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More Failed Economy Show Thoughts...

So instead of applying for another job, I’m writing another issue of the blog. Is that because I’m worried I might actually get offered the job? And if so, is that a good reason to procrastinate? I could really use a job. It really stung to have Sallie Mae, the Federal student-loan agency, tell me they had no jobs for me—at the same time they’re hiring 2,000 people to man their call center. Figured out how to play Zmulls’ “The Emperor”: the verses are the same chord progression I used in
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The Failed Economy Setlist Grows...

The Failed Economy Show setlist is up to 20 songs, after Sunday’s practice. Of the Woody Guthrie songs, WORRIED MAN BLUES is a keeper; so is I AIN’T GOT NO HOME IN THIS WORLD ANY MORE, and the two newfound ones, DANCE A LITTLE LONGER (got to clean up some of the lyrics, though—I know why this one never got played on the radio) and AGINST THE LAW. I assume nobody has a problem with GOIN’ DOWN THE ROAD FEELIN’ BAD—The Grateful Dead made that one famous, and I’d be surprised if everyone didn’
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Band Practices...

Practice Saturday with the Portland band and Sunday with the Coast band (we have got to get them some names). Coast band now has a drummer, a versatile one--Chris Miller, who also lives in Garibaldi. (The idea that we can assemble a whole band of good musicians living in a single town of 900 people is mind-boggling. Shades of the Dodson Drifters…) On SUNDAY, John, Chris and I worked on the following, which are all definitely inclusions in the Failed Economy Show setlist: 50 Ways t
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Failed Econnomy Updates...

And we occasionally do the unnecessary… Musicated a Betty Holt song, “Our Own Stimulus Plan, “ a good uptempo, between-the-sheets tune; she’d contacted me earlier about using the song in the Failed Economy Show, but said she may actually have someone else doing music for it. It got music anyway because I had to get it out of my head. (Indicates it’s a good song.) I can go back to doing necessary things now. Stan Good’s “WD-40 the Economy” has a revised soundtrack, with the changes Stan
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Producing The Failed Economy Record...

Well, the plumbing emergency is over. (Most folks probably weren’t aware there was one.) What it took to fix it is a deterrmined application of the proper tool in the right place—and persistence. Winston Churchill’s answer to how to win World War II: “Never, never, never, NEVER give up.” Not bad rules to apply to everything, really. FAILED ECONOMY SHOW has gotten some nice submissions, and more keep coming in. I’ve made copies of an hour’s worth for the band; we’ll pick through those,
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Red Room Number Two...

RED ROOM #2 will be THURSDAY, 30 APRIL, 9 P.M. Poster’s done. First practice will be Saturday, 28 April (St. leif’s Eve, by the way). Sharma’s setting up times (I’m flexible, being unemployed and all). Setlist will be: Bluebird on My Windshield (fast trucker rhythm) Hey, Little Chicken (country blues) Naked Space Hamsters in love (fast bluegrass) Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues (slow & sleazy) Dirty Deeds We Done to Sheep (rock ‘n’ roll, Johnny Cash style) 50 Ways to
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More Video Thoughts...

About the time I finish and post one “issue” of the blog, I start another one. I’m not sure whether that means a lot is happening, or I just have too much time on my hands. Probably the latter. Why else would I spend time on Facebook’s “Which Disney Princess Are You?” quiz? (I’m Cinderella, in case you hadn’t guessed.) Some things are going okay. I have two bands I’m playing with, and we have a fan base; the ability to get gigs may be limited mostly by reluctance to ask for them. Ther
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Video Thoughts (mostly)...

I have seen both of the Bay City videos—the one taken by John with his digital camera (it had enough memory for two songs), and the one taken by Dick’s wife Carol (which caught nearly all of the 2-hour show). John’s is not bad visually, but the audio is awful. I assume that’s the result of the camera’s limitations (those built-in mikes are cheap), and that we really didn’t sound that bad. Dick’s has better sound (more expensive camera, better microphone), but It’s still not great; the b
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I'm In Two Bands Now?

A couple of “uppers” (that’s good—helps offset the two job rejection letters I got in the mail). I got hit up on the street by a fan asking when the band were going to do our next concert (I think it will be the Failed Economy Show, and probably the beginning of May). I’ve heard already from a number of folks who didn’t make it to the Bay City concert but say they are determined to come to the next one—and I’ve encouraged them, emphasizing what a good time they missed. The director of
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First Music Video (sort Of)...

Okay, we got a band. They play really good together, they’re interested in playing together, and they’d like to do more gigs. Where do we go from here? We did videotape the Bay City Concert, with two different cameras—I haven’t seen how the tapes came out. The more sophisticated of the cameras is old, but Dick has the equipment to convert its VHS tape to DVD. We should have a couple of promo audio tracks on hand, and the only way to get them may be by recording them. (At John’s,
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Bay City Post-mortem...

The Big Bay City Concert is over. It went really well—without a hitch, in fact—the audience (most of whom I knew) loved us, and there were a few of the Arts Center’s Board on hand, too (so I urged the audience to tell those guys how much we were appreciated). We did some things that worked right. We did four practices in the three weeks before the gig, plus I spent the better part of a day with John the bass player, Wednesday nights with lead guitarist Jeff at the Ghost Hole, and Friday n
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The Band Is Good...

The band is really good. I think the folks who come to the Arts Center are going to get a heck of a show for their five bucks. I hope we pack the place. I want people telling the Arts Center they want us back, and people from other places wanting to hire us to play in their communities or for their events. I have made sure some key people (like the manager of the Recreation District) knew about it, and got invited to attend; I don’t know if they will—I have endured a lot of times when things
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Updates--4 Days Till Bay City...

The Red Room wants the Portland Band back. (I’m not surprised—we were good.) They’ve offered a choice of dates, but two of the band haven’t decided whether they want to do it again. I’ve encouraged Sharma the bass player to talk to them, and the Red Room, about the details; I’m in, if they can work something out. I think I have the go-ahead from the Coast Band to go get more gigs. They’re committed to playing the gig at the Garibaldi Museum in June, and the Failed Economy Concert as well
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And 50 (sorta) Ways To Cure The Depression...

The “Failed Economy Concert” is going to fly, I think. Bass player’s in, and I think the rest of the band will follow. Our postmistress (who is president of the local Lions Club) is excited about the idea, and offered the Lions’ sponsorship; we can do the concert on the Dance Floor at Garibaldi City Hall—second-biggest meeting space in the county (it’ll hold 500 people if they’re friendly), and the Lions will pay the City the rent for the building. Haven’t talked dates yet. I’ve told eve
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And Now, The Economy (sort Of)...

One of the interesting facets of the Failed Economy is people have become more comfortable talking about their personal financial problems. That’s particularly evident here on the Coast, where folks have historically been very private about their personal lives. But it seems that personal financial troubles have passed from the realm of private embarrassments to that of shared experience. Rather like a freak snowstorm—everybody’s been hit by it (and everybody knows everybody’s been hit by it)
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Ten Days Till Bay City...

Bay City Arts Center says they won’t have their new sound board in time for the March 7 concert. I’m not sure (yet) how big a problem that is; they do (or did) have a soundboard, a 4-channel one, and I’m not sure why they were replacing it, and I have to find out. (They’re also fixing the building’s furnace, and I don’t know if that will be done in time for the concert.) In the meantime, the band (bless ‘em) do have some resources that we can put together. I have an ancient Sony 6-chan
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The Bay City Setlist...

Setlist for the Bay City concert looks like this: Dead Things in the Shower (mod. fast country) Armadillo on the Interstate (slow & sleazy) Bluebird on My Windshield (fast bluegrass) The Frog Next Door (deliberate blues) The Termite Song (fast bluegrass) Tillamook Railroad Blues (deliberate blues) Prehistoric Roadkill (fast bluegrass) Welcome to Hebo Waltz (fast waltz) Free-Range Person (fast bluegrass) Milepost 43 (mod. fast country) Dead Fishes (fast bluegrass) B
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Practice With Band No. 2...

Practice with Band No. 2 (we have got to get them some names) went real well. Jeff (lead), John (bass) and Dick (harmonica) work really well together. It helped, I think, that I’d given all of them CDs with the songs (helped, too, that Jeff and I have played a lot of these in our Wednesday nights at the tavern). They’re excited, and so am I. I’m comfortable advertising the concert, now that I’m sure we’re going to be good. We’ll have time for a couple more practices before the Big Concert.
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Red Room Post-mortem...

Well, I broke a string. It was partway through the last song, so I just played without it. Some folks said afterwards the guitar sounded a little distorted, and the broken string was part of that—other contributing factors were my using my old D’Armand pickup (which gives the acoustic guitar a very electric sound) and playing through a little amp instead of the Red Room’s sound system. All fixable. It did go well. We had a big crowd—virtually every seat in the place filled—and since mo
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Pre-gig Promotional Thoughts...

UPDATES: There are a few people who appear determined to reimburse me for the “Broken Record” CD, and since I have no job and no money, I guess I will not stand in their way. I have one extra copy of the CD, and I’ve sent it to Brian, head of the Just Plain Folks organization, suggesting that he auction it off as a fund-raiser. Poster’s done for the Bay City gig, and it’s getting its first little distribution; the Arts Center has it, and so does the Tillamook Library (and I’ve gotten the
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An Idea--custom Cds?

Here’s an idea. (Not mine. I collect ideas.) Pretend you’re a consumer. (A lot of us used to be consumers, back when we had jobs and money.) You’ve got some extra bucks, and you’re going to buy A RECORD. Not Top 40 stuff, of course—that stuff is mostly tasteless pap these days, and overpriced to boot. You’ve got your eye (or ear) on an independent person—not in thrall to the big record companies, in other words—that you think writes pretty good stuff. Thing is, you really only wa
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Five More Days...

Five more days… The Portland Band is as ready as they’re going to be. There are a couple of songs that could use more work, but we’re out of time. This coming Friday is the Big Gig. I only got posters up in a couple of high-traffic music businesses in Portland (one selling records, the other instruments), but all of us in the band have friends and relatives coming, so maybe it’ll be okay crowd-wise. I may have the Local Band together. Dick Ackerman is willing to be the harmonica player
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And Yet Another Paying Gig?

YET ANOTHER PAYING GIG… The managers of the Garibaldi Museum called from Virginia, asking me to play at the Museum 27 JUNE (it’s a Saturday) 7 P.M. Hour-long set—I told them I’d bring a band if I could. They want promotional photos and bio (which I have), and asked me to send them a contract (I’ll send something simple, basically agreeing to what they said). I sent them a promotional poster, too—they haven’t seen one of my posters yet. It was this second gig that got John (the heavy-met
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Another Paying Gig...

ANOTHER PAYING GIG! This one’s on the Coast, at the Bay City Arts Center, five miles from Garibaldi. SATURDAY, 7 MARCH, 7 P.M. $5 cover charge, split between me (60%) and the Arts Center (40%). They’ll sell refreshments, and I’ll sell CDs. They were excited about the idea, which was really gratifying. (And many thanks to my daughter for making the suggestion.) I would like to be playing with a band for this gig, too. The Arts Center, an antebellum-style Masonic Lodge built in 1927, h
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The Band Is Good...

Okay, the band is good. We can take over the world now. Things clicked at practice when Donny came outside while I was taking a break and announced, “Sharma’s playing the bass—and she’s better than I am!” I suggested, since Donny plays harmonica (among other things) that we try “Armadillo on the Interstate” (which we’d had trouble with) with him playing harmonica and Sharma playing bass—and it was beautiful. We subsequently revised the whole setlist to do it that way. So there’s the
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