Here is the stage being set up for the holidays at Mardi Gras Casino. I’ve been undecided about stage and light shows since I first saw them. A set of spotlights on a dim stage, fine, but not when the crowd is distracted from the music. I find most to be uninspired relays using standardized components. Secretly, I suspect light shows were invented to give roadies something to do besides toke up. Am I wrong?
Over the years I’ve told you how traveling causes dreams. My jaunt to Miami y’day had the same effect. (I place little relevance in dreams, but the cause and effect amazes me.) Over last evening I dreamt I was on a crowded bus returning from an event; there was a sports coach on board named “Stellar”. He was every pound the annoying jock with booming voice and an infantile concept of motivation. (The Lombardi Effect: Let’s us just do what he says or he’ll never shut the hell up.)Memory can be a chancy thing. I took the early morning off to read. The weather and days are perfect again. I read a short passage named “Jane”, by an author I had previously criticized. W. Somerset Maugham. Remembering I’d written about his work on the computer, I quickly zeroed in on September 2004. I was surprised to find over so much time that I had virtually repeated a blog session.
The memory thing. If I ever get this entire blog published, there are bound to be many instances of recurrence, which you should read them before labeling them repetition. (Even then, less repetition than average, and far less than to be expected in a work of this size which concerns real life.)
What’s the “W” stand for, anyway, Maugham? Wilburt? Wilheim? Could be there was a Long Name Contest and Tennyson was in the lead. Willie? Wombat?
“Jane” is a tale of a rich widow who marries a man 27 years younger. It is assumed he is a clever trickster, but his influence turns her into a socialite. Through the eyes of the widow’s acquaintances this is scandalous. She even quits wearing petticoats, the trollop. In the end, Jane dumps the young man to marry an Admiral her own age, who we are told is very persuasive. “His flagship has eight 12-inch guns and he’ll discuss the matter at short range” (yeah, yeah, Admiral Stellar, miles ahead of you on that one). All I’m saying is I’m aware some authors go through phases yet it was hard to believe the same guy wrote “Of Human Bondage”.
So what do I mean “some authors”? Don’t all authors evolve? Nope, consider the other extreme, the hack writers that churn out the same leftovers for years. As a professional courtesy, I refuse to mention Stephen King, Joseph Conrad, or Dean Koontz. Or Ernest Hemingway, who wrote like he was born in 1898, like he learned to write at a boarding school, and like he spent far too much time living with stray cats down in the Keys. If you get my drift.
Dunkin Donuts is open, and an instant hit. Packed to the newly-painted rafters. They have a small patio, more like a balcony. It is a natural community focal point, where I managed to win a crib game by seven points, something else I won’t say nothing about. If, as I hinted, the donut shop owner bought up the premises due to success, he is inviting competition. For now, he is the only bright spot in Tin-Sell town.
Later, I fell for my favorite and oldest Florida runaround. I’ll tell you the situation, you figure out who was behind it. I get a call just after noon for a performance from 4:00 till 8:00 PM; there will be a “lady singer” present. The only lady singer in existence who has never heard of Faith Hill, Tracy Chapman or the existence of country music. Or so she says. I waited until after 5:00 to show up, knowing there was a 50/50 chance that band would be taking a break no matter when I arrived. (They were.)
The place was vacant, ready to close up. I salvaged the situation by waving in some passersby so the bar would stay open. But the guitarist screwed up by playing that droning “Mary Jane” song that should be banned in Broward County. Proving again how he can squelch the mood with his drug music, this being about the 30th instance of it that I’m aware of. Yet I understand why he can never hang it up and let a pro manager like me lead the band. His ego won’t let him see that I can pay my rent off gigs he can’t even break $10 at. It’s because I know what the crowd wants and he does not. He has never successfully worked a room for an entire gig in the ten years I’ve known him. The best he’s ever managed is a good set, then he kills it in the next instant with that pot-head malarkey.
With that “Mary Jane,” of course, those on the Broadwalk assumed there was a funeral going on and walked away. So did the ones I’d waved over. I’m used to people begging me to continue, not gulping one beer and leaving. I could easily have packed that place, furthermore, I’ll be watching closely for my chance to do exactly that in the upcoming 90 days. I’ve recently played with bands that did $800+ gigs in that same location, so we know who to blame.
Nor was there any lack opportunity for there were droves and droves of people walking by; the total problem was choice of music. As usual, we started off okay, with “Party Till The Money Runs Out.” Then it heads downhill, with “Honky Tonk Woman”, which we never rehearsed. By the unrehearsed next song, the customers had left. (The guitarist wants “no improvising” as if that is not what we had just done. (He means only he is allowed to improvise because he is so filthy damn good at it, when are you going to face it? But that is almost naming the guy.))
I have never quit over a small crowd. I’ve often played a full four-hour show to three patrons. Quitting is unprofessional and the band tonight quit, not I. I was ready to continue when the guitarist yanked the power plug. (I will soon have a computerized system of unbelievable capability to prevent that. And it is carried on my belt loop.)
Also present was that weirdo sax player, the one who plays behind the notes and can’t understand a thing anybody says unless it is repeated. He seems nice, but I’d throw him out the door before the second time he pulled that know-nothing act on me. Still, he does show up consistently and while he can’t play the same instrumental break twice, he at least precludes the guitarist from doing the same.
There’s another loser sequence to this, called “stage position”. If you expect four people to show up, you arrange the equipment on stage differently than you would for two. Not tonight’s hero. He had positioned for himself and the lady singer (do the words “obvious”, “poink” and “impending rejection” come to mind?). So the rest of us get squeezed stage left behind the fake palms, like we didn’t notice. Ask yourself, what is the mentality of the guitarist who pulls stunts like that, even subconsciously? See, I said all this without mentioning any names.
What a swell guy I am. “Give me my own way in everything and a more pleasant chap will never be found.” The Internet is so screwed up I could not locate the author of that sentence.
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