My Christmas Break

I haven't had anything to post about for a week, what with Christmas and no gigs and all. But here's a music related incident anyhoo:

I'm at my folks' house for the break, in Southern Oregon, just outside of Medford, and I'm kind of having music withdrawals. So I organize my family to show them some of the new salsa music I've been learning and playing. I pick a simple and recognizable piece. What better than 'Oye Como Va'.

My little brother Jake is 15 (Happy Birthday!) and is playing the baritone sax, little sister Charlotte is 13 and playing the flute. My father Ron is a great lover of music and was instrumental (no pun intended) in my decision to pursue music. However, he is not a musician. So imagine my surprise when he was holding down cowbell and clave patterns!

Here's a short clip of us playing just the first part of the song. For having NEVER played any music of this type, and still being somewhat beginners at their instruments, I'd say we sounded pretty good and had a load of fun!



Williams Family Salsa on Vimeo
Thanks to Margarette (my step mom and great classical flutist and family music director) for the camera work!

R.I.P. James Brown

I know everyone's already talked all about his legacy, but his music was very important to my personal musical development. He's the reason I have the rhythm that I do today, learning the rhythmically complex basslines at such an early age set me up to handle easier stuff with ease.

I could go on and on, but I won't,

Not now anyways....

Dig this real short taste of the Godfather at work, and dig the soul sister who jumps on stage to shake her thang, dig the way he plays along! (Warning, video cuts off abruptly)

The Finger's Still Shot.....

We had a surprisingly good gig tonight at Steamer's in Pismo Beach. That gig is always hit or miss. I'm so used to being the 'dinner set' band there, where no one pays attention and we basically play to ourselves. It's even worse that they stick us as far away from customers as possible. So it's always a pleasant surprise when a few people show up and get into what we do.

Tonight was that night. A family of 5, an older new age couple, a local jazz head, two older ladies, and two middle aged ladies hung out for most of our set. Granted that doesn't sound like much, but it's a hell of a lot better than our typical audience of, oh say, NOBODY.

The crazy new age lady would get up during particularly burning solos and raise her arms and close her eyes and look up into the ceiling as if we were gods. It was wild, she kept hooting and hollering and going on. As weird as she was, it really made us play better, and it rubbed off on the rest of the crowd. Everyone started applauding after solos! Amazing I tell you.

Another interesting thing happened tonight. Ray Chang, our trumpet player/band leader, was going around and talking to us individually. He was saying stuff like, 'You haven't been really clicking musically lately and I'm not really stoked on it. Maybe you could listen a little better and focus on the groove, blah blah blah'. Well I'm a good sport and I'm like, whatever man, cool, yeah. I've known him for a while and we're pretty good friends, so I don't want any drama...

Our drummer however got pretty offended. Issac Lang is a studied guy and he knows the language of jazz very well. He pointed out to me that this combo, including Darry Voss on vibes (who is THE premier jazz drummer in the county mind you), knows what we're doing and in fact it may be that Ray is the weakest link.

As a bass player, I have a tendency to avoid drama at all costs and cruise right along. You musicians out there know my type, the laid back bass player guy. So I try not to get involved in that little conflict, and Darryl, well he's above that sort of thing anyways.

And sure enough, the three of us, bass, drums and vibes, were locking in and killing it tonight. We really got cookin' and had some nice moments, as if to prove to Ray that we know what's up.

Meanwhile, poor Ray had a bit of an off night. He was lost the beat a few times and flubbed some serious notes in recognizable melodies, couldn't find the one in 'Take Five' and so on. I looked over at Isaac who kept rolling his eyes throughout the course of the evening. Interesting dynamic.

So needles to say, we playing surprisingly well, and maybe it was because of Ray's little talk. It obviously made us step up and play our best. So maybe he was right?

Whatever.

Merry Funky Christmas

My fingers are all chewed up

I haven't been playing my upright for a while, so when I decided to break it out this week, it chewed the hell out of my fingers.

That's what I get.

That and poor intonation....

Christmas Jazz

The happening jazz spot, Grappolos, was not so happening last night.
First of all it's finals week, which meant that all the kids weren't out like usual. Second of all, I played like crap for the first set. By the second set we got cookin though. We had some fun.
Gary Drysdale, ripping local jazz guitarist, kept calling christmas songs. He has them all arranged for jazz style.
My man Dylan Johnson, great upright/electric bass player from Morro Bay who is currently rocking the NYC jazz scene, is going to be in town next week. He'll be playing that gig and I'm gonna go down and watch for a change. That should be nice.

Are You A Cheap Ass?

Ahhh yes, the Playbacks had a great gig Saturday night. It was our 4th gig ever and we got a great response.

The Frog and Peach is a great place to play live, but the management there is a little on the drunky side? They tried to pay us $150! The least I've ever made there was $250, and I've been playing there off and on for ten years now. So we're trying to milk more dough out of them, we'll see how that goes.

Kevin Nash played great that night. He's the 17 year old guitar player who has a great ear and tasty phrasing. His parents came and watched the show. It was funny to check out his mom's reaction to people dancing in the bar, and especially when everyone was singing along to the chorus of Prince's 'Sexy MotherF%^&ker". Pretty classic.

Almost done with the Playbacks Demo, hoping it'll be done in time for the old Christmas Compilation....

Who Is This Amazing Woman?

I don't know, but I know three things:

She's in Brazil,

She rocks the upright bass with a german grip arco style,

and she's gorgeous.


Double Bass on Vimeo


Besides that I'm pretty wiped out. The Leadbirds played at SOHO in Santa Barbara last night with Katherine Shorr, this righteously cool singer songwriter lady from LA. It was a great show, even though we had to play a few Christmas songs, which I absolutely loathe, but we had a good time. Great turnout for a wed. night show.

Woke up at Kenny Loggins' house (He's out on the road, which meant I could sleep in the guest room!) and drove back to SLO just in time to work 8 hours at the music store as a retail guy. Easy money, hangin in a music store and getting paid. It's a good music-related supplement to my income. And I happened to sell like $1200 worth of gear for my man Dan Ernst, the owner.

But damn, talk about being wiped out. Had a rehearsal with the Playbacks after work, and needless to say I think I'll be sleeping in tomorrow.....

Eventful Day

My phone, which contains my entire schedule/gig calendar/life, broke.

Spend all day recording tracks for the Playbacks demo. I can't wait till these three songs are done, they're gonna sound good.

In the studio however, I cut a huge chunk out of my primary bass finger, the same finger that was already jacked up. I've got horrible luck that finger right now. I wrapped it tight, it wouldn't stop bleeding, and I was concerned for a second, but it stopped bleeding.

I then went to my jazz gig at the Inn at Morro Bay. That place is hit or miss. I've played to completely empty rooms there before. Fortunately it was Morro Bay's big Christmas Boat Parade, so the place was more packed than I've ever seen it. The line up was Ray Chang, Mike Raynor and I. We played well and got into some good moments. It turned into a wonderful evening.

Now I'm going to try and live without a cell phone for a few days and see how bad the withdrawals are.

Off night?

Tonight was a strange gig.
I've got a new bass, an Ibanez ATK 5-string, and it's a bad ass axe. However, I'm not used to it, and all my chops don't work so well on it yet. I'm working on it, but I felt awkward on it tonight.
The usual jazz heads were out en force at Grappolo's tonight, and they all brought their friends. There was no one in the house who was not digging! By the end everyone was dancing hard like a dead show or something.
I got the mad props from the jazz heads even though I felt like I was playing sub-par. It was an interesting thing to feel lame yet be complemented on my playing at the same time.
It might have to do with my recent reading of "Effortless Mastery", a book about the mindset that it takes to master jazz on any particular instrument. I've been trying to let go of my ego as much as possible.
But still, I just felt like I was going through the motions tonight, very uninspired. And yet there it is, the positive feedback.
One of these days I'll understand exactly what it is I'm trying to do. But right now I'm a bit confused....