we made it to La Guardia only about 35 minutes late, but that still meant we had to hurry to get to the gig. The music needed to be done by 11, and we were getting into the airport about 8:15. So , the only workable solution was to take some sort of Uber/taxi directly to the gig. A gentleman near the airport exit doors asked if we needed transpo, and I immediately said "yes," figuring it would be overpriced. I didn't care - let's get there. And we did. He hustled us over there quickly. I won't write here what the price was, but we got there just in time.

Luckily, our borrowed van was parked in front of the club, so our luggage could be stowed quickly. The opening band, Teenage Cave Girl, had just finished. The drummer playing with Animal Show (a two-piece this night for some reason) was struggling with setting up our borrowed kit (from Bob of Western Star), and I knew nothing of it, either. But we got the kit set up after a bit, and the makeshift Animal Show played about 30 minutes.

As we were getting set up. Rice discovered the bass rig didn't work, so he had to be patched into the soundboard directly and sharing a channel with Patrick. We couldn't hear him, he couldn't hear himself, and yet, audience members seemed to hear him fine, from what I heard later.

We didn't start until 11, but we were allowed to go 'till midnight. Crowd response was fantastic, and I thought the gig was a good start, although Rice obviously didn't think so. It was fun being able to play in front of my old friend.

Immediately after we finished, the dance party began, and people crowded every bit of the room, including the stage, making strike and load out a challenge, to say the least. Hard to complain, when everybody's dancing and in a fun mood. A couple of our folks weren't in the best frame of mind, but we got it all in the van. And then it was off to Atlantic City.

Uh, let's see....how do I put this? We were staying in the Harrah's casino in what were admittedly very nice rooms. But the clientele there is something almost unbelieveable. Take your average Jerry Springer Show guest and factorialize that by ten. Seriously. Dudes strutting around, bumping into you without a care (and almost knocking you over)....women stuffed into revealing dresses at least three sizes too small....and at 4 am, which is usually when we'd return from a gig, swarms of them. My jaw was probably open during every long walk to the hotel room. Wow. Many of these specimens probably voted, too. Jesus. I'll pick up with tomorrow's activities in the next post.

Drumming, the Great Eye Collagen Experiment, Upcoming Travels, and Apollo 11

Hello! Feeling especially good today.....yesterday's gig was rather special. I'll have to elaborate.

Recently, Rice and I began backing up Patrick Pena, otherwise known as Harvey McLaughlin, in a trio designed for him to open shows on the upcoming Hickoids European tour. What I at first thought might be a bit of a chore has turned into anything but. I'm having a blast with this, and I suspect Rice is, too. The songs are simple enough to not be too difficult to remember, and since Patrick is playing piano (and singing), the space opened up without a guitar is being duly filled by Rice and myself. What this means is any fill or nuance I throw into a song isn't drowned out by constant barrage of guitar. I've never played in a piano trio before, and this is an incredible revelation.

I suppose a big part of being in any sort of artistry is knowing that what you're creating is actually reaching someone, whether they like it or not. And maybe, just maybe, I hadn't thought much about this before. The Hickoids, as much as I like it, has two (or even occasionally three) guitars blaring away, making any sort of subtlety impossible. You might laugh that I'm using the word "subtlety" in the same sentence as the word "Hickoids." But this stuff is important. It's what separates the great bands from the merely good ones. It does make me wish the Hickoids would rehearse and play with some of this in mind. Many times, I've thought "if I were a guitar player, I wouldn't play constantly." Larger professional bands that I've seen play (or at least video of) take this into account. One of my faves when I was younger was The Tubes, and at their peak, they had two guitars, two keyboards, and two drummers. If you watch video of them from this period (roughly '77-'80), the guitars and keyboards are not all playing all the time. And the drummers (Mingo Lewis playing percussion mostly) worked in a complementary way as well. The Hickoids probably will never work on this, largely due to its current membership.

But back to this trio. We played three shows during our Memorial Day run recently, but those were all shaky affairs, largely due to Rice and myself not knowing the material through and through yet. And, even after yesterday, I can say we're not 100% there yet, but we're oh so close. And yesterday's gig was one of the most fun I've played in my life. It just felt like complete connectivity between the three of us, which inspired me to push some things even further....percussion, off-time accents, etc....and we hadn't even rehearsed since before I had my eye procedure (oh yeah, gotta write about that). I ran through the set several times during the week at home, so I was reasonably fresh for the show; I think Rice did the same. We're playing later today at an Austin Music Rooms party, a show I don't expect much from except to stretch our muscles a bit, but I'm still looking forward to it. I feel refreshed as a drummer.

So, yes, the eye procedure. The Corneal Collagen Crosslinking, Epi-on variety. The procedure itself was rather easy to get through, although there was indeed pain that night. The tech's suggestion that I sleep as much as possible that day was heeded, and that helped tremendously. By the next morning, most of the pain was gone, and a lot of healing had already taken place. I had the bandage contact lenses taken off five days later, and now we play the waiting game. So far, I don't notice a huge change in my vision. It might be slightly sharper, but time will be the final arbiter of this. According to others, I'll know more in a few months. At least, with the promise of future cataract removal, I know this won't have been for naught.

And so we leave for NYC in a couple of weeks (a bit less, really). Two Hickoids are leaving earlier for Baltimore, in order to grab our friends' Western Star's van and equipment. Cody is going up earlier, too, leaving Rice, Tom, and I to fly up together. We'll then be picked up by the folks with the van. My old friend Jonathan has set up a couple of shows in Manhattan and Brooklyn, and we're playing Baltimore and DC as well. The I-95 tour. After a few days, we fly to Madrid to begin that adventure. Michelle is flying to Madrid as well and should reach Madrid an hour before we do. We'll have to figure out transpo from there. Which will occupy much of my time the next week or so. I'm glad Michelle's coming over. She has September and October trips planned for Turkey and Egypt (third time!), so my time with her will be little over the next few months. Waaaah!! I'm very happy she's getting to travel to places she's wanted to visit, though. And who knows what the political future will hold? Gotta travel while you can.

And, lastly for today, Apollo 11. As you're no doubt aware, the 50th anniversary of the initial moon landing and walk is upon us. A couple of weeks ago, I saw the documentary "Apollo 11," and was surprised by how moving I found it. I watched it again on the anniversary last night. The space program of the late sixties has a special place in my heart and always will. When I was a kid, these guys were my rock stars. My pre-teen walls were covered with astronauts' pictures, large photos of Earth to Moon trajectory patterns, and depictions of all the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo missions (up to that time, I suppose). When the moon landing and walk happened on July 20, 1969, we were visiting my mom's friend Joan and her husband Willis (who later introduced me to golf, ha!). I still remember his words to me when Armstrong took the first step onto the moon's surface. "I just want you to remember this, Lance, when down the road, and I'm not around anymore, who you watched this first step on the moon with." Willis was a good man. He passed away in 1980. My reaction to watching the sheer brilliance of "Apollo 11" surprised me. And made me happy. What a different time.

Until later!