THE CLUB YEARS...
We had a friend in a gigging band who liked our music who had a regular Sunday slot at a club called Boomerz...His band played covers...lot's of covers, from stevie ray to the cure.He offered us the first break slot,30 minutes to play in a club...in front of an audience that was 25% our friends and the rest had never heard anything like us.
I had to buy a new amp for this gig because my current amps were too big for the club...I went to the local guitar shop and ended up with a Laney 30 watt tube amp and in the course of the sale learned the guys here referred to Boomerz as the "Iron Lung" and if you counted all the patrons you might end up with a full set of teeth.I was not encouraged.
The first time we played I would look up to see dumbfounded faces,like they kinda got it but didn't quite relate to songs about rest stop serial killers...it was like if we were on american bandstand and the rate a record kid would say..."It's got a good beat and you can dance to it, but the lyrics leave me disturbed and confused...".High praise.
We would decide on set list and practice incessantly initially,but as we got it down we relaxed a bit...partially due to our comfort level with the songs in the set.And because it was starting to be more job than fun.
The next time we showed up early and got to mill around for awhile before we played.There were 2 couples, not from around here,who engaged me in conversation about tattoos...mine and thiers.These guys were straight out of county lock up in louisiana...missing teeth and jail house tattoo's,each was equipped with a mildly obese girlfriend in way too tight ,sportin' a yo-yo denim cut-offs and shirts way too small creating a michelin man effect they were oblivious to.
A word about the "stage"...It was so small that we couldn't all fit and I was front and center on the dancefloor...in the mix.We were playing a blues number with lots of lead guitar fills (my guitar).I almost always look down when I'm not singing,but especially during lead fills,which on this song are long.
So I finish one and look up to start the next verse and not 2 feet in front of me are the trailer girls...bumping and grinding away to the song, I temporarily lost it,turned around and looked at LT (the other guitarist),who was also cracking up...we gave the signal and wound up the song before we imploded on each other.Half the regulars decide they like us,the other half still has that look from our first time out.We don't know it yet, but Boomerz management wasn't impressed.
Next: Double Vision.