Fun night at the Aurora Borealis last night, with our pals the Post Punks. I showed up around 6 for soundcheck, only to find the sound guy had car problems and wasn't there yet. I started setting up my stuff (Zoom B24, butter bass, IEMs) and got ready. Spencer on sound showed up shortly after, and then it turned out that Jen and Dusty had forgotten their IEMs. Luckily, Jen's daughter was at home and was able to bring them up to the club.
Earlier in the week, I found some flats in my gear box and swapped out the rounds that were on the butter bass. Those rounds were super zingy and I just felt like it was too much, even for non-yacht rock stuff. I spent some time getting used to the flats and found they sounded pretty good.
We soundchecked with a song or two and got our levels dialed in. As a band, we got at $100 tab so it was dinnertime. Grabbed some not so great fish and chips, and then it was time to watch the Post Punks do their set of 80's songs. My new-ish friend, Ben, plays bass for them, as well as the Rallies. He brought an Olympic white P with tort, and an Ampeg amp and 410 and sounded great. He played fingerstyle and with a pick depending on the song and it was great stuff. He's solid and I really enjoyed his band's set.
 |
| OK fish and chips |
 |
| Ben with the Post Punks |
Cathy also sings with the Post Punks and she sat in with us for a few tunes later. She has great stage presence and voice control. The rest of the band was decent and did fine, if a little disconnected. Bonus points for the keyboard player who also busted out a sax!
 |
| Ben and Cathy! |
I was fortunate to have some friends come for a change. Mike (with the photos) and his partner Amy, Brett and Elba and their friends, and then later my boy Aaron showed up. Seven people out for me is pretty good. Eric had something like 10 and overall, it was a pretty nice night for us, attendance-wise. I'm sure the club would have liked double that, but the crowd was into it, dancing and singing along.
I set up my phone again stage right, hit record and hoped for the best. IEMs sounded good, though my bass was pretty hot after some time. I was able to deal with it. I think I played really well. My main issue was with singing. For the past 3 weeks or so, I had bronchitis, which then turned into pneumonia. I'm feeling better, but my lungs are definitely still healing. I can sing, but some of the high notes can be tricky. I forgot to hit my inhaler before we started and on some songs, I struggled.
Upon watching the video back, I was really pitchy. I felt like I was good in the moment, but woof, there were definitely some challenging moments where I was close, but not quite.
Stage was nice and big, lighting was decent. New shirt was on point.
 |
| video capture from phone |
Dennis and I interacted a bit during the set. I'd go over to him and he'd come right up on me. Good times!
 |
| Me and Unc getting close |
 |
| Cathy jumped on to do some ELO songs with us |
 |
| Last 3 pix by Mike Mitchell |
We got to play all 23 songs on our setlist and had a great time doing so. Both bands were on point and the crowd was well entertained. As always, I can't wait to do it again. We don't have anything lined up, though, so there's that.
Now it's time to get to work on the private party in a few weeks.
