Shinybass journal entry 06-17-13

Good morning, sunshine.

Literally.  In our new house, my music room faces East, so I am greeted by the sun every day I am home.  Attempting to break all musician stereotypes, I am up at 6 every day I am home, and enjoy having my retinas burned out by the incoming solar energy.  (And as a side note, I am not breaking any musician stereotypes at all – I know lots of players up this early, too).  The energy the sun brings to my music room is pretty infectious, for it is completely illuminated all morning, without throwing one switch.  Its a stark contrast from the light-blocking curtains of the bus.  You can stay in your bunk all day and not know what time it is.  It’s like a casino, really, but much smaller and with worse payout odds, although the amount of alcohol served can be the same, if desired.

Getting back on my blog horse has been great for me, and although a couple weeks off is hardly a Last Crusade/Crystal Skull gap, but at the same time, it was both a nice break and a welcome return. Not only from you the reader, but for my brain, which needed the release.  And thank you for the mad stats on my site last week.  It means a lot when I have more clicks (cliques) than an East Nashville hot chicken festival.  (That one is too hip for even the hipsters).

We’ve been on the road promoting the hell out of Love is Alive, which is Phil’s new single.  It is climbing the charts, which is a good thing, and our push of shows is really helping.  Looking ahead at the schedule, and we are hitting so many great places, including a couple of shows in Canada in the coming weeks, including a show with Little Big Town and Kenny Chesney on Prince Edward Island.  I’m OK with destinations like that.  But no good deed goes unpunished.  For every beach, it seems, we get one desert, and for every metropolitan area, we get one cow town.  So it goes.

This past week’s run was no exception.  We started with a little promo on WGN where I was watching JDawg make faces off camera as I was ON camera.  That’s always fun.  More importantly, we saw the bubble machines where they draw the Illinois lottery (or the ‘numbers’ as the illegal bookies call it), and in our green room we found local delicacies and Harry Caray.  Not a bad afternoon at all.  The mood was really fun and lighthearted, and we played a lot of silly covers in our sound check time – every thing from Bee Gees to the ‘ballad-y’ years of Chicago.  It was a good day, then it was made even better when I had dinner with my ‘unofficial’ flight instructor and his family.  A perfect ending to a great day.

The next day took us a few hours down the road to the 8 Seconds Saloon in Indianapolis.  I’ve played 8 Seconds a few times now, and the crappiest part of the gig is the location.  The closest hotels (with or without illegal activity going down) are about 15 minutes away, and there is nothing to see close to the venue.  This means when I see it on the calendar, I know I will be on site all day long.  And so was the case on Thursday.  Even though I am a free man, I felt like I was in lock up – I was doing pushups and squats in the dressing room.  Anything to pass the time… The raucous crowd was a good ending to the long day, and even though I was tired, Animal House was on TV, so, there went any chance of an early slumber.

I awoke on Saturday to the wide open plains of Kansas, which is a beautiful place when the sun is coming up.  The small farms that line the highway were a stark contrast from the asphalt of the day before.  Our bus wheels eased in to Mayetta, which is north of Topeka for a show with Mark Miller and the rest of the boys from Sawyer Brown.  It was good to see those guys again, and there was brief talk of Mark, J Dawg and I starting a band of bald guys.  That was all of 10 seconds.  Right Said Fred already tried that.  And since we WERE at a casino, I had to donate to the Indian Ranch Electricity Fund.  You are welcome, break room – you can keep the Coke machines on for a day with my losses.

We made it home about noon, and my day was as domestic as could be.  I made my Father’s Day calls, and spent a lot of time either buying, returning, or buying and returning things for the house.  Good times indeed.

So there’s the week that was.  Coming soon we have Summerfest, another Chicago show, and of course the Canadian push.  Looking ahead, there’s a couple of East Coast swings, West Coast swings, and maybe even some baseball swings in our future.  One can only hope.  The lawn beckons, as do the rest of the boxes in the garage.  There’s something to be said for becoming a monk with no worldly possessions.  After moving all mine a few times, I started trying on robes just for size.

See you on the road!