Okay, no more messing around. When I say [I want] scrambled eggs for breakfast, I mean business. Look out Paul Bunyan. Don’t just stand there, start making toast. This was a tour of the fishing supply shop. On a mission to find some camp fuel to test our hurricane preparedness, I chanced upon this aisle of serious kitchen gear. You ain’t lived until you’ve tried my T-Rex omelet.
The music lesson* is getting to the point where I just cannot teach them more than I know myself. I was able to spark some interest in few lead riffs that I know. I recall one of the first bands I started in my early teens had a guy who picked up lead playing in a few weeks. Tim Campbell, that was his name. Still plays today, and if he can do it, go figure.The point is, guitaring cannot be complicated, and already I know it is really a series of little patterns and clichés. Nothing verifies that faster than listening to the average Blues guitarist around here. And trust me, they are all average. I was off work early enough to poke around downtown and found the Hippie playing across the street. I returned later, after Bingo, and found the usual situation.
That means six or seven musicians, each soloing and faking music they had clearly never rehearsed as a group, and dragging each song out to nearly ten minutes. There is a time and place for all that, but it is not downtown Hollywood, Florida. Except for one table who kept requesting country music, the cacophony was driving people away. The active audience consisted of one kid dancing on the pavements. I stuck around for a half-hour, but it was so bad (and loud and out of tune) I just walked away.
Now don’t get me wrong, the Hippie is in his glory having large groups of musicians showing up whenever he gets a new location. It is just that I have never seen that kind of arrangement result in a stable, working band, and neither has he. The big band era is long gone, never to return in our lifetimes. But if it ever does return, it will not be any combination of musicians such as I saw tonight. They were having fun at least; I hope the cafe takes that into consideration when they are fired.
Wait, there is more. It was still early, so I dropped in to see the Karaoke show at Capt. J’s. That is Rhonda, the lady who took over Ron’s old circuit when he passed away. There are two things to bear in mind. One, I helped her get her equipment working when she first started out and in return, she stole my two best gigs last year. I understand why she did that, and I jammed with the Hippie on New Year’s Eve. Two, I have watched her crowd shrink to peanuts. She flew well initially because she had Ron’s following but her audiences have dwindled to five or six regulars and they all sing the same material, following her around.
I’m not ready yet, but I know I can put on a better show. She has picked up that I’m a popular entertainer, the whooping and hollering when I walk in the door is a giveaway. [Since it really happens, it is not bragging.] I can see the manager paying close attention to my style and the mass reaction. Tonight somebody actually requested a song to be performed by me. Very few will spot the extreme significance of that little fact. It just does not happen. Somebody asking me to sing, that is.
While I’m in this mood, let me say something about a certain bass playing style I don’t even know what it is called. (I suggest "fag style".) That stereotyped manner where the wrist is draped over the body and the fingers pluck the strings upwards. First of all, every one of you guys sound exactly alike, and second of all, that style was only original when the first guy did it. You are so absorbed copying somebody else’s technique that the music that comes out sounds like what’s left over.
There, now I can breathe easier.
[Author's note 2015-11-14: this must refer to lessons I give on guitar strumming. It is modeled on the old Chet Atkins "Play Guitar in 7 Days", and if you do what he says, that is really true. I may not play guitar, but I know precisely how it is supposed t be done. And learning just the guitar part off a recording is not the best way to go about it. So I must have been holding a guitar class at the time this was written.]
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