Tonight we played Java Mama’s in Resiterstown, MD – normally one of my favourite gigs, but tonight it was a bit rough. A friendly coffeehouse with wonderful humans slinging coffee in a warm, wooden environment – we brought the big speakers, we brought the noise – my favourite kind of venue.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA 
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA The amazingly talented, spectacularly beautiful, in all ways but one wonderful Acacia Sears! In what one way is she not wonderful? Well – LOOK!!! She’s stolen EVERYONE in ilyAIMY EXCEPT ME!!! It makes me hurt deep on the inside. THAT’S MY BAND, WOMAN!!! (at the College Perk open mic in College Park, MD
But tonight it was a hard night. It was actually a pretty full house, and beyond that, filled with people who were theoretically there to see us. Beyond friends and fans that were there for the music, there was a social group meeting at the coffeehouse – who… I don’t know what… were hoping we’d be good background music? I have no idea – they claimed they were here to see us but this group, who made up fully half of our audience for the first part of the night, sat with their backs to us talking among themselves.
And this wasn’t whispery talky talky, this was really loud yell-to-the-person-across-the-room talky talky. I was displeased.
And so we embark on different strategies. First you try just playing a song and seeing what happens. Gaze was the scout, put forth in investigative fashion. It begins unintrusive, ends bangily (no pun intended) but not TOO bangily… and generally is a good “hi how are ya” kind of tune. It introduces both our voices, has not too much screamy-growly, says “check this out, Heather’s hot and she plays a drum” and sort of shows off on guitar without being too flashy….
That was pretty much ignored.
So we had a couple of different directions we could go – Heather tends to err on the side of being quiet and unobtrusive, and I tend to err on the side of getting really fucking loud, and so there’s always a difference of opinion as to what to do next.
However, there’s one strategy that we BOTH tend to agree on – and that’s communication!
And so I try talking to them: what’s your group? Why are you hear? The only thing I’ve overheard so far is “where do you board your dog?” – insert dog piracy joke that I personally found very funny. Unfortunately they didn’t get it. They requested “America”. We replied that we’d just watched “The Last Unicorn” who’s soundtrack was done by America… they thought The Last UniCORN was a CORNY movie.
At this point we’ve decided that our senses of humour are incompatable and return to playing music. Soon, one of their number comes forth to hit on my friend Gwen – which is understandable, cause frankly she’s hot. Of course, she’s probably also close to half this guy’s age and sitting about three feet in front of us – so in order to get to her, he walks in front of Heather, knocking her mic stand out of place, and stands in front of me and the speaker, talking loudly to make himself heard.
Transcendent Third on July 4th in Baker Park in Frederick, MD. Now, I have better photographs where Matthew’s better lit and Michael’s not stuck behind a pole, but you can see ONE twin which is SORT of like seeing BOTH twins and THIS photograph shows one of the stage hands wearing an Optimus Prime helmet… The audience at Baker’s Park on the 4th of July as the skies opened up and poured their worth upon us. A moat soon formed and people backed further and further into the tent as the waters encroached upon us. I’ve got to thank Emily for putting that stage together (and for getting funding for tents!!!). It was a really, really good time had Even So getting rained out of the 4th of July at Baker’s Park in Frederick, MD. The storm held off just long enough for us to have a REALLY good set and sell a lot of CDs. The whole day was a lot of fun, though absolutely exhausting. We had great sound being run by grizzeled long-hairs (which is usually the best sound). A great stage-hand who helped us move our shit (and by move I mean he caught it when we slid our guitars down the muddy hill) and a very fun audience who was just-walking-by-at-the-time but then went OMG and stood/sat transfixed when we slapped them with Hands. There was a collective thought-bubble of “oh, I thought you were going to be… different” and then another collective thought-bubble of “oh, but me-likey!!!” Of course, I may have been imagining it, but I could’ve sworn I saw it…. Of course, one of the best things about playing the 4th of July this year is that we were performing the same event as the Blue Oyster Cult. It was awesome to see them actually perform their song “Don’t Fear the Reaper”, though I wonder what it would be like to be an artist who’s audience really only wants to hear stuff they’d written some 30 years ago… some of the new stuff was really gorgeous though and it was gratifying to see Buck Dharma play guitar god – I have a new appreciation of his skills and the beauty of his compositions on guitar. It was really good to see some classic rock legends who didn’t make too big a deal of themselves – they gave the audience what they wanted, and performed what THEY wanted, and looked like they were having a good time. There were no pyrotechnics or crazy stage shows – it was five guys doing what they Love to do. Of course, wet or not, the audience for the Blue Oyster Cult was a whole lot bigger. I liked catching this one guy in mid-yawn.
And so I go through the rest of the song TRYING to decide what it is that I want to say…
I’m trying to decide whether or not to display my anger, or to simply make a joke out of it… I guess I could ignore it…. but I AM pretty pissed off. And so I start off being scathing and then sort of back off and my statement goes limp. Though I sort of MEANT to say “Hey, the next time you want to hit on one of our fans who’s probably the age of your daughter, could you at least not hit my partner’s mic stand into her face with your hard-on?”
What came out was something more like “the next time you need to walk right in front of the performers, could you please not bump our mic stands”. It came out slightly growly yet , sort of with a smile… I think I probably need to go take a class on aggressive-assholism… but the guy was also pretty big. He retreated to the back of the room for a bit and then left after giving Gwen his number.
And so my brain spent a lot of time over the next couple of songs wondering what other artists would do. I don’t spend a LOT of time thinking about John Mayer, but he’s who sprung to mind… if John Mayer was here, and no-one recognized him, would people automatically shut up, recognizing his talent and commercial viablility? Or would they keep on keepin on with their performer ignorin’. According to an article in the post a couple of months ago that placed an internationally reknown classical violinist in the subways of Washington DC, the audience probably wouldn’t have taken notice for just the music – and so what would John Mayer do? Grin and bear it? Would he engage them in conversation and try to win them over? Would he pull a Seth Horan and get angry at the audience and scold them for talking over him?
I tend to then just keep flailing around on the setlist until I find something that starts drawing people in – and this usually works… eventually. Last night it worked, eventually… of course, eventually that group of people left and the room was full of people who WERE interested. We did well with the night, made good tips, sold CDs… had some really fine moments throughout the night… but for a while there I was really, really lost.
In very few venues that we play is the music set up as the FEATURE. At a bar, alcohol and conversation is the point of the place. The music is there to draw more people in to drink. At a coffeehouse, often it’s the same idea – draw people in to move product. I understand this – very rarely is the MUSIC the business. And frankly, then it’s all about draw and those venues are often even LESS fun. I like the places best where music and art are part of the environment, and they try to move product to their community based on their environment – but that means that it’s a battle for attention.
Adam Day opening for us at the Bowie Old Town Grill in Bowie, MD. It was good to see him perform again after so many years of being away – his voice is still strong and beautiful and his writing still powerful. It was a good night, playing hard with the full band – moments of splendour as Trouble or Illinois is Overflowing wrapped the audience gently and stole them from their own Lives. Moments slightly ruined by that dunk asshole in the back of the room yelling that he thought Heather was hot… sheesh… like anyone DOESN’T know?!? Amy Law joining us at the Bowie Old Town Grill for Illinois is Overflowing. ilyAIMY at the Bowie Old Town Grill in Bowie, MD. I think, that if we can get our sound issues figured out here (I’ve got some thoughts) that this might become our Maryland home… (thank you Mara for pictures!)
In all honesty, sometimes other people were there first, and whether or not your posters have been on the walls for a month, you as the performer are the interruption. Unless you have a sizable portion of the audience on your side, or an owner who steps for and declares “this is a listening room now, please be quiet”, frankly, it’s OUR jobs as performers and sales-persons of our personas to make those people WANT to be interrupted.
It’s not an easy job, but I’d argue we’re better at it than most, and frankly, I think a lot of our peers in the Biz don’t GET that.
Despite the rough beginning, the show really WAS a great time had: our friend David had brought along a bass and said he’d learned the bassline for Drown – and asked if he could play along… he missed a couple of notes but did a really good job. Looking back on the night, I probably should NOT have suggested the use of an auto-wah, but it still sounded really good.
But the most beautiful moment of the night actually happened AFTER the night was over.
It was a long night and the car was parked down the hill, and so after all the noise and the highs and the lows I pushed out into the sultry air and walked towards my trusty steed… and amongst fire flies and the smell of coffee and sparklers, I could hear strains of our music – “No Place is Home” was being played in the parking lot… I found a young couple lying on the grass listening to our CD as it was played from their neighbouring pickup. Someone in the neighbouring park was letting off sparklers – pure pillars of white fire, and as the after-images cleared the blinking lights of fireflies all around.
It was like we were REAL musicians…. the soundtrack for some beautiful teenaged moment – something that will be remembered fondly for years. Maybe we’ll even be “their song”…
