The Blue Moon is in the University District of Seattle and is pretty much the picture-perfect definition of what a "dive bar" is. Opened in 1934, it looks like it hasn't been updated since then. I'll spare the details, but when Marci is even saying she wouldn't go there (and she doesn't go to many shows these days), that's saying something.
That said, aside from it being a bit grungy inside and outside, the spirit and sound were good, as were the people. But, no food there, so prior to my arrival, I stopped by Dick's for a couple Specials, fries and a Coke, and devoured them using my trunk as a table.
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| Better than In-n-Out. Fight me. |
Tummy satisfied, I drove the .5 miles to the Blue Moon, loaded in, parked around the corner, and headed in. There was some confusion around start times prior to the show; the poster said doors were at 8, show at 9, but Robb had wanted to start earlier, with doors at 7 and show at 8. Then the club wanted us to do what the poster said. It was dumb; ain't nobody got time for that.
Anyway, we ended up not starting until about 8:45 or so, whatever. Sun Tunnels kicked it off with some mellow indie rock. Three-piece: guitar, bass and drums. The singer/guitarist was under the weather and either he felt really gross or he was just not super demonstrative on stage. Nor was the bassist. Both dudes pretty subdued. The tunes were decent and unique enough and there were moments of glimmer in the tunes that sounded good.
The bassist played an old P through an old GK and a 15" Schroeder cab. He had some pedals on the floor and his bass sounded nice and gnarly. Dug it.
We jumped on stage next and got setup. I brought the Avatar 212 and Terror Bass, along with the Hog. The night before at practice I had a pretty aggressive sound dialed in, but that was with the Trace and the 210/115 setup. I like the flexibility of having the Orange/212 setup, but I don't think I've had enough time with it to fully understand it.
We started playing and it was just so boomy. I immediately realized it was because I was right next to the subwoofer. Anytime I'd play a note and let it ring, it played some deep bottom underneath the note. I tried to turn down my bass and increase the mids, but on stage, it sounded pretty muddy. But I soldiered on.
With Planets and me playing with pick on nearly all the songs, we have some fast ones and the picking is tricky. I use heavy picks, both from Fender and Ernie Ball and I have mainly been using the pointy side of the pick to, well, pick. Recently, I've been rotating the picks so that I'm picking with one of the round sides. It mellows the sound a little (less attack) while allowing me to pick faster. It's an interesting trade off, but on songs like Dustcloud or Nomenclature, where it's fast 8th notes, it's really helpful.
Vocally, the sound guy had me pumping through the monitors. I was also close to the mains, so I could hear from those as well. I also got right up on the mic and just sang, trusting the sound guy to adjust me as needed. Whatever he did evidently worked; I had some nice comments about the vocals, from someone getting goosebumps from hearing us, to another guy saying I was like Michael Anthony up there (I'll take it). Some old friends came out (Brian, Michael) and it was nice to see them and catch up.
When we finished, the Giving Moon from Chicago jumped on stage. They were fronted by what looked like a 18 year old kid. He was skinny, in a tie dyed Grateful Dead shirt, playing a Hamer guitar. The rest of the band looked a little older, but not by much. They started playing and it was clear that the kid (he actually turned 26 yesterday) was a shredder. Robb showed us a clip of him at practice the other night and the guy's playing reminded all of us of Tim: bluesy, fluid, really competent.
The rest of the band was really tight as well. They have been touring pretty regularly and it showed. I've played in a lot of bands over the years, but never in one as polished and tight as these guys. But, having said that, and as good as they were, they were really boring.
Lots of energy on stage, plenty of bouncing around, sounded great, but maybe it's an age thing. They didn't really click to me. I felt like as good as he was on guitar, those types of shredders are easy to come by. However, he did have great stage presence, really great voice and mad guitar skills. Really a total package, but his tunes need to grow a little.
They also did three covers in their set. Not sure if they don't have many originals or if that's a Chicago thing. Here in Seattle, we are spoiled for original music, good and bad, but they sprinkled in a Black Keys tune, Hey Joe by Hendrix and Yellow by Coldplay. All done well enough, but three covers in a 40 minute set?
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| The Giving Moon |
Of course, being the petty, grumpy old man, I just sat back and talked mess about these kids. Though it was mainly tongue-in-cheek. Me and the boys and others recognized that these were talented dudes and really good at what they did, and more likely the issue was with us and not with them. Let's face it, we are old!
After the show, I chatted with Jack, the tour manager/roadie for the Giving Moon. He did play acoustic on a couple songs, but primarily he drives the van, sets up and tears down and basically plays Tour Dad. They played Eugene the night before, and were headed to a place called the Chicken Shack somewhere in mid-eastern Washington. Having just embarked on the tour with Forest Ray, I commiserated with them a little, but man, I don't miss that. They are young men doing young men things.
All in all, a nice night. We made a few bucks to put towards recording in a few weeks. We got to connect with some bands we've never played with before. Oh, and we got the performance live streamed! I cut out the other bands and uploaded our portion of the video to Youtube. Not high res, but it is free from Facebook.
