Music

Drummer wannabe (drum er wan nuh bee) n. Those horn players who insist on coming to the drums and beating them EVERY day. also everyone.

Nerf Claves (nurf clah vayz) n. What you give the bag, freakin’ ree ree, geriatric, stick jockey, or water boy to play. also Nerf woodblock and Nerf cowbell.

Word to the wise: Don’t ever be a Drummer Wannabe with your Nerf Claves (or Nerf Tambourine)

Saturday night I played drums at Mass for the first time in two weeks.  I was really excited to play for a bunch of different reasons.  Partly because I was anxious from being at weddings for the last two weeks and missing playing, the other part is that I have two brand-spankin’ new cymbals that I wanted to mount onto my set and try them out.  I was really pumped up and looking forward to it.

I got in and spent the usual 1/2 hour it takes to unload, unpack and set up my drum set.  I get everything set up and we start to practice, and overall things went pretty good.  We gear up for Mass, when I hear a sound I’ve been dreading for weeks. It was coming from the music office, and then I heard the sound again, this time a little more constant…

The flute player was bringing out the tambourine. 

Then Mass began, and with it a train that was destined for derailment.  Mass progressed and we went through our songs, and I heard it.  The gal started with her tambourine.  At first the damage was minimal, but before I knew it, the Drummer Wannabe started laying down a beat, and her path of destruction followed.

The problem is not with the tambourine itself.  It serves a purpose, and when played right, can be a very tasteful and beautiful addition to certain songs.  However, most often the tambourine is abused by Drummer Wannabe’s that feel they need to do something EVERY FREAKIN’ SONG.  The problem is that most of the time their technique is wrong, and when your technique is wrong, the tambourine is coming in 1/4-1/2 beat late. 

Normally if the tambourine is the only percussion instrument, this is an issue that a music group can work through.  However, when you combine crappy tambourine playing with a drum-set, specifically the crisp tone of a ride or hi-hat cymbal, you’ve wrecked the group, and with it, completely wasted my drumming abilities and the 1/2 hour I spent setting up (and the 1/2 hour spent tearing down).  Your 1/4-1/2 beat tardiness is now distinctly exposed, and the fact that your misuse of the instrument prevents you from following the rhythm set by the drummer creates the tempo phasing that is bound to screw up the rest of the group.  And this is not considering the likely fact that there’s a reason they’re a Drummer Wannabe and not a real drummer – they can’t keep a straight beat in their head!

Drummer Wannabe is going to be gone next week, which is lucky for me.  However when she returns next week I have 3 options to remedy this situation:

1 – Attempt to teach her to play tambourine with the right technique
2 – Hide the tambourine
3 – Break/Sabotage the tambourine

Needless to say the mature thing is to try #1, which I plan on doing in two weeks.  I already made arrangements with the group leader to run through the Mass parts with the sole intention of exposing her misuse of the instrument.  Hopefully this can be a teaching moment, otherwise I’ll have to resort to option #3 (I can’t do #2 and take the chance that she’d find the tambourine)

The moral of the story – DON’T BE A DRUMMER WANNABE.  You may feel left out, being the only person up there not playing an instrument, but believe me – it beats playing tambourine incorrectly and making yourself, along with the rest of the group, look like dumb-asses.  Laugh if you must, but heed my words and make music better for all of us…

Quite a bit has been going on throughout the last few days, and I thought it’d be beneficial to forgo my nightly game of Super Mario World or Madden 2006 that I end my evenings with, and actually capture a few thoughts while they’re still fresh in my mind.  This entry may be a little random and all over the place, but that’s probably how things are going in my mind at this point.

Friday Craziness

Ended up going to Denver and back in a matter of hours, arriving just in time to play my "Gig".  I left early from work on Friday, packed my drum set into my car and drove down to Denver to go to my friend Kristi’s wedding rehearsal.  It went just about the same way any wedding rehearsal goes – nothing spectacular.  My only reason for being there was so I would know when to go up and read and know how loud I need to read – they didn’t even have me go through the whole reading and just stopped me after a few lines.  I got a good dinner out of it though, plus I got to see Kristi and her sister Carrie, Kristi’s sister from New Mexico and also one of my best friends.

At that point I ducked out of Kristi’s wedding rehearsal and made my way back up to Redeemer Lutheran Church to play at the Habitat for Humanity Benefit Concert.  This concert, called "Raising Voices, Raising Walls" featured 8 groups select from area churches and featured groups from the Evangelicals, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Mennonites & Catholics.  Our choir got picked to represent the Catholic bunch.  Overall the evening went pretty well.  The numbers were maybe a bit low, but I think for the first annual event, it wasn’t too bad.  I think the biggest success from the evening was the fact that they made all these connections and inroads with the various musical groups, now all they need to do is advertise it better.

Noteworthy thoughts from Friday:

• The law of church drum sets rang true – if a drum set belongs to a church, then it pretty much has to be crappy…  It ended up working ok though.  I still packed and brought my drum set (leaving it in the car) in case something did come up.  I did get to use my own cymbals and hardware, which turned out to be pretty good.  I still don’t understand why people put duct tape onto your drum heads.  We wall want to muffle our drums from ringing, but there’s a market full of products that will help you do just that.  You don’t need to break out the duct tape.  And if you are going to resort to tape, use electrical tape – at least it won’t leave crappy residue all over your heads.
• I have come to loathe "drum sheilds" – these see-through plastic booths that they’ve made for drummers.  The drum set at this church had them, so we had to use it.  I managed to find a picture of one (which is posted to the right).  Basically these things are supposed to do two things: 1) Keep the drum sounds from being picked up by other mic’s 2) muffling the drum sound.  I think for most people these are moot points – 1) For most groups, especially church groups, you’re not likely to use quality mics that will pick up those sounds, or the stages are probably big enough to filter out the sound and 2) Learn to play quieter – if your technique is developed well enough you can control the dynamics.  You don’t need a crutch to hide your lack of ability to play – adding in a $500-700 contraption isn’t a solution.  I joke that the only benefit this provide is if anyone at your gig is strapping and wants to take a shot at you, you’ll be okay. This may also be useful if you’re a drummer in the witnes protection program.
• Our choir is freakin’ good, and I’m lucky to be part of such a talented group of musicians.

Geez, that was just one day, 4 more to go..  I think I’m going to break these entries up a bit.

Wow…  It’s been a busy few days, and I have quite a bit that I would like to process, so I’ll try to get through everything in a few different posts, and hopefully we’ll get things caught back up in my life!

First off…

Dave Matthews Night #3

What an amazing end to a wonderful weekend.  Bethany and I went up on Sunday night for #3 and decided to once again skip the tailgating.  I think we were both a bit tired from being away all weekend long, not to mention a bit saddened by the Broncos loss earlier in the day (don’t get me started).  We ended up in the upper lots again, not far from where we were for night #2.  We just pulled to the side of the road, set up the chairs, blasted the music and had a good time before the show.  We made our way up to the our seats and got to see my good friend Joel, who was helping collect donated food from concert-goers.  Then we made it up our way.

Red Rocks Setlist: Night 3 Don’t Burn The Pig You Never Know Stand Up Grey Street When The World Ends * Dream Girl Lie In Our Graves Lover Lay Down What You Are * Out Of My Hands #41 * Granny Halloween * Butterfly Crush * Pantala Naga Pampa Rapunzel * Encore: I Did It [tease] Louisiana Bayou * The Star Spangled Banner [Intro] All Along The Watchtower Special Guests: * Rashawn Ross

As hyped up as I was to see John Butler Trio for a second night, I was disappointed when the set list was virtually identical to Saturday night’s show.  I was hoping to hear some of their other material, but guess I’m relegated to my CD’s.

Highlights of the show:

• They played a lot more obscure songs, as compared to Saturday night (when they played some more mainstream stuff & singles) overall
• They played “Don’t Burn the Pig!” or “Pig” from the album!!  Oh man, I don’t think I’ve heard that song live yet.  It’s my second favorite DMB song of all-time!
• Great rendition of #41!
• During the show they were trudging along through the set list, when the crowd starting chanting “HAL-LO-WEEN, HAL-LO-WEEN!” over and over again.  The chanting got so loud that it seemed like virtually the entire amphitheater to join in, when they responded by playing the darkest Dave Matthews song of all time!  It was the first time that I’ve ever heard that live, and was so excited that they played it.
• What’s weird is that the set list says they played 4 encore songs, but in reality it was two.  The “I Did It [tease]” was just a few chords, and then the “Star Spangled Banner” was just a bass solo before Watchtower.  Pretty sweet though…

Dave Matthews Night #4

Oh man…  Those seats were nuts!  Below I have posted some pictures to give you a sense of just how close I was.  At one point I was standing 20 feet from Dave Matthews!  How cool is that?

Red Rocks Setlist: Night 4 Recently * Drive In Drive Out Typical Situation Everyday Everybody Wake Up Old Dirt Hill Hunger For The Great Light American Baby Intro Dream Girl Jimi Thing * Exodus *+~ Louisiana Bayou *+Ä Encore: Smooth Rider * Too Much * Special Guests: * Rashawn Ross + Robert Randolph ~ Ivan Neville Ä David CasT

The show was pretty sweet – not the best show that I had been to all weekend, but there were some big highlights overall:

• They pretty much hit the “reset” button on their set list chooser.  Where in the first three nights, they only had a small handful of songs they played twice, Monday night’s set list took no consideration of what was previously done, so it was nice
• “Exodus” – they brought everyone & their mom onto the stage to play this Bob Marley song.  I had never heard them play this song before (except in a really old, crappy bootleg version on my computer).  It was sweet!  They jammed for almost 20 minutes!
• Typical Situation, a classic song that I’ve rarely heard.
• How much fun they had.  Dave had some really awesome impromptu moments, at one point singing about how much it sucks to follow up people in his band when they do great solos and leave so much to be expected.  It was funny!
• Throughout the course of the show Dave kept thanking the crowd, telling them how cool it was to “end such a great tour on a high note”, which as the show progressed, kept becoming a greater compliment each time.  It started off as “ending one of our best tours”, to “our best tour ever”, to “one of the great summers ever” to “the greatest summer of my life” at the end.  That was pretty cool!  You could that they still enjoying being on the stage together night in & night out, and despite touring for four months straight, that they were really going to miss each other as they’re taking time off this fall & winter.

The parking sucked.  Even though my sister and I parked in the same place that I used for night #3, we didn’t leave early enough, and had to be herded out with the rest of the crowd.  By the time we got to our cars it took us a good half-hour to get ourselves out of there!  Every other night took about 10 minutes and was easy!  Oh well, I guess I have to pay for it some time.

So my amazing weekend came to an end – 4 back-to-back Dave Matthews Band shows in (arguably) the greatest venue in the country – I think this may go down as one of those “once in a life-time” opportunities – heck, maybe one of the best weekends of my life!

The next day I was asked multiple times if I was glad for it to be over, or if I was “sick of Dave”.  At first my answer was “of course not!”, but after thinking about it, I managed to better articulate my feelings:  If I didn’t have any responsibilities or had to make as many sacrifices to go to those shows, I would be happy to go to another week of those shows, but because I pretty much put all of my life & responsibilities on hold for four days – and how much I’m paying for it now – there is a part of me that’s glad that it’s over.  Does that makes sense?

Pictures below:

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p align=”center”>See the rest of the pictures on Shutterfly…

Red Rocks Night #2 is in the books!

Bethany and I had an amazing time up there.  We ended up missing the Tailgating festivities again, but mainly due to us wanting to get a better parking spot, and it paid off in the end.  We got out of there in about 10 minutes – so not bad at all!  We had a pretty short walk, so that was pretty nice as well.

Red Rocks Setlist: Night 2 Seek Up One Sweet World Don’t Drink the Water Hunger For The Great Light Rhyme & Reason #34 Smooth Rider Jimi Thing Blackbird Steady As We Go Hello Again Crash Louisiana Bayou Best of Whats Around American Baby Tripping Billies Encore: Where Are You Going Two Step

The next biggest highlight was that we managed to sneak the digital camera into the amphitheatre!  No more messing with these disposable flash always-on camera!  It definitely paid off, we got some awesome pictures, some that I’ll post here, the rest are over on my new Shutterfly site.

So to offer a recap of a few things:

Highlights:

• Amazing setlist! They opened up with "Seek Up", just like they did on their 1995 Red Rocks disc!  It was awesome!
• They played "Blackbird" – the Beatles song!  It was so pretty!
• #34 – The first that I’ve ever heard it live
• They had a guy named Rashawn Ross guest on a few songs.  This guy was HUGE!  He looked like an Offensive Lineman, and it was kind a funny seeing the contrast in size between Rashawn and bassist Stefan Lessard. This guy came out and played trumpet and was AWESOME!  He played this sweet solo during Jimi Thing, where he hit this range of extremely high notes, and he hit them all!  It was amazing!
• John Butler Trio – These guys rocked!  I’m excited to go see them again!
• They played Two Step! That’s it, I’ve heard that song and can now go home!

Lowlights:

• The crowd – while they initially got into it more than Friday night’s crowd, I was pretty disappointed with the people around us.  First off, there were all these people that just kept leaving!  And what was crap was a lot of these people weren’t coming back with anything – no food, no beer – nothing!  Then there were some old people next to us burning their hippie-lettuce (like a lot of other people at the concert), then to the right of us was this drunk guy hitting on this mom who brought her daughter to the show – it was annoying and disturbing.  Then in the row above us there were these gals from the South that were so incredibly annoying.  I’m down with the southern accents, but when it comes to southern girls there are two kind of accents: cute, sweet southern belle; and then high-pitched, twangy annoying southern accent.  These girls behind us were the latter.  It was pretty lame
• The dumb fans at the concert.  Out of the different types of fans, there are two primary types in my mind: the musical-appreciation fans that respect the musical abilities of the band; and he dumb frat-boys that like to go so they can smoke pot.  It felt like we were sitting in the frat section.  When DMB started playing #34, I was excited to hear it, since they play it so rarely. But everyone just started talking loudly through the whole song – it was lame!  Then DMB starts playing "Blackbird", and while you think people would listen to it, everyone gets on their cell phones to call their friends to tell them DMB is playing Blackbird.  Way to go – you spent all this time calling your friends telling them about it, that you missed the actual song.  Argh!

So overall, this was a great show!  I wanted to share a few pictures!  To see the rest, go to my shutterfly site.

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I love how this shot turned out, I didn’t do anything in Photoshop, the crowd naturally came out Black & White

Awwww…

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This was taken at the end of the last song of the encore…