K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 25Mar2017

Pretty good night. Lots of kids out at first, including a pack of girls who'd just come from the beach (with some parents). They were on their way past when the crosswalk signal stopped them and I hijacked them by handing out the song lists. And since they'd all seen the new "Beauty and the Beast" movie the day before, you can guess what song they wanted.

Now that my Vietnamese super fans know how to find me, they came by again. Phuong has to be the sweetest lady I've ever met -- there are probably a few adult women who will admit that "Puff, the Magic Dragon" is their favorite song, but how many also cry at the story of "The Boxer"?

But they didn't get there until about 8:30, and we're supposed to quit at 9. Warren says that he and Jim have been exceeding that deadline lately and getting away with it, and theorizes that, since Sanchez has apparently disappeared for good, and was presumably the cause of the curfew, the cops have relaxed their enforcement again.

That sounded OK to me, except that, right at 9:00, the cops' little golf cart was parked right across the street from us, while they were inside the gallery over there for some reason. It seemed a bit inexpedient for us to be observably playing through amplifiers when they came out, so I shut it down and just chatted with Phuong and Chris until the cops left. Then we went ahead and played until 10:20, with no further police appearances.

Still too many bums, and especially obnoxious drunken ones, for my tastes, but Warren tried to keep a lid on that, as best he could. It's a shame that we live in fear of the cops shutting us down, but (almost) never benefit from them helping keep the drunks out of our hair. This time though, for the first time, they came by and just hung around the worst drunk until he decided to go someplace less intimidating. More of that, please.

[My Stories] For Want of a Capo

Before my senior year of high school, I discovered that I'd already taken almost all of the "college prep" classes the school had to offer, so I had to fill the space with three electives. For the first two, I signed up for Electronics and "I R & D", which was the most advanced "shop" class. I was invited to take it by my Drafting teacher from the previous year, who taught both. (Drawings of machine parts! In pencil! On paper! *There's* a future-proof career path!)

Each kid in I R & D got to do a Project, but since all the other kids had come up the official way through the actual Shop classes, they were classic "shop kids" -- they could weld and saw, but they couldn't actually think so good. I ended up doing the design and plans for everybody else's projects -- which I suspect was the teacher's plan all along -- and never getting to one of my own.

Anyway, for my third elective, my girlfriend talked me into taking Choir, and my "next year" schedule was all settled at the beginning of summer. By the end of summer, she wasn't my girlfriend anymore, but a bunch of other girls in Choir wanted me to try out for "Mariners", the school's 12-kid pop group. What they call nowadays a "show choir" -- smiley happy kids singing pop tunes while doing choreography. Like "Up With People" or Disney's "Kids of the Kingdom".

My brother had been a Mariner two years before, but I hadn't paid much attention -- not my kind of thing. Still, the pressure of all these girls wanting me to join up worked, so I tried out, and got in (not actually too impressive a feat, since they need six guys and only about eight tried out).

I had to drop Electronics to fit the Mariner class in, which in retrospect, considering my eventual adult career, seems like a mistake, but I had the time of my life and don't regret it at all. It taught me a lot about really singing and performing, and incidentally got me started me playing guitar. Changed my life.

A couple of years after I graduated, the director/teacher of the Mariners decided to make a go of constructing a "professional" group. He recruited all the best of the previous few years' worth of kids, and I auditioned, but didn't make the cut as a singer/dancer. But by that time I was a (barely serviceable) bass player, and this group was to have an actual backing band, not just a piano player, so I got in that way.

They found a drummer and my best friend Bob was brought in to play guitar, and we were up and running. We learned a bunch of songs, and might have even played a few gigs, though I don't remember any. Nor getting paid, ever...

The director decided to do an actual Concert, and rented the Long Beach Elks dome. We sold tickets to our friends and relatives, and almost nobody else. But it was exciting nonetheless.

It was decided that "the band" would get to do a song -- probably just to fill some time. Bobby and I chose James Taylor's "Hey Mister, That's Me Up On the Jukebox", with me singing. To put the song in the proper key to make it singable, Bobby would use a capo -- the clamp that makes the guitar neck effectively shorter, and therefore pitched higher -- the same as how James plays it. But bass players don't use capos, they just learn the song in the key that the capoed guitar now sounds like.

We practiced the song until I was presumably ready to do it in public for the concert. We got to the Elks Dome and set up on the huge stage under the spotlights. Our amplifiers were at the back of the stage and Bobby and I stood by them while the 12 main performers sang and danced out front.

When it came time for our song, the kids cleared out, and Bobby and I walked out to the front of the stage and up to the microphone standing there, dragging long cables behind us. I was nervous, obviously. I looked over at Bobby to see if he was ready, and he said those four fateful words, "I forgot my capo."

Time stopped. The implication was clear -- without his capo, we'd be playing in two different keys. I had two choices: sing it with only guitar, or only bass. Only bass would be in the right key, but sound lame -- obviously, singing with only guitar is more "complete". So, that choice made, I further decided it would look dumb for me to stand there holding my bass but not playing it, so I walked the half-mile back to the amplifiers, put the bass on its stand, and walked the now three miles back to the mic at the front of the stage.

Bobby started the song, and I sang it -- a little low sans-capo, but not out of range. One best-kept secret about playing guitar (or bass) is that, secondarily only to its use as a musical accompaniment, it also serves as Something To Do With Your Hands, and just as importantly, as a psychological shield between you and the audience. Without my bass I was naked -- nothing to do with my hands, and nothing between Me and Them. Multiply the stage anxiety by ten.

But I got through it. People say I did good, but how much can you believe your relatives in this regard? I wouldn't know -- I was in shock.

But the kicker was, when we finished the song and walked back to our places by the amplifiers, there was Bobby's capo, sitting on his amplifier. Sitting. On. His. Amplifier. By "forgot", he meant, "left it back there on the amp". Within arm's reach of, say, my bass stand. Instead of me walking back and forth to put down the bass and being left to sing the song without it, he could have walked back there and gotten the capo. And yet, somehow, he remains unmurdered.

If I recall correctly (though I'm pretty sure I don't), that was the last gasp of the professional song-and-dance group, though probably *not* really due to our little capo fiasco that I'm sure the audience barely noticed. But it did prove to be a somewhat inauspicious start to my solo singing career -- though that would be on hold for 25 years to let me get good enough on guitar to not be reliant on someone else's capo...

Keith at Festival of Whales -- Sat/Sun, 11-12Mar2017

The lady in charge of the Festival of Whales told me that she had gotten so many good comments about me that she was going to find me a better place to play (and double my pay!). So on Saturday, she put me in the "Dana Wharf Plaza", near some restaurants and the dock where the Whale Watching boats are.

The big plaza certainly looked like a better place to play, but it was actually a little *too* big, which made it too impersonal. Lots of people came by to listen, but they were so far away that there was no actual interaction. Only the brave ones came all the way over to look through the list and request songs.

But I was able to pry several sets of kids away from their lunch at the fish & chips place to dance out front for a while. And enough people came over to sit at the side benches nearby to make it fun enough that I stayed for four and a half hours.

On Sunday, she tried to get me into my usual non-Festival place in front of the coffee shop, but they already had someone else booked there, so I was back where I was the previous Sunday -- along the walkway around the harbor. This time the classic cars they'd scheduled actually showed up, so there was a perfectly restored 1973 Jaguar XKE right next to me. It was a little awkward -- my music made it hard for them to talk to people about the car, and their talking kind of interfered with my music, but we got along OK.

What was much worse was the "Whale of a Concert on the Water" at Baby Beach, which, despite being 400 yards away, was *really* loud. First there was a cover band, then a girl-singer cover band, then a U2 tribute band, all on a floating stage in front of the beach. Cool, but, wow, really loud. Several people coming from that direction told me that they preferred my music to "those guys", but I'm sure that anyone with the opposite opinion just kept it to themselves.

My strategy of putting the colorful Kids' Song lists on the ground right at the edge of the sidewalk worked well again. Lots of kids got sucked in, which made their parents stop to let the kids request a song or three. And sometimes it was the parents that noticed the lists...

At one point a guy came up with a fiver in his hand and said he wanted to buy a CD. I said, sure, just take one, and he said that there was none left! I had set six of each ("Favorites" and "Kids' Favorites") out there, but sure enough, they were all gone, so I dug some more out to give him one. I'm pretty sure that's the most CDs I've ever sold at a single gig.

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 11Mar2017

Despite playing long hours at the Dana Point Whale Festival on both Saturday and Sunday, it was "our turn" on The Corner in Laguna, and I can't pass that up. So I quit Dana Point at 4:00, drove through some fast food and up the coast to play some more.

Traffic was terrible getting there, but I got lucky with parking and The Corner was empty when I rolled up. I set up and tried to play, but my amp was all but dead -- and I knew exactly what was wrong. Earlier in the week, I had opened it up to replace the dead battery inside, and, by the symptom, I'd clearly knocked one of the wires to the speaker loose while I was in there. Fortunately, the guy in the ice cream store had a screwdriver I could borrow, so a field-strip right there on The Corner later, I was up and running again by 6:00.

It was strangely foggy down there, and still not a lot of foot traffic (but why were there so many cars?!?). Unfortunately, the bums were out in force. I don't know where they spend the winter, but they're apparently back. When I started playing, I could have thrown eight rocks and hit eight bums. Including good ol' Josh, who sits at the side bench mumble-chanting "Aloha, aloha!" and holding up his Legalize Marijuana signs. Somebody should really tell him that he's won that one and can go on home...

Warren had a guest visiting from Back East, so I was solo for the first two hours until he showed up with the wife and guest in tow. I tried to play songs that would let him show off a bit for his friend, balanced against the not-so-showy tunes requested by other people and his wife.

And my Vietnamese superfans, Christopher and Phuong, showed up again after an almost two-year absence. They had apparently come by last week looking for me, and Tom told them to try next week. So they did -- such dedication! I tried to play new songs that they hadn't heard before, but Phuong kept requesting classics from the CDs. They're such fans that they always ask if I have any new CDs, which is fair, since I recorded the "Favorites" one six years ago...

Keith at "Festival of Whales" -- Sat/Sun 04-05Mar2017

A couple of weeks ago, the lady who runs the Festival of Whales (Andrea) happened to see me playing in front of the coffee shop, and essentially asked me, "Do you play for the Festival? Would you like to?" Of course I said "No, and yes!", so even though they were already booked up, she's finding me places to play anyway.

She must really like my stuff, 'cuz even though I volunteered to play for free (since I do every weekend anyway, and I really just wanted to not be shut out for two weekends), she got me some money -- and after the rave reviews she got after my first day, has up and doubled that. And more importantly, she's intently trying to find me even better spots to play in for next weekend.

On Saturday, she put me down at "Baby Beach", where they were having the sandcastle building contest. It was a bit weird, since there's no real traffic, and the people were kind of far away, but I had a lot of people come up and thank me for making the day special, and I sold several CDs.

Then on Sunday, she moved me down along the "Harbor Walkway", where the classic Woodies were supposed to be, but they got scared off by the predicted rain and didn't show. I played for a while over by the Harbor office building (ironically literally right outside the window of the lady who gave me so much trouble getting the Permit to play down there), but it was a little too far away from the people going by. Seeing this, Andrea suggested that I move down the way a bit and closer to the walkway, which worked much better but had no shade, so she called someone and had them bring me an Easy-Up.

But like 15 minutes after they came and set it up, the weather made an abrupt change and instead of keeping me from getting sunburned, it was keeping me from getting rained on. I was OK with waiting it out for a while, but since it had sent any potential audience running, there wasn't much point. Andrea (and her mom!) helped me toss the stuff into the back of my car, and I went home, having only gotten to play for two hours.

Next week: better weather, and an even better spot!

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 25Feb2017

We had a real cold snap so it was low-50s all night, which caused low traffic and an even lower stop-to-listen ratio. Oddly, after no bums at all for the last few months, there were several this time, but they were just in the way, not terribly obnoxious. As a concession to the heart repair procedure I'd had the Monday before, I brought my stool, which has the added benefit of allowing me to use my foot tambourine, though I seldom remembered it was there...

Three little girls and their dads came by for ice cream and a few songs. The girls all had wrist-bouquets, so I asked what the deal was -- they were on the way to the Father-Daughter dance at the school. Cute.

We did have some nice people at times. A couple of young ladies came by and wanted to take pictures of Warren. After a while they were picking songs, but apologized for not having any cash, to which I said my usual, "Don't worry about it -- if we were out here for the money, we wouldn't be out here."

But I guess they dug through their purses and found some emergency gas money or something because they both ended up producing five-dollar bills to buy CDs with.

At the end, a crazy-looking guy came by and was standing way too close and intensely staring at our hands and guitars, and asking questions about the equipment and chords and stuff. Warren has run into him before and he apparently plays hard rock down there occasionally, so I guess it was "professional curiosity", but it was just a bit too intense...

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 11Feb2017

It never actually rained, but it was threatening to all day, and it was cold again, so the crowds were pretty thin. Our new friends Tim and Anna had promised to hold The Corner for us against any other challengers until we got there. It was nice to not have to worry (much) about whether or not we'd actually get to play...

With the thin crowds, it was a pretty uneventful night until right towards the end when two nice ladies and their friend showed up. He was pretty drunk (and loud) from the whiskey in his hip flask, but the ladies were nice and loved the music, and kept us playing requests until we ran up against the new 9:00 deadline. Warren thought we could probably fudge a bit over the line, so we did, but I decided that it wasn't worth the citation, and besides, "leave 'em wanting more".

While we were packing up, the ladies kept telling me that I ought to be playing at "the hotel", meaning the Hotel Laguna where they were staying, across the street. I didn't know they had a bar/lounge in there, with live music, but the ladies insisted that I was better than the band they'd seen in there earlier, and they wanted me to go over there with them and see about getting a gig there.

That didn't seem likely, but after I'd taken my stuff back to the car, I thought, what the heck, and walked back to the hotel and found them in the bar. Two guys were playing some rowdy blues-rock, exactly as I had told them was what Management in these places want, as it supposedly sells more drinks, and I can't/won't provide, so I never get hired.

But the ladies insisted that they knew some other woman who sings there, and they'd talk to her and get me an audition. They also said that they'd come see me in the morning in Dana Point. Spoiler Alert: Neither of those things happened.

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 14Jan2017

When I got to The Corner, there was a little duo already set up there: Tim & Anna, aka "Kangaroo Rat". Tim plays accordion (really well) and Anna plays along on a glockenspiel. They play soundtrack music (their "Game of Thrones" sounds *great*!) and some originals, but everything sounds like a French rom-com movie soundtrack, or maybe the background music for a surreal Czechoslovakian stop-motion short.

Anyway, Warren talked them into moving up the street at 7:00, which would leave us half of what we were expecting, but better than nothing at all.

They actually quit around 6:20, though, because a lively little six-year-old brought down the house with her dancing, eventually joined by Anna, and they figured they couldn't top that and bowed out.

Wonderfully, the family came back after a while to let her dance with some of my music.

Otherwise, a pretty subdued evening. We had enough listeners to keep it interesting, but it was pretty cold so people didn't want to stay for long. Frankly, sometimes that new 9:00 curfew saves us from ourselves...

Keith Plays a Cruise Ship -- Saturday, 07Jan2017

A high school bestie of one of my kids invited all of us to her wedding on a cruise ship, followed by the actual four day cruise to Ensenada. I ponied up for all four of us since getting everyone together for a family vacation is getting more and more unachievable.

I love these cruises 'cuz I get to see several darn-good bands play, and see how other guys do it. Indeed, it was on a cruise that I discovered the harmony box that's changed my life as far as songs I can successfully cover.

Right away, I came upon "Solo Guitar Sounds with Nathan" in the Atrium bar. He was *really* good, and fascinating to watch since he builds great renditions of (modern country-ish) songs using a looper. He sits on a cajon (wooden drum box), and would record a drum track loop by banging on it, overlay a bass track loop on his guitar with a octaver, start singing a verse while playing and recording the guitar chords, and then he could let the drum, bass, and chords loops run while he played lead over the top. With the vocal harmony box singing two extra voices on top of his own, he could potentially be a 7-piece band, by himself, with (arguably) no pre-recorded "backing tracks".

I was amazed and fascinated, and the only one really listening and clapping for his efforts. When his set ended, I went up and I told him how impressed I was and we talked about how it was all done. I somehow revealed that I had brought my guitar on the trip, and he invited me to "jam with him" sometime.

Which turned out to be the next afternoon, out on the "Serenity Deck" where he usually just sets up some simple chord loops and noodles around with lead guitar on top of them -- he's found that vocals "don't work" out there. When I got there, he plugged my guitar in, and I played the chords from my songs while he supplied ever-more-ornate melodies on top.

That was pretty fun for both of us, and gave him faith to invite me to get up on stage the next day and actually sing some.

Now, the cruise people put all of the wedding attendees together at the dinner banquets, and my wife and I ended up at a table with 8 of the groom's friends, all around 22 years old. But they were really friendly and after two long dinners with them, we were all great friends. That night it leaked out that I'd be playing at the "Dream Bar" stage the next day, and they all said that they'd come.

And they did! Nathan set me up with a mic (but unfortunately not through his harmony box 'cuz it would have been a nightmare to change his intricate wiring setup) and plugged in my guitar, and off we went, with Nathan promising to provide harmony himself when he could.

I started off (as always) with "Hotel California", which the kids, parents, and other adults all sang along with, and, emboldened by that, I went to "I'm Yours", which all the kids know, and out they came to dance and shout along to. Nathan was thrilled, since he's used to playing to a largely indifferent crowd (as most bar gigs go). Not to mention the kids clapping and shouting "Keith! Keith! Keith!" at the end of the songs. It wasn't a huge party, but it was definitely a party.

I had expected to play my usual mellow stuff, but since I was clearly running a party here, so I apologized that I don't know any party songs after "I'm Yours", "...but maybe this one...", and did "Wagon Wheel". After that I said, again, that I really don't know any party songs, but put that to a lie by firing up "Margaritaville". I hadn't intended to create a running joke, but there it was...

After a couple more I-Don't-Know-Any-Party Songs, I announced that I wasn't really an employee here, and only up there because Nathan was good enough to allow me to come up and spoil his set(s). I'm just a passenger along for the wedding cruise, and the bride's name is Layla. I fired it the song, and everybody cheered and the kids danced some more (and Nathan did an amazing job on the lead -- I guess after playing 4 hours a day, every day, for five years, you get good).

Then, since I really was out of party songs, and since during the wedding and reception it became clear that the happy couple's "song" was "Over the Rainbow", I said, "This one is also for Layla and Cameron" and they (and the rest of the kids, and her parents) got all romantic and slow danced.

Unfortunately, Layla had already set up a cocktail party that evening, so after a way-too-short hour, all the kids left to go do that, leaving Nathan and I to play to the actual bar patrons. So my party was over, but the remaining people seemed pleased to listen to my more mellow songs. But the cocktail party was only an hour, and Nathan was set to play for three, so the party came back after a while -- fortunately ready to listen to a mellower set this time.

I was a little afraid that Nathan would get in trouble for letting an amateur get up and do his sets for him, but the Musical Director (who's also the bass player for the 80's/90's band) came by, seemed pleased at the big dance party I had going, and took pictures and video. And later that night, I ran into the 80's band's singer, and he told me how much he'd enjoyed my stuff, and as I was leaving the ship the next morning, the Cruise Director said he'd come by too and thought I was great. So I guess Nathan's job is safe...

I've been harboring a fantasy of actually getting a job on a cruise ship, but I can't figure out how to even audition for it. Their website shows audition schedules, but it's always for Broadway-type show people, never Guitar Guy. Nathan thinks that they do need people, but at random times, and to just keep checking. He says, "But if you want the job, you'll get the job" so he thinks that I'm good enough, I just need to get (video) auditioned. The Musical Director said that it's just by the website, but she gave me the name and email address of the guy in charge of Carnival's booking.

We'll see. But maybe we can just call this Enough to get it out of my system. If I had a Bucket List, this would definitely have been on it. But maybe it wouldn't be quite so much fun, day after day after day, for literally months on end.

Keith at Hospitality Night -- Friday, 02Dec2016

Laguna Beach has its "Hospitality Night" on the first Friday of December, when they close off their main street for a big "block party", and Santa comes by to light up the historic pepper tree in front of city hall. My friend in the Laguna Beach Historic Society has me come play from the front porch of their downtown historic bungalow headquarters, hoping to entice some passers-by to come in and look at their historic artifacts and photos.

And it certainly worked. Despite the cold Santa Ana winds, lots of people were out, and most of them stopped for a while to listen (sometimes pointedly crossing the street to do so). Fortunately, the wind graciously mostly died down while I was playing, coming back with a vengeance just as I was leaving and driving home.

I had someone to play for almost the whole time, and three or four times I had the entire sidewalk jammed with listeners. And I must have had a dozen groups stop to listen for a while, and then someone says, "You know, I've never been in here", and someone else, "Let's go in, then!", so it worked beautifully as a promo for the Historic Society.

Several times I had people come up onto the porch and sing along, softly. One lady seemed reasonably bold, so I asked her to sing the Girl Part to "Baby, It's Cold Outside", and she made a swing at it, but turned out to not actually know the tune outside of the first few lines. Oh well, fun for both of us anyway.

Anyway, it was fun -- and great to have a gig where I get to play the schmaltzy Christmas songs and people actually listen and appreciate it. I can't really do those at my nine Santa Claus gigs.

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 19Nov2016

It was clouded over and seemed like it was gonna get really cold -- which made for a great sunset, but I wasn't expecting many people to be out. But it wasn't too bad, and we had plenty of people come by, especially a lot of families with kids. I think I hit a new record of "Twinkle Twinkles" per evening.

One little baby lit up with a smile so big that her dad had to grab the pacifier before it fell out of her mouth. She was so small that I didn't really expect her to even recognize it, but nope, she was All In.

A big ol' cowboy came up and asked me to sing a song for his girlfriend back in New York (?) to show her how much he misses her. Wanted me to insert her name, "Billie Joey" into the song. Uhhh, what now? So I tried to think of a "missing you" song, but couldn't, and had him scan the list.

He went for "Carolina In My Mind", which, OK, at least the syllables line up, but it didn't really make much sense when I sang it as "Gone to Billie Joey in my mind". But he seemed happy with the video he took of it, and dropped, apparently, all the change in his pocket into the tip jar. Now we know what I'll do for a buck eighty-seven...

I'd worked up two new songs to try, and both worked pretty well. One was a bluegrass-tinged version of Bruce Springsteen's "I'm On Fire" that I stole from a YouTube video I stumbled upon. I've always liked that song, and I'm loving this version of it.

The other was "Seven Bridges Road" by the Eagles, which, for some reason, I've been asked for several times lately. The first and last verses are a capella five-part harmony, so I don't know why people keep thinking that there's any way a single guy could pull it off, but I guess it's flattering that they overestimate me to the point that they think I could.

But I decided to give it a go with the harmony box, not really expecting to get away with it, but it works, and it works *really* well. Indeed, the worst part of the song is the middle section where the flatpicked guitar comes in, and I'm terrible at flatpicking, so I'm faking/stumbling my way through it. But that might just be a matter of practice, and now I have a reason to.

Anyway, it's quite a rush to stand out there and just *sing*, unaccompanied and bald-faced. And not just "sing", but "belt". Dunno if it's exhilaration or fear, though. Is there a difference?

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 22Oct2016

I hadn't played down there in six weeks, so I was really looking forward to it. Of course it's way past tourist season, but we had people to play to the whole time.

Since my month off of performing, I feel a lot "looser". Surprisingly, I seem to have forgotten almost nothing about how to play the songs, but being so distant from the last time playing them has somehow given me a freedom to reinterpret them, and not play them identically to how I always have. It's hard to describe, but it's fun -- and, I think, more "musical". (Or, I suppose, less -- if what it is is just a newfound sloppiness...)

Anyway, Warren got there plenty early to make sure to get The Corner, called me with the good news and I got there and we were playing by 6:45. The early start turned out to be a very good thing because at 8:40, the beat cops came by to inform us that The Captain had decided to enforce the part of the city statute that prohibits amplifier use after 9pm. This is a real bummer since frequently it only gets really fun after nine, and we've been known to play well past midnight.

At least this didn't come down during the summer. As it is, the audience was starting to fade away anyway, but this will put a serious crimp in how much fun it is to play down there.

The funny part is that, in answer to Warren's query, the policewoman said that, yes, it was in response to complaints from the local businesses. Which is ludicrous, since they're all closed by 9pm, except the ice cream store that stays open as long as there are people buying ice cream, for which they are quite pleased to have us out there bringing people over.

I wonder how hard it is for a non-Laguna resident to get the city to change a law...

Keith in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 27Aug2016

When I pulled past the corner at 4:30, Chris the Catatonic Fiddle Player was there. But by the time I had parked and walked down there he was just leaving (though he reappeared about 8:00 to presumptuously demand a long string of requests. What was up with that?) I nabbed The Corner, but it meant that I started so early that the batteries died at 10. I suppose they did me a favor, cutting me off at 5 hours, but there were still people around...

Anyway, it was a pretty good night, I consistently had people around to play for but only any really big crowds a few times. (Warren had abandoned me for a band he wanted to see up at the Sawdust Festival. Me, I'm savagely boycotting the Sawdust because of my unexplained and unjustified black-balling. I'm sure they're feeling the sting.)

I did have a cute puppy, and one very successful “Let It Go” singalong. And one big teenage girl dance party and they dragged in some teenage boys from up the street a ways to dance to "Hey There, Delilah", "Don't Stop Believing" and more. That was fun.

But there was some potential new competition. A very large guy and very small lady walked by with a cart full of equipment: guitar, a full-size standup bass fiddle, amps, etc. They went down to the alley and played 60s rock 'n' roll. I heard "Magic Carpet Ride" and "Get Together". Complainin' Doug came by and he thought that they were pretty good, but I couldn't hear them from such a distance to know that for sure. I just have a bad feeling that they're yet another group angling to snag The Corner...

A lady came by and listen for a while and then came up and asked me if I play parties. I told her I did and she asked how much for how long and I told her. That seemed to meet her approval and she asked me to play at her mom's house party tomorrow evening. Unfortunately that's exactly when I already have a house party gig! I only play 10 parties a year -- how did this happen!?!

She wandered off but came back after a while and asked if I knew anybody else that could come and play. I told her, "Well, I play music, but I'm not really in any kid of "music players club..."

Later on, a guy came up and said that he had no cash, so he had liked my Facebook page instead. Cool -- that works for me.

And a funny old guy, snappily dressed in his tweed sports coat and straight from the Old Country, came right up and said, "I luff yer myuzeek! But! Do you know any... Bobe Die-len?" I do know a few, but they're really other people's versions of Dylan songs: "Mr. Tambourine Man" by The Byrds, and "Don't Think Twice" by Peter, Paul, and Mary, which is the one I did for him. Seemed to be sufficient, but I should probably try to find a song I can play more like ol' Bobe himself, just for these die hards.

Keith & Bobby at "Captains" -- Friday, 19Aug2016

I went to Minnesota for a week to visit my inexplicably-moved old music friend from high school. He managed to set us up a duo gig at the place he plays semi-regularly, whose name is variable, but usually some variant of "Captain's Lakeside Bar and Grill".

It was like nothing we have in California. Kind of a complex, with a ballroom with bar, a small restaurant, and a big patio. And a campground attached. And because it was Friday, a Meat Raffle where they raffle, like, meat. Every Friday. And people come out expressly to get in on the raffle. Of the meat.

Toto, I don't think we're in California anymore.

We played on the patio, and there were already some people there, and one nice lady who clapped loudly right from the first song, yelling "Awesome!" and such after each one. Other people came, and given a choice of sitting at tables far from us or right up close, most of them chose up close, which is flattering.

We started out in front of a little gazebo thing, but it started to rain, so we had to back up underneath it so we wouldn't kill our electronics or, you know, selves. Fortunately, the tables all had umbrellas, and this is Minnesota so nobody left because of the rain, or even seem to notice, really. What's a little rain when there's meat being raffled?

We did all songs from my book, since Bobby can follow and enhance anybody, and I'm useless. Sometimes he played bass, and sometimes the new guitar we'd bought on our road trip to his favorite gigantic guitar store over in Wisconsin. I struggled a little with the loaner not-my-guitar and its too-skinny neck, but mostly got away with it.

And people really seemed to like us, even though we weren't ('cuz I can't) doing country or bar songs. Bobby had warned me off of doing the really mellow stuff that's my forte, but as the evening progressed, it seemed that there was room for some of that, and as he began to relent on that stance, I started to cheat a bit.

Anyway, several people came up to say how good we sounded, and we got two (!) job offers, one of which Bobby signed up for on the spot, though only as a solo, obviously. Even the owner reportedly said that it was a shame that I don't live here 'cuz she'd like to have us back, and apparently she never compliments anybody.

Part way through we took a break (Bobby: Let's take a break. Me: What's a "break"?), and then Bobby decided to just let me play some more as a solo, which was fun too, mostly 'cuz I got to choose songs that he wouldn't have allowed if he was up there: "Fire and Rain", "Over the Rainbow", etc.

Anyway, it was easily the most-fun gig I've had in a long time, because of the wildly different venue, the incredible response (if smallish audience), and because it was a blast to be playing with Bobby again. And because even the Meat Raffle people liked us -- they came right up and said so.

K&W in Laguna Beach -- Saturday, 13Aug2016

When I got to the corner, the didgeridoo boys were there again, but this time, they were just setting up, not about to tear down. I shoulda just cut and run (to Dana Point), but Warren thought we might do OK on the no-longer-Fingerhut corner, so I set up there. He was wrong. Almost nobody stopped all night. And it put us too close to Charles, who screams into an all-treble amp along with his all-treble Telecaster, and new competition Uke Girl, who decided to set up in the alcove just up Forest. That put us at the nexus of three other bands, all no more than 50 feet away.

The only brief highlights were a lady and her boyfriend dancing away to several songs in a row, one little girl who danced in the cloud of my new bubble machine, and the arrival of the Elliot sisters (friends from high school) and their assorted husbands and brothers.

We also had an old Toshiba colleague who requested his favorite song (The Boxer) just as my microphone started acting up. We had actually accumulated a small crowd at that point (small, but the largest of the night), but after my 10 minutes of screwing around trying to figure out why it was fading in and out (a symptom I'd never seen before), they were all dispersed, except our friend. And after his song, he was gone, too, and we were left to play to only our reflections in the store window again.

The didgeridoo boys left around 10:00, and we moved over to the ice cream corner, hoping to get something going, but it was too late. We did have a *super* friendly kid who had stopped to admire the music while we were on the other side, and helped me move my stuff over -- but he left when Lena, a local bipolar lady, came by and started cussing him out for no reason at all. Indeed, her rantings got so out of hand that we just decided that enough was enough, and packed up to go home.