art of the jam 48
with one more week to go until the one-year "jamniversary" of the wreck room's wednesday night ritual they call "lee and carl's invitational jam," jam-meister lee allen put together an evening tailor-made to remind folks that you never know what's gonna happen on wednesday night.
a couple of the reg'lars were missing in action: gtrist ron geida was visiting his old stompin' grounds of springfield, massachusetts (that's right, he's a red sox fan), while drummer joe "drumzilla" cruz took the night off due to an illness in his family. (hope it all turns out for the best, joe.) fw symphony violinist steve "vikingo" huber was on hand, but he'll be tipping out soon for a few weeks of travel 'n' adventure outside the environs of the fort.
all day long, the local muso community had been stirred up by the theft, from his car in the parking lot behind 7 eleven on berry street, of confusatron / electric mountain rotten apple gang / whatever-else-you-got bassist extraordinaire matt skates' instruments (that's right, you heard right -- both his fretless fender _and_ his stand-up). them was bahstidz what done it, but hopefully, matt's stolen axes will be recovered, and in the meantime, a bunch of his friends (starting with head rotten apple adam kobetich) have kicked in some dinero to help defray the cost of replacing these work tools. to that end, there was a jam at fred's with a buncha cats from groovin' outfits like confusatron, sleeplab, and barber mack who passed the hat for skates and stopped on a dime, pulled up stakes and relocated to the li'l wreck room when it started looking as if the weather was fixin' to turn foul.
between the half-dozen jamcats onstage, you had connections to maybe two dozen fort worth bands. there was drummer josh clark, getting his land-legs back after four months playing on a cruise boat. lately, he's been playing with skates brothers matt 'n' andrew in caffeine chemistry (the band formerly known as c.s.s.), and was the logical choice to fill the drum chair when john shook started putting together barber mack. for his part, new bandleader shook's also been playing bass with hard-luck country-rockers jasper stone (most recent instance: they were playing fred's patio when the cafe went up in flames). pianist-vocalist james norris is in five bands (and counting): the jazzy james and myles, the bluesy standard transmission (the band formerly known as trouble in mind, who appear to have become the de facto house band at the new black dog), the samba-y sleeplab (whose leader jeffa was also on hand for the jam), and miscellaneous weirdo outfits brownbeef and gelfling supervisor, about whom i should prolly know more but don't. there was also a gtrist named cameron whom i'd never heard before and doubtless plays with someone. whew! inspahrd by the presence of this diverse array of players, the jam-meister dug deep in his bag of grooves and led them down several obscure but fascinating improvisational rabbitholes.
as the witching hour approached, the stage was cleared to make room for stoogeaphilia -- of all things, an iggy & the stooges coverband consisting of me-thinks frontguy ray liberio, goodwin / underground railroad / pablo and the hemphill 7 bassist matt hembree, great tyrant drummer jon teague, and yr humble chronicler o' events on gtr. making our debut, i believe we played with a fair amount of energy and conviction, the civilians 'n' fellow musos were unable to detect the minute amount of clamblow (an advantage of playing repertoire with which most folks in the house were prolly unfamiliar), and a good dirty time was had by all. hembree checked in today to inform me that "i've got blisters under my calluses on my right hand. that hasn't happened in years. rawk'll do that to ya, i guess." if you missed, we be doin' it again thursday, may 18th, at the black dog. thanx 'n' a tip o' the hat to the jam-meister for lettin' us break the seal on his night, and to james for playin' one-fingered pianner on "i wanna be your dog."
so anyway, next week is the "jamniversary." if you're a muso / singer / spoken word artiste who's ever performed at the jam, c'mon out 'n' do it agin, why doncha? and if you're a civilian, especially one who's never been, trust me, you owe it to yourself. you really never do know what's gonna happen on wednesday night.
a couple of the reg'lars were missing in action: gtrist ron geida was visiting his old stompin' grounds of springfield, massachusetts (that's right, he's a red sox fan), while drummer joe "drumzilla" cruz took the night off due to an illness in his family. (hope it all turns out for the best, joe.) fw symphony violinist steve "vikingo" huber was on hand, but he'll be tipping out soon for a few weeks of travel 'n' adventure outside the environs of the fort.
all day long, the local muso community had been stirred up by the theft, from his car in the parking lot behind 7 eleven on berry street, of confusatron / electric mountain rotten apple gang / whatever-else-you-got bassist extraordinaire matt skates' instruments (that's right, you heard right -- both his fretless fender _and_ his stand-up). them was bahstidz what done it, but hopefully, matt's stolen axes will be recovered, and in the meantime, a bunch of his friends (starting with head rotten apple adam kobetich) have kicked in some dinero to help defray the cost of replacing these work tools. to that end, there was a jam at fred's with a buncha cats from groovin' outfits like confusatron, sleeplab, and barber mack who passed the hat for skates and stopped on a dime, pulled up stakes and relocated to the li'l wreck room when it started looking as if the weather was fixin' to turn foul.
between the half-dozen jamcats onstage, you had connections to maybe two dozen fort worth bands. there was drummer josh clark, getting his land-legs back after four months playing on a cruise boat. lately, he's been playing with skates brothers matt 'n' andrew in caffeine chemistry (the band formerly known as c.s.s.), and was the logical choice to fill the drum chair when john shook started putting together barber mack. for his part, new bandleader shook's also been playing bass with hard-luck country-rockers jasper stone (most recent instance: they were playing fred's patio when the cafe went up in flames). pianist-vocalist james norris is in five bands (and counting): the jazzy james and myles, the bluesy standard transmission (the band formerly known as trouble in mind, who appear to have become the de facto house band at the new black dog), the samba-y sleeplab (whose leader jeffa was also on hand for the jam), and miscellaneous weirdo outfits brownbeef and gelfling supervisor, about whom i should prolly know more but don't. there was also a gtrist named cameron whom i'd never heard before and doubtless plays with someone. whew! inspahrd by the presence of this diverse array of players, the jam-meister dug deep in his bag of grooves and led them down several obscure but fascinating improvisational rabbitholes.
as the witching hour approached, the stage was cleared to make room for stoogeaphilia -- of all things, an iggy & the stooges coverband consisting of me-thinks frontguy ray liberio, goodwin / underground railroad / pablo and the hemphill 7 bassist matt hembree, great tyrant drummer jon teague, and yr humble chronicler o' events on gtr. making our debut, i believe we played with a fair amount of energy and conviction, the civilians 'n' fellow musos were unable to detect the minute amount of clamblow (an advantage of playing repertoire with which most folks in the house were prolly unfamiliar), and a good dirty time was had by all. hembree checked in today to inform me that "i've got blisters under my calluses on my right hand. that hasn't happened in years. rawk'll do that to ya, i guess." if you missed, we be doin' it again thursday, may 18th, at the black dog. thanx 'n' a tip o' the hat to the jam-meister for lettin' us break the seal on his night, and to james for playin' one-fingered pianner on "i wanna be your dog."
so anyway, next week is the "jamniversary." if you're a muso / singer / spoken word artiste who's ever performed at the jam, c'mon out 'n' do it agin, why doncha? and if you're a civilian, especially one who's never been, trust me, you owe it to yourself. you really never do know what's gonna happen on wednesday night.
posted by stashdauber at 8:01 PM
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