Guitar
Wow. 2013 is all but over and I can't believe all the plot twists that developed and defined what was a landmark, watershed year for me.
The biggest development was really the lack thereof: my wife and I had planned to move to the city of Bath in the south of England in September. Flights were booked, the local rentals listings were regularly scoured, a visa application was moving forward and my heart was in my throat. I've lived in British Columbia all my life and have been a resident of Vancouver since I moved here at the age of eighteen, in 1988. My music career was birthed here in 1989 and I've been active on the local scene with only the briefest of pauses, since. As a result, almost everyone I know and hold dear is here (or close by) and losing that community was terrifying to me.
There was also the looming question of the cost of the whole enterprise; moving the whole family to another country was going to be costly, regardless of how many belongings we jettisoned. I was planning to leave with the tiny bit of clothing I actually wear, my music gear and little else beyond cooking supplies. Both my wife and I would be starting from scratch career-wise, and I knew the next couple of years would be of building a reputation from scratch, with little money to show for it. I couldn't figure out how we'd be able to pay rent and feed ourselves, particularly with my wife planning to attend university.
In the end it turned out that British universities considered my wife a foreign student, despite her citizenship and nationality; she'd been out of the country too long. This situation, paired with my growing work schedule eventually resulted in us pulling the plug on the plan during the summer. Oh, the relief. I can't even describe it.
But let's back up a little and take a look at some other defining events of the past year.
Last year started, as per usual, with me ringing in the New Year on a bandstand, in this case the beautiful Gastown gastro-pub the Pourhouse with the Poorboy Trio, a group formed for the purpose of playing that venue and comprised of my soul-brothers Huggybear (harmonica, melodica, ukulele, whistles, flute and once-in-a-blue-moon, guitar) and Pat Darcus on upright bass. We've grown to have a fantastic rapport with that venue and its excellent staff and we had a barnburner of a show that night, complete with me walking the bar, guitar all a-wail. In truth, I feel guilty that I'm not playing there tonight for New Years, but I had a prior commitment.
Throughout January I had a steady weekend gig at the Beaver and Mullet, a cool little pub at Vancouver's beautiful English Bay. This was a significant development for me, as I hadn't had a steady solo gig for about a year and a half and had pretty much given up hope. Although the Beav would close it's doors in March, it provided me with a jolly and inviting venue to tighten up my solo arranging skills and give me the confidence to move forward with that element of my career. I still miss the staff and regulars of that place; thanks to all of you guys for making the front end of my year so enjoyable and enriching. And thanks for all the drinks!
The confidence I gained at the Beaver helped out a great deal when I was contacted to play a solo blues brunch on Granville Island, a gig I continue to do monthly. Other gigs of note that month include Hurricane and the Hooligans first gig at Fanclub (the replacement for the temporarily closed Yale Hotel, Vancouver's home of the blues for, like ever), and my second-ever gig with the excellent Wendy Biscuit.
February was quite busy for a February; I played with the Hooligans, the Poor Boy Trio and Leonard and the Lab Rats as well as a few solo gigs and a duo with with my friend, Rachel Davis called Joni Baloney, which was an unrehearsed Joni Mitchell tribute - terrifying and immensely gratifying in one fell swoop. The Lab Rats gig was the first of my monthly special-guest appearances, which would continue until the unfortunate and premature demise of Huggybear/Leonard's excellent Pat's Pub jam session later in the year.
March was the first truly crazy-busy month of the year with nineteen gigs on the calendar. March was really all about the Hooligans, as the very busy Dave 'Hurricane' Hoerl had managed to book us for a local weekender, as well as an Alberta tour featuring two shows (and a memorable jam-session) in Calgary and nine shows over seven days in Edmonton. Naturally we were hit with a blizzard during the voyage; no trip to Alberta would be complete without some extreme weather. Regular readers will remember that I cohost a jam at Vancouver's Princeton Pub on Tuesdays - well, despite the tour schedule, I managed to only miss one Tuesday in March.
April opened up with a really fun show at my old stomping grounds, the Fairview Pub. I performed with the excellent Wendy Biscuit for her CD release party and then closed the night with the longest running/special-to-me group I'm involved in - Sandybone and the Breakdown, newly armed with the great jazz drummer John Nolan behind the kit. John lifts the band up to new heights and is an inspiration in many ways, not least of which is his quick ears and intuitive sense during the most oddball musical moments. Thank you John.
April also featured solo shows at the Beaver and Mullet and the Dockside Lounge, regular Tuesdays at the Princeton, a guest spot with Leonard and the Lab Rats at the Pat's Pub jam, and the first two of a fairly short lived jam at a joint in Kitsilano I won't honour by naming. Cheap prick.
May saw the sad end to the Beaver and Mullet, which was sold to corporate-pub whores the Donnelly Group, who evidently plan to own every bar in the city and turn them all to crap. I didn't even try to keep the gig under the new regime; I did my time in the corporate hospitality world and I'll never go back.
May also saw the Hooligans entering the studio to work on Dave Hoerl's 'Untwisted' solo album. We'd been honed to a fine point with a busy two months and were able to record eight great beds for the album in one ten hour session. Kudos to Chip Hart and Roger Brant for their poise under the glare of the red light. I went home after the session and did four more hours of preproduction for the next day's overdub session and was able to nail pretty much everything first take, playing baritone, lap steel (in two different tunings) and standard guitar. I went in a couple of weeks later to do a couple of things we missed, but was finished with the album in about sixteen hours of studio time altogether. You can look forward to the new album this summer? Soonish? You know how these things go...
I had the opportunity to play the now-sadly-demised Jazz Cellar with Wendy Biscuit in May, the first of two shows in the club this year. It's closing tomorrow I believe. What a way to ring in the New Year...
June, very strangely, was the slowest month of the year. That is not normal. That is weird. The month was not without its highlights, however, one of which was the seventh anniversary of the End of the Line Jam session I cohost with my best of pals, the inimitable Sandybone, with whom I will be ringing in the New Year this evening at said venue. Much thanks to Les for keeping us around and putting up with our antics (and the previous sentence).
Very notably in June I began my next regular solo gig. I was called out of the blue by an agency I hadn't worked with since the nineties to do a lounge solo at a boutique hotel downtown, and was immediately a hit with staff and customers both. I continue to entertain there pretty much weekly. Thanks to all involved.
Toward the end of June Sandybone packed us all up for a quick tour of the local islands. The Breakdown broke it down for a couple of nights on Pender Island, an afternooner on Mayne Island (so hungover, sorry buddy...), followed by a really groovy show in Victoria on Vancouver Island on the first of July; happy Canada Day!
July was similarly a little more restrained than average, but we had a lot of family things to do, so that was a blessing. I enjoyed two steady gigs a week, as well as a hilarious guitar-summit type guest spot with local legend James 'Buddy' Rogers (many giggles and wacky lickage indeed), and a great show with Sandybone and the Breakdown at the Dewdney Pub. Both gigs were indicative of one of the themes of 2013; the emergence of the Fraser Valley as a bastion of culture. Honestly, I drove out to the 'burbs to work more often this year than ever before.
The most exciting moment of July also took place out that way. Sandybone and the Breakdown performed at the Harrison Festival of the Arts in early July, a prestigious gig for us to snag. We made a mad rush to the Festival in our usual style, and had our drummer show up at the last possible minute. Just when we were getting into our groove and getting happy, we saw every head in the audience snap over to streetside. Twenty feet from the stage some twenty-something wastehead had driven his shiny new Toyota Land Cruiser into a family of four walking on a sidewalk a 'safe' distance from the road. This all happened just out of my line of sight and I was pretty mystified until the MC came and made the announcement that no one had been killed. We played on as every emergency vehicle in the Fraser Valley screamed into the quaint little lakefront, mountain-nestled town. At one point I thought Sandy's amp was bust, but it turned out there was a helicopter right over our heads. Geez, what a gig. The MC said he thought of the band on the Titanic, blithely playing on while the ship went down.
August is when the year really kicked into gear (a long loping one with a lotta' gas behind it). Nigel Mack arrived in town for his annual west coast visit/tour and once again pressed me into service. Altogether I played twenty-two gigs in August, eleven of them with Nigel. Honestly, there were so many shows that month that it's hard to pick one to talk about. All in all a great month. Thanks Nigel, lookin' forward to the Calgary Blues Festival this summer!
September slowed somewhat, with sixteen shows, leavened somewhat by the excitement of my boy's fourth birthday and a visit to the Vancouver Guitar Show (which I was too lazy to do a blog post about). It was a month of profound relief for me, as I reflected on the near miss of moving to England. Indeed, as the tickets had already been purchased, my wife and son departed for the UK for a family visit in mid September, leaving me to be a bit lonely during the slowest two weeks I'd had since June. It's good to miss your loved ones now and then; it helps us not take them for granted.
Rachel Davis and I once again tackled the Joni Mitchell songbook at the Fairview on the first of the month. A memorial performance for an old friend was a bittersweet affair, as I said goodbye to one and hello to some old friends and some new ones, notably some jazzers I'd admired from afar for many years. Hearing kind words from them about my playing was humbling, to say the least.
I again found myself out in the Fraser Valley, this time playing the super-cool Porter's Coffee House in Langley twice in one week; first with more guitaristic hilarity with James 'Buddy' Rogers, then with the Hooligans two days later. Porter's is an old general store that stills sells rock-candy, as well as local art and arts and crafts (yes, they're different). The couple that run it also run an excellent restaurant out of the space and have live music several days of the week. Kudos to them for their vision, dedication and execution.
October held strong at seventeen shows, including Pat's Pub, the Pourhouse, the Kingfisher in Maple Ridge and three shows at a groovy little oyster bar in my hometown of White Rock. As has been the case of late, there were less band performances and a goodly amount of solo shows. It was around this time that I entered the world of live looping, looking to bring a little variety to my solo show.
November clocked in at fifteen shows, including Sandybone and the Breakdown performances at the Backstage Lounge and the Railway Club (suddenly the subject of much controversy), a weekend at North Vancouver's venerable Rusty Gull with Hurricane and the Hooligans (I love joints that never change. Thanks Rusty Gull!), a Pourhouse/Poorboy Trio show and another Hooligans date at the Kingfisher, (now a monthly venture, check their calendar). And of course a whack of solo gigs.
But the most thrilling development for me during November was the formation of the first rock band I've played in since the early/mid nineties. Good old Craigslist put me in contact of some fella's who wanted to play my wish-list of influences: Thirteenth Floor Elevators, the Stooges, the Sonics, the Kinks, old AC/DC. We got in touch, got to jamming and are working hard at getting our act together. Not much to report as yet (baby steps as yet), but I have to say that after screaming my fool head off and smacking my guitar around a bit with these guys, I wake up the next morning feeling light and beautiful, the weight of the world lifted from my shoulders. I look forward to the next year with this group.
And here we are in the dying minutes and hours of December and the year. December rang in at a dizzying twenty-two shows, the busiest of the year, with all the Christmas shopping, holidaying and my wedding anniversary (beautiful night, thank you baby!) crammed in between. I began playing a Sunday afternoon show at the awesome Funky Winkerbean's Pub, that will be weekly for the foreseeable future. The band is Martin Eade on drums, the inimitable Leonard/Huggybear on the myriad instruments he plays (see above), and myself on guitar/slide/baritone guitar, and we're laying down some seriously gritty blues for the seriously gritty Downtown Eastside. We're going to have some fun down there, so you make sure you come and partake.
Tonight it's off to the Princeton Pub to ring in the New Year. I'm going to leave for work in a couple of hours and need to eat and bathe before I go, so this post will not be complete with links or much of an edit. I've been banging this out for the last couple of hours fuelled by too much coffee and weed and it's almost time to sign off. I realize that the gearheads haven't really got much to chew on in this article, but it's telling of my focus this year; the gear is cool, but its just a tool for getting out and playing, and I'm much more concerned with the music than the tools. I did start using the baritone in performance and am purchasing the Bass VI that Mike from Eastwood Guitars
sent me. I'm sure there's much more I could write about, perhaps at a later date?
As for now I look forward to taking the stage with some of my best friends (and my wife!) and playing some music for some of my other best friends and family. Life couldn't be much better, indeed.
If you're in town, I hope to see you tonight. If not, I'll take this time to wish you a very happy new year and all the best looking ahead.
Double D
- Ephemera And Updates.
Howdy all. It's been awhile since I've posted and as usual this is for the best reason: I'm really busy making music, as opposed to just obsessing about it. Sandybone and me from a previous island journey. This last...
- It's Been A Year!
On with the show!! It seems like just yesterday I began this little experiment, this little guitar-zine, this blog. In fact it's been one year and I cannot believe that the worldwide response to my disjointed ramblings has been so warm...
- Tony Robertson- Six Strings Down
Tony Robertson. We'll miss you, buddy. It was with a heavy heart that I learned my old friend Tony Robertson had passed away this past weekend. Tony succumbed to a bone marrow illness after a long and brave fight. I first met Tony...
- Ephemera And Updates
Garnet Stencil head. 4x10 open-back cabinet comes this week! Lookout Vancouver! Hello everybody. Once again I have let a significant period of time go by without posting anything new. I know how much this makes me crazy when I'm...
- Prinny, Six Years In- Update!
Just a little post to remind those readers in the Vancouver area that Sandybone and I are celebrating our sixth year anniversary of hosting the End of the Line Jam at the Princeton Pub (1901 Powell St.), on Tuesday, June 19th! Who'da'...
Guitar
2013 - A Year in Review
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The biggest development was really the lack thereof: my wife and I had planned to move to the city of Bath in the south of England in September. Flights were booked, the local rentals listings were regularly scoured, a visa application was moving forward and my heart was in my throat. I've lived in British Columbia all my life and have been a resident of Vancouver since I moved here at the age of eighteen, in 1988. My music career was birthed here in 1989 and I've been active on the local scene with only the briefest of pauses, since. As a result, almost everyone I know and hold dear is here (or close by) and losing that community was terrifying to me.
There was also the looming question of the cost of the whole enterprise; moving the whole family to another country was going to be costly, regardless of how many belongings we jettisoned. I was planning to leave with the tiny bit of clothing I actually wear, my music gear and little else beyond cooking supplies. Both my wife and I would be starting from scratch career-wise, and I knew the next couple of years would be of building a reputation from scratch, with little money to show for it. I couldn't figure out how we'd be able to pay rent and feed ourselves, particularly with my wife planning to attend university.
In the end it turned out that British universities considered my wife a foreign student, despite her citizenship and nationality; she'd been out of the country too long. This situation, paired with my growing work schedule eventually resulted in us pulling the plug on the plan during the summer. Oh, the relief. I can't even describe it.
But let's back up a little and take a look at some other defining events of the past year.
Last year started, as per usual, with me ringing in the New Year on a bandstand, in this case the beautiful Gastown gastro-pub the Pourhouse with the Poorboy Trio, a group formed for the purpose of playing that venue and comprised of my soul-brothers Huggybear (harmonica, melodica, ukulele, whistles, flute and once-in-a-blue-moon, guitar) and Pat Darcus on upright bass. We've grown to have a fantastic rapport with that venue and its excellent staff and we had a barnburner of a show that night, complete with me walking the bar, guitar all a-wail. In truth, I feel guilty that I'm not playing there tonight for New Years, but I had a prior commitment.
Throughout January I had a steady weekend gig at the Beaver and Mullet, a cool little pub at Vancouver's beautiful English Bay. This was a significant development for me, as I hadn't had a steady solo gig for about a year and a half and had pretty much given up hope. Although the Beav would close it's doors in March, it provided me with a jolly and inviting venue to tighten up my solo arranging skills and give me the confidence to move forward with that element of my career. I still miss the staff and regulars of that place; thanks to all of you guys for making the front end of my year so enjoyable and enriching. And thanks for all the drinks!
The confidence I gained at the Beaver helped out a great deal when I was contacted to play a solo blues brunch on Granville Island, a gig I continue to do monthly. Other gigs of note that month include Hurricane and the Hooligans first gig at Fanclub (the replacement for the temporarily closed Yale Hotel, Vancouver's home of the blues for, like ever), and my second-ever gig with the excellent Wendy Biscuit.
February was quite busy for a February; I played with the Hooligans, the Poor Boy Trio and Leonard and the Lab Rats as well as a few solo gigs and a duo with with my friend, Rachel Davis called Joni Baloney, which was an unrehearsed Joni Mitchell tribute - terrifying and immensely gratifying in one fell swoop. The Lab Rats gig was the first of my monthly special-guest appearances, which would continue until the unfortunate and premature demise of Huggybear/Leonard's excellent Pat's Pub jam session later in the year.
March was the first truly crazy-busy month of the year with nineteen gigs on the calendar. March was really all about the Hooligans, as the very busy Dave 'Hurricane' Hoerl had managed to book us for a local weekender, as well as an Alberta tour featuring two shows (and a memorable jam-session) in Calgary and nine shows over seven days in Edmonton. Naturally we were hit with a blizzard during the voyage; no trip to Alberta would be complete without some extreme weather. Regular readers will remember that I cohost a jam at Vancouver's Princeton Pub on Tuesdays - well, despite the tour schedule, I managed to only miss one Tuesday in March.
April opened up with a really fun show at my old stomping grounds, the Fairview Pub. I performed with the excellent Wendy Biscuit for her CD release party and then closed the night with the longest running/special-to-me group I'm involved in - Sandybone and the Breakdown, newly armed with the great jazz drummer John Nolan behind the kit. John lifts the band up to new heights and is an inspiration in many ways, not least of which is his quick ears and intuitive sense during the most oddball musical moments. Thank you John.
April also featured solo shows at the Beaver and Mullet and the Dockside Lounge, regular Tuesdays at the Princeton, a guest spot with Leonard and the Lab Rats at the Pat's Pub jam, and the first two of a fairly short lived jam at a joint in Kitsilano I won't honour by naming. Cheap prick.
May saw the sad end to the Beaver and Mullet, which was sold to corporate-pub whores the Donnelly Group, who evidently plan to own every bar in the city and turn them all to crap. I didn't even try to keep the gig under the new regime; I did my time in the corporate hospitality world and I'll never go back.
May also saw the Hooligans entering the studio to work on Dave Hoerl's 'Untwisted' solo album. We'd been honed to a fine point with a busy two months and were able to record eight great beds for the album in one ten hour session. Kudos to Chip Hart and Roger Brant for their poise under the glare of the red light. I went home after the session and did four more hours of preproduction for the next day's overdub session and was able to nail pretty much everything first take, playing baritone, lap steel (in two different tunings) and standard guitar. I went in a couple of weeks later to do a couple of things we missed, but was finished with the album in about sixteen hours of studio time altogether. You can look forward to the new album this summer? Soonish? You know how these things go...
I had the opportunity to play the now-sadly-demised Jazz Cellar with Wendy Biscuit in May, the first of two shows in the club this year. It's closing tomorrow I believe. What a way to ring in the New Year...
June, very strangely, was the slowest month of the year. That is not normal. That is weird. The month was not without its highlights, however, one of which was the seventh anniversary of the End of the Line Jam session I cohost with my best of pals, the inimitable Sandybone, with whom I will be ringing in the New Year this evening at said venue. Much thanks to Les for keeping us around and putting up with our antics (and the previous sentence).
Very notably in June I began my next regular solo gig. I was called out of the blue by an agency I hadn't worked with since the nineties to do a lounge solo at a boutique hotel downtown, and was immediately a hit with staff and customers both. I continue to entertain there pretty much weekly. Thanks to all involved.
Toward the end of June Sandybone packed us all up for a quick tour of the local islands. The Breakdown broke it down for a couple of nights on Pender Island, an afternooner on Mayne Island (so hungover, sorry buddy...), followed by a really groovy show in Victoria on Vancouver Island on the first of July; happy Canada Day!
July was similarly a little more restrained than average, but we had a lot of family things to do, so that was a blessing. I enjoyed two steady gigs a week, as well as a hilarious guitar-summit type guest spot with local legend James 'Buddy' Rogers (many giggles and wacky lickage indeed), and a great show with Sandybone and the Breakdown at the Dewdney Pub. Both gigs were indicative of one of the themes of 2013; the emergence of the Fraser Valley as a bastion of culture. Honestly, I drove out to the 'burbs to work more often this year than ever before.
The most exciting moment of July also took place out that way. Sandybone and the Breakdown performed at the Harrison Festival of the Arts in early July, a prestigious gig for us to snag. We made a mad rush to the Festival in our usual style, and had our drummer show up at the last possible minute. Just when we were getting into our groove and getting happy, we saw every head in the audience snap over to streetside. Twenty feet from the stage some twenty-something wastehead had driven his shiny new Toyota Land Cruiser into a family of four walking on a sidewalk a 'safe' distance from the road. This all happened just out of my line of sight and I was pretty mystified until the MC came and made the announcement that no one had been killed. We played on as every emergency vehicle in the Fraser Valley screamed into the quaint little lakefront, mountain-nestled town. At one point I thought Sandy's amp was bust, but it turned out there was a helicopter right over our heads. Geez, what a gig. The MC said he thought of the band on the Titanic, blithely playing on while the ship went down.
August is when the year really kicked into gear (a long loping one with a lotta' gas behind it). Nigel Mack arrived in town for his annual west coast visit/tour and once again pressed me into service. Altogether I played twenty-two gigs in August, eleven of them with Nigel. Honestly, there were so many shows that month that it's hard to pick one to talk about. All in all a great month. Thanks Nigel, lookin' forward to the Calgary Blues Festival this summer!
September slowed somewhat, with sixteen shows, leavened somewhat by the excitement of my boy's fourth birthday and a visit to the Vancouver Guitar Show (which I was too lazy to do a blog post about). It was a month of profound relief for me, as I reflected on the near miss of moving to England. Indeed, as the tickets had already been purchased, my wife and son departed for the UK for a family visit in mid September, leaving me to be a bit lonely during the slowest two weeks I'd had since June. It's good to miss your loved ones now and then; it helps us not take them for granted.
Rachel Davis and I once again tackled the Joni Mitchell songbook at the Fairview on the first of the month. A memorial performance for an old friend was a bittersweet affair, as I said goodbye to one and hello to some old friends and some new ones, notably some jazzers I'd admired from afar for many years. Hearing kind words from them about my playing was humbling, to say the least.
I again found myself out in the Fraser Valley, this time playing the super-cool Porter's Coffee House in Langley twice in one week; first with more guitaristic hilarity with James 'Buddy' Rogers, then with the Hooligans two days later. Porter's is an old general store that stills sells rock-candy, as well as local art and arts and crafts (yes, they're different). The couple that run it also run an excellent restaurant out of the space and have live music several days of the week. Kudos to them for their vision, dedication and execution.
October held strong at seventeen shows, including Pat's Pub, the Pourhouse, the Kingfisher in Maple Ridge and three shows at a groovy little oyster bar in my hometown of White Rock. As has been the case of late, there were less band performances and a goodly amount of solo shows. It was around this time that I entered the world of live looping, looking to bring a little variety to my solo show.
November clocked in at fifteen shows, including Sandybone and the Breakdown performances at the Backstage Lounge and the Railway Club (suddenly the subject of much controversy), a weekend at North Vancouver's venerable Rusty Gull with Hurricane and the Hooligans (I love joints that never change. Thanks Rusty Gull!), a Pourhouse/Poorboy Trio show and another Hooligans date at the Kingfisher, (now a monthly venture, check their calendar). And of course a whack of solo gigs.
But the most thrilling development for me during November was the formation of the first rock band I've played in since the early/mid nineties. Good old Craigslist put me in contact of some fella's who wanted to play my wish-list of influences: Thirteenth Floor Elevators, the Stooges, the Sonics, the Kinks, old AC/DC. We got in touch, got to jamming and are working hard at getting our act together. Not much to report as yet (baby steps as yet), but I have to say that after screaming my fool head off and smacking my guitar around a bit with these guys, I wake up the next morning feeling light and beautiful, the weight of the world lifted from my shoulders. I look forward to the next year with this group.
And here we are in the dying minutes and hours of December and the year. December rang in at a dizzying twenty-two shows, the busiest of the year, with all the Christmas shopping, holidaying and my wedding anniversary (beautiful night, thank you baby!) crammed in between. I began playing a Sunday afternoon show at the awesome Funky Winkerbean's Pub, that will be weekly for the foreseeable future. The band is Martin Eade on drums, the inimitable Leonard/Huggybear on the myriad instruments he plays (see above), and myself on guitar/slide/baritone guitar, and we're laying down some seriously gritty blues for the seriously gritty Downtown Eastside. We're going to have some fun down there, so you make sure you come and partake.
Tonight it's off to the Princeton Pub to ring in the New Year. I'm going to leave for work in a couple of hours and need to eat and bathe before I go, so this post will not be complete with links or much of an edit. I've been banging this out for the last couple of hours fuelled by too much coffee and weed and it's almost time to sign off. I realize that the gearheads haven't really got much to chew on in this article, but it's telling of my focus this year; the gear is cool, but its just a tool for getting out and playing, and I'm much more concerned with the music than the tools. I did start using the baritone in performance and am purchasing the Bass VI that Mike from Eastwood Guitars
sent me. I'm sure there's much more I could write about, perhaps at a later date?
As for now I look forward to taking the stage with some of my best friends (and my wife!) and playing some music for some of my other best friends and family. Life couldn't be much better, indeed.
If you're in town, I hope to see you tonight. If not, I'll take this time to wish you a very happy new year and all the best looking ahead.
Double D
- Ephemera And Updates.
Howdy all. It's been awhile since I've posted and as usual this is for the best reason: I'm really busy making music, as opposed to just obsessing about it. Sandybone and me from a previous island journey. This last...
- It's Been A Year!
On with the show!! It seems like just yesterday I began this little experiment, this little guitar-zine, this blog. In fact it's been one year and I cannot believe that the worldwide response to my disjointed ramblings has been so warm...
- Tony Robertson- Six Strings Down
Tony Robertson. We'll miss you, buddy. It was with a heavy heart that I learned my old friend Tony Robertson had passed away this past weekend. Tony succumbed to a bone marrow illness after a long and brave fight. I first met Tony...
- Ephemera And Updates
Garnet Stencil head. 4x10 open-back cabinet comes this week! Lookout Vancouver! Hello everybody. Once again I have let a significant period of time go by without posting anything new. I know how much this makes me crazy when I'm...
- Prinny, Six Years In- Update!
Just a little post to remind those readers in the Vancouver area that Sandybone and I are celebrating our sixth year anniversary of hosting the End of the Line Jam at the Princeton Pub (1901 Powell St.), on Tuesday, June 19th! Who'da'...