May 20, 2006
Hello, Kitty
Norm Chomsky's first gig went ok—when Selber and I were in grad school, we ignored all that overwrought focus on "pass with honor" and "pass with high honor" for our exams and maintained a strict policy of "pass without embarrassment."
Norm Chomsky passed without embarrassment (although I had to explain that the real Noam Chomsky wasn't there to a couple of people). We spent most of yesterday and today rehearsing, setting up on a porch to play out to an audience on the lawn and near a bonfire. We set up a JBL PA system, several monitors, several amps, three mics, and two mixers. Then we tested an infinite number of variations of mixes among the amps, drums, and PA system to get all the wrinkles ironed out.
On the way to the party, Underdog said, "I can't believe you didn't set rain date."
So today, it rained. The Weather Channel actually predicted hail, so I guess we got off easy. It was only in the low 40s. (Welcome to late May in the North Country.) Several dozen people actually stood out on the lawn, in the near-freezing rain, for the whole show, and clapped and yelled.
I think they were holding up lighters, but the rain was snuffing them out. (The rest of our audience gathered in the house and gave out muffled claps occasionally, and later told us they'd like our muffled sounds.)
But mainly I posted this pic to show the new "Hello, Kitty" guitar strap I bought last week. ($13.99 from Musician's Friend.)
(I'm not sure what song I'm singing here, but it's either the Woody Guthrie/Billy Bragg/Wilco "All You Fascists Are Bound to Lose" or Camper Van Beethoven's "Take the Skinheads Bowling".) There are a couple more pics at my Flickr site; I'll post some more later after I get OKs from my bandmates.
Posted by johndanseven at May 20, 2006 02:06 AM