January 1st, 201… damn. 2020! Happy New Year!

New Year’s Eve. We booked this gig a while back and I was
pretty happy to finally have a NYE gig back on the books. I don’t remember the
last time we did one, but generally they’re pretty high paid and they’ve GOT to
be – cause we’re grown-ass people and don’t really need to be out on what can
be the drunkest night of the year, playing to the party people.

That being said – First Night Easton sounded perfect : a
parade of sea creatures, music all evening, a crab drop – and a non-drinking
event!

We rolled out to the Eastern Shore early in the afternoon to set up our digs for the night : not only was the gig lucrative but we were also being put up by Carpe Diem Arts at their retreat space out in Royal Oak, MD – about a half hour into the woods away from where we were playing. The last time we’d been there it’d been steely grey and cold and blustery. And this time it’s golden and sunshiney. We’ve caught two opposite moods for this wonderful place and they’re both simply gorgeous.

Carpe Diem DOES have great taste…

We claimed bedrooms and shoved stuff in the fridge and
generally ran around exploring nooks and crannies till it was time to run to
the gig.

Now – the gig itself – had suffered from substantial mission
creep. At first ilyAIMY had been invited to play New Year’s Eve and that was
awesome. We’d have to provide our own sound. That’s fine. I generally prefer
that. There’s a dance troupe ahead of us, would they be able to plug their
music through our PA? Sure…

Can you get there and backline at 5pm to make sure
everything’s smooth transitioning through out the evening?

Fortunately KRISTEN was in charge of making sure we got ate. At this early point in the evening (during the dancin’) I was still pretty chipper!

Ugh – now, for every caveat there’s been an uptick in price,
so yay – but now a 3 hour gig with our good friend Lea Morris (who was asked to
join us for the night by the organizers) has become a 7 hour day for me… and
then : “and we’ve booked an opening act, can you please run sound for them and
get in by 4 to make sure there’s time for sound checks?”

Oh – THIS dancing was what I meant… not whatever I was up to in that last pic.

Now that is officially at LEAST an eight hour day with the
concept of “minimal time between acts” which sort of means no real breaks. That’s
a LOT. Plus, when we get there, the dance troupe is under the impression that
the entire stage is there’s from whenever they’d arrived (before I showed up at
3.55pm, they were already on stage and prancin’) to 6.45pm when their routine was
over.

Night Watch sound checking at the Prager Auditorium.

Lea, Kristen and Heather performing at the Prager Family Auditorium in Easton, MD.

We’re trying to take it easy, but this really is kind of an
argument, the management’s not answering THEIR phone, we compromise and work
around one another… the rest of MY band is now milling around because that 5pm
sound check is going to be more like an 8.30pm load-in and line-check, the
other band, Night Watch, at first seems to think this is MY fault but
eventually settles in to the idea that THEIR 4.30pm sound check is going to be
more like a 6.45pm load-in and line-check… and all in all the night can’t get
any worse.

Me running sound for me….

And it doesn’t. The event management has sent me an extra
pair of hands that helps chill things down, I manage to eke a sound check out
for Night Watch out of spare moments. Lea seems fine with not showing up till
closer to 9 in any case… the night progresses pretty smoothly. I think we were
in particularly fine form for our first set, Lea / Heather / Kristen’s set was
exquisite… it’s only the last set that kind of goes off the rails as I allow
our helper to run the board and sound gets progressively worse on the stage.
According to the audience and the cameras, things were fine in the room, but
the feedback in the monitors was bad enough to really effect the last set and
we were kind of just glad to get off the stage. Plus a broken string and I
needed to step AWAY once we cleared the stage.

Kristen and I ran into the streets in hopes of catching the
midnight crab drop, but alas arrived at the scene of the crustacean’s landing
too late to witness the event. We were only about 30 seconds late, but the
beest was well and truly grounded.

From there it was just a long, grueling load out and what
seemed a LONG drive back to the house… but then… oh my God it was full of
stars!

Absolutely stunning. We gathered and drank whiskey and
stayed up too late and ate bad pizza and good cheese. And it was a great night.

Happy New Year!

Below – taking it very slow and easy the next day. My body HURTS and I’ve still got a 2 hour drive home followed by unloading all the gear one last time. I’m definitely feeling over-extended, but not so much that I’m not going to soak it all in….