Tuesday Nite Blues
Okay. It's time to get this project underway.
I started playing the guitar when I was 16 years old. I had NO idea that it would become so central to my life. I know so many people today who play or have played instruments who have a very casual relationship with them this late in the game. Some of them are even in bands... it's just about havin' fun. Nothin' wrong with that.
I don't even pick up my guitar every day anymore... hell, sometimes it isn't more than once a week. Life is just... busy. Even so... I can't imagine life without it. It would be so... empty. Finding my "voice" has provided me with the means to give shape to the music in my soul, and nothing - short of some fairly serious brain damage - can ever take that away from me. It's a well of comfort lingering on the inside, applying regular pressure to reach the world outside. And occasionally... it must have its way.
Besides... whenever I realize that I haven't picked up my guitar for a few days, it feels kinda like I've been neglecting a girlfriend or something.
Captain Carl's Tuesday Nite Blues Band was a one-night show I put on in Dodge City before I moved here back in 2006. It was named for the weekly all-request blues hour I had on our classic rock station, and it was a free show to which I invited the listeners as a way to say goodbye to the community which I had become a part of, as a musician and as a local radio personality. This was the town that had supported me as an entertainer... they came to my shows, they listened to my radio show.... It was a cool little encore for me. I played a few Ask Vinnie shows in the summer and fall afterward, but that was the real kiss goodbye.
More than that, however, it was an opportunity to share the stage with a few of my favorite people. My brother and I had started our musical journey basically in tandem, playing in the same band back in 94/95. We recorded one song in a local studio, the first and last time I ever paid for studio time, and shared a single gig: a party at our rhythm player's father's place near Liberal. In all those years, we never ended up in the same project. We flirted with it now and then, as he continued to study and develop his chops as a drummer, but we just didn't have the time. This show was our chance to finally take the stage together as accomplished musicians... and I'm pretty sure it was his first "paying" gig (it was a free show, but we made a couple hundred dollars in tips).
My buddy Alydhian played the bass for us. It's not really his calling... he'd been a keyboard player in my first band back in the day, but he'd hadn't pursued it after the band broke up. He and I have been tight for more than 15 years, but while I continued to improve and require the accompaniment of steadily more accomplished colleagues, he did not. He does, however, have a natural talent for the bass guitar. A couple of times over the years, I've been able to hire him to fill in on relatively short notice. He would spend a few weeks cramming the material, learning it by rote, then do a passable job on stage. For this show, he consented to spend 60 days working his ass off to get the material down, most of which were new originals I was pumping out in the wake of my divorce and my burgeoning relationship with Roulette.
Miss B was one of my colleagues in Ask Vinnie, and is an amazing talent. Many of my songs were gender-neutral, and a few written specifically in exploration of the female perspective, where I was attempting to connect how I felt with how Roulette or my ex-wife might be feeling... This lady fell in love with my music and lent her voice to it in a way that made it instantly come to life. She listened to me prattle on about the themes woven into the songs, and injected the heart and soul it took to bring them out - love and fear and pain and all.
We rounded out the sound with the aid of an amazing gentleman who played the keys for Ask Vinnie, and we hit the ground running. It wasn't a perfect show... but it was a very rewarding experience.
Now it's time to take the original music I wrote for that show, and some of the original tunes I've labored over since, and immortalize them in the studio. I am once again going to pay for time in a real studio, and Skrat and Miss B are going to help me make a CD. My buddy Drew is gonna help us out with some basswork, and I'm gonna turn to one of my old colleagues from about 10 years back to lay down some keys. It's finally coming together. I've recorded songs on my own and contributed to other people's recordings, but never gone into the studio with a full album of my own original music, surrounded by some of my favorite people... and I'm a little overwhelmed. It's going to be expensive... that's always been one of the big deterrents. But I don't care. It's worth it.
And Roulette says its okay. *grins*
I don't know whether I'll ever get to do this sort of thing again, so I'm intending to document the entire process. I'll do weekly video blogs with rehearsal notes and updates on the project, maybe even occasional footage from the jam sessions, and then I'll take the camera into the studio and document the recording process. Real behind-the-scenes kinda stuff. It'll be fun.
Wish us luck!