another great band story in the making…

As anyone with the possible exception of some of the more rude commenters here can tell you, I’m a guitar player.  You know, a left-handed guitar player, hence the name (leftystrat).   I’ve been playing for quite a long time, unfortunately by (with?) myself.

It’s not that I don’t want to be in a band.  It’s not that I haven’t tried to be in a band.  It’s not even that my personality is so abhorrent that people don’t want to be in a band with me.  I can play halfway decently, I don’t smell (much), I don’t bite (hard), and I’m mildly amusing to be around (if for no other reason than to watch what I trip over next).

It’s just that… well… musicians are assholes.  Not all of them.. just the ones I’ve played with.  They’re artists and a majority of artists are flakes.  Professional musician is almost an oxymoron.

Also, I’m a guitar player (you said that).. and we’re a dime a dozen.  Granted, we’re not held in quite the low esteem of drummers (1-2-3-4), but we’re certainly a breed to avoid.  Immature, egocentric, and generally lacking the sense to arrive on time (or at all), that’s us.  Here’s a riddle that stereotypes us brilliantly:

Q. What do you call a guitarist without a girlfriend?

A. Homeless.

Perfect, no?  Of course drummers are also well-represented with their own jokes:

Q. How do you know the stage is level?

A. The drummer drools out of both sides of his mouth.

So you see, we’re well known before we enter the room.  Remember - every stereotype had to come from somewhere.

I started playing the guitar at age twelve.  I picked it up pretty quickly and played all the time.  Within short order I got a band together for a talent show.  They made it to the gig and broke up shortly thereafter for reasons I can’t remember.

That was the start of my `career,’  which tended to go forth at irregular intervals and proceed along these general lines, albeit usually more tragically hilarious.  I couldn’t get out of my own basement no matter how hard I tried.  Someone always flaked out, usually before we even played out.

I was told that I needed to meet more professional musicians, perhaps older ones., so I set about meeting them.  At several times I even got into bands that played and got paid (a true rarity).  Even the professionals flaked out.

Then there were the women.  I’m not trying to damn an entire gender but most of my dealings with them have been… difficult, to be polite:

• I can’t come to practice - I’m having my period
• I’m only carrying the mic because that’s all I use
• they all show up to look at me anyway
• I just didn’t feel like coming
• I have to wash my hair

Some of the auditions were great stories by themselves.  I tried out a singer with years of experience who immediately went into some hysterical, high-pitched keening that he referred to as singing.  We tried again, and he went right up there.  A bigger fellow, he reminded me of a heavy metal Meat Loaf.  He seemed confused, as if to say he sounded perfect in the shower, but he couldn’t figure out why he didn’t sound like Robert Plant at the audition.  We changed keys, thinking it would make things easier for the fellow.  He changed keys too.  Constantly.   Unfortunately, he never changed to the key of the song.

Most of the bands couldn’t get work.  Business being what it is, the club owners `allowed’ you to play a set for free as an audition.  The only trouble was that they weren’t auditioning the band’s musicianship or showmanship.  They were auditioning the band’s ability to bring a few hundred of their best friends, who happened to be raging alcoholics.  Since I didn’t have more than two or three raging alcoholic best friends, that sort of thing never really worked out for a return (paid) engagement.

Whilst auditioning (code name: Project Begging), I managed to develop something of a stage persona.  Of course this was entirely without thought.. it just sort of happened.  I bought a wireless system because I got tired of tripping over my cords.  It worked: I no longer tripped over my cords.  I tripped over other people’s cords instead.  When we moved those cords, I spent a few weeks tripping over cymbal stands.  Our band motto became “We may not be great, but we’re funny.”   On one gig I left my wireless at home.  At the end of the set, I walked offstage like I normally do.  Unfortunately I forgot that I wasn’t using a wireless and toppled a stack of amps because the *$&ing guitar was still plugged into them.

So I switched to musical comedy (some would call my playing comical regardless).  Damn if that didn’t take off.  I dropped the full band and kept a three-man core group that did song parodies in comedy clubs.  It was very different from playing rock and roll; there was a better class of drunk in comedy clubs.  It smelled a lot less like stale beer and cigarettes - moreso liquor and stale cigarettes.  They were also less easily impressed, making things even more interesting.  After a while I was playing shows across the country and our parodies were being heard on morning radio across the country.   We even appeared on the radio and television shows of a rather tall, big-nosed, long-haired syndicated radio host.

I wasn’t used to working constantly and things going well.  In order to accomodate me, the bottom fell out of the comedy boom, closing clubs and killing all the gigs.

Life, which has a way of happening at the weirdest times, happened at the weirdest time.  There was a job, a house, no job, a house, illness, and a serious job.

But I missed playing.   Most `normal’ guitar players struggle, playing in stinky, dingy bars for almost no one, getting their original songs inserted into setlists until they can play only originals.  Since I skipped Step One, I really just want to play music I like in stinky bars for like-minded people.  Call it missing essential steps in my musical development.

There’s a new type of band forming these days.  It is composed of Olde Phartes (40-50) who want to play but have jobs, families, and guitar addictions.  They practice and play out once a month or so.  Way back when, one never admitted to being even over thirty.  Now my contemporaries are seeking each other out.

I answered an ad for a classic rock band looking for a guitarist.  Olde Pharte age range, good tunes, only wanting to play out once or twice a month.  Sounded ideal.   The fellow who returned my email turned out to live around the corner and is a lawyer, working in a High Rent District.  This could be a good sign.  Or a bad one.

When he called, I could tell that he had been through a ton of typically unreliable guitar players.  He did his level best to screen applicants, telling the brutal truth about everything.  I could tell he was really trying to scare me but it only made me laugh a bit.   He was doing what I tried to do when recruiting band members.  He was making totally unreasonable demands like:

• showing up more or less on time
• kindly know the tunes you’re supposed to know
• splitting the cost of the rehearsal space (in case I’m offered the slot)
• auditioning next week, sorry to pressure you, here’s a few songs

It was both funny and sad.  Sad that he’d have to make these unreasonable demands.  Funny because I’ve made them and been called a tyrant for it.

It sounds like they just want to play and have fun at it.  It almost sounds like they tailored the ad to me.  Ok, there won’t be any Hendrix set, or even a musical comedy tribute to date rape, but it sure sounds like good old classic rock fun.  And there’s a female singer involved.  Sounds like she’s going to be one of the first professional females I have ever met.

I can’t wait to audition.

[adopting female affectation]  What do I wear?  Which guitars do I bring?  Is a basic black amp ok, now that it’s after Labor Day?  If I lose this due to a Fashion Faux Pas, I’ll never forgive myself.