1/21/24

One of the drummers I mentioned in my post about the blues jam, Terelle has been talking about the two of us working as a rhythm section for church gigs. I’ve never played a church gig  but it is music and I am more than willing to give basically anything a shot. 

There were a few false starts but we finally got some stuff going lastt week, three sets in one day. Bring it Terelle!

I was up at 6am getting dressed and loading gear, picked up Terelle and headed to United Baptist Church near Hopkins.  First sermon at 7:45 second at 10. This was amazing.  Joe is the organist/musical director playing a full Hammond/Leslie set up! Just a standard keyboard for Tyrone. Both of these dudes can throw down. First rate players and a real joy to work with.  

I didn’t know any of the tunes and we semi walked through them before the first service. It goes like this. Mid tempo tune with some bounce as people are coming in. Slower tune while the preacher is warming them up. And by that I mean singing in a way that made me lose my place a couple of times because it was so good. I could feel it, everybody could feel it.  Just amazing. 

The third tune is when they pass the plate and it is a mover that is made to make them shake and we threw down on it. Then we sit out while the preacher is giving the sermon and we end it all with a mid tempo tune that makes the whole room (and the people online) feel warm and alive. 

I could talk about this for hours. The way the song has structure but sometimes we vamp here and sometimes there. How in the first sermon the preacher sang one part three times and eight in the next sermon. How sometimes we just stop then all jump in hard on the one 32 bars later. 

How we played the same four songs in both sermons but none of them felt the same.  

All of this and some of the kindest people who welcomed a stranger in and made me feel like a part of everything and then paid me!! Just amazing and I went home for a bit floating. 

Then around four we headed over to Sandtown-Winchester to play an anniversary celebration for this pastors 25th anniversary of preaching. 

This was for the Laborers for Jesus Church but we weren’t in that church, this was a community center in another part of town. I don’t know what is going on here I just go where Terelle tells me to go…       

Anyway the piano player/musical director was a real nice guy (but I can’t remember his name!!) and another top level player. We did a quick walk through two songs and it was time to go. 

We only played a total of three. The third was pretty straight forward so  it was fine without knowing it. And that was kinda it. The preacher preached. They fed everybody that came around and it was another real nice time with a lot of kind people.  

That is the short version of it all. I went from zero church gigs in my life to three in one day and it was beautiful. Tons of details I left out and I could talk about this for hours. We aren’t sure where we will end up but Terelle is working this and he is bringing me along and I am not gonna argue with the man. 

1/14/24

 Patrick sent me a file with nine tunes in it the day before I was gonna help them out. No rehearsal just get up and do it. I’d heard a few of them but never played any of them. This is my normal now. 

We were at the Polish Home Club for a benefit but upstairs in the big room and I’d never even seen up there before.  Huge. It is massive. No wonder they have big stuff like this up there and keep the blues jam out of it. We’d get lost up there and it would look empty. 

This was a memorial for a fella that I never met. A music scene guy that was semi- homeless and a fixture in the Fells Point scene. From the way he was described to me, if you hang out in any music scene you already know someone like him. Similar my buddy Lawrence from Austin that we lost a few years ago. Total mess of a person but a fried all the way. I can still hear his voice, “I love you fool!”  Miss that dude all the time. 

We went up early, my buddy Larry has been in this group for a while and I was grateful for him bing there. I needed a guide at a few points in the songs since I never played them. Larry would hold his guitar neck up so I could see where he was headed, probably made his arm tired by the end for having to do it so much. 

All in all it was pretty great. I was standing between the drummer and percussionist and those dudes were dead on. And I mean DEAD ON. They were so solid they were practically holding up a sign to give me the spot where I put my notes. Incredible and needed!

We did abut a half hour in total, nothing too crazy. I was just happy to learn some new stuff, play with some new folks and to be a part of the scene. 

1/12/24

 Dave is back in town while he and his family pack up their place to move back to central Texas. I’ll take a couple of gigs with him and Skizz if we can sneak them in!

Back at “home” playing 1919. Nichole wasn’t working (kinda poleaxed over that honestly. People I saw a couple of days later asked “where was Nichole”?) and it was a rainy-assed night with wet feet that never got dry. But the room was pretty full and stayed that way all night. 

We did two solid sets and it was the regular kinda fun. When we wrapped I noticed this guy named Patrick at the bar with his wife. He plays with my buddy Larry in “The Latin Band” if you’ve ever been lucky enough to talk to Larry about it. 

We start taking and he says “I need a bass player for a benefit we are playing Sunday, are you available?” But that is a story for another post!

11/12/23

 So late on this one…

This was supposed to be a repeat of the last 1919 show with Drew but at the Cats Eye, he ended up getting sick and we did this instead. What a weird night. 

“Hey Scott, why don’t you me and Tim do a few of my tunes at the top to burn some time before the rest of the Fleet Street guys can make it we finish with a Fleet Street show?”

“Good idea but let’s get a bass player for your stuff then we let Fleet Street take over. Oh and Buddy is gonna play harp with us the whole night”

And that is how I played some of my music for the fist time in Baltimore. Last minute,showing my tunes to the band onstage. 

Honestly it was pretty great. It would not have been my first choice but it was easy to just let things go and have fun with it. Felt good going down the list of tunes for the crowd. “Let’s see we did the one about killing that guy, the one about being naked, the one about boobs but we haven’t played the one about fucking yet”. 

Solid reaction. 

We wrapped that and I switched to bass and from there we just did a Fleet Street show. Lots of fun and I love playing with those guys!!

11/8/23

Back at 1919.  It’s been a minute hadn’t been here since that last show with Dave and Skizz. This time I’m up with my buddy Drew Bassin, with Scott and Tim and another dude named Buddy on harp. 

Decent crowd there, since it is one of the really narrow row houses it is a little like bar/music/toilets sectioned off and it’s a hard place to watch without being right on top of the band. But it has this magic little vibe and it’s crazy comfortable. 

Anyway we were backing Drew who is also a dude from the blues jam (Buddy as well) and we ended up doing abut four hours of playing with one break a third of the way in. I’ve been too used to how it worked back in Austin. 45 minutes and you are done. Hickoid headlining sets could go as long as 90. I did three hour shows back in Knoxville but I lived in Austin too long (I know…) and the single short set became normal.

Good time and playing with people I really dig. I’ll eventually catch up with how long the sets are. Got to admit it does feel good going to bed exhausted from playing. 

10/24/23

This time iI was filling in for Tony with The Fleet St Blues Band at the Cats Eye. Baltimore’s premier live music venue!! Scott and Tim from the blues jam are in this along with Tansu on guitar and Elon on harp and vocals. They’ve got the last Tuesday of every month except this one because of Halloween. Hell I don’t know what’s up… I’m just filling in.  

Three pretty decent sets of fairly straight forward blues. That is not a complaint. I love it and it feels good to play and I REALLY dug playing with these folks. 

First off, all of them are solid as hell players and they love this band/show/club. You can tell it’s a total lovefest there. 

Also Tansu is a lefty!! AND WE STOOD RIGHT BESIDE EACH OTHER!!! I bet it looked cool as hell!!  I know it did from where I was standing.  

This wasn’t the first time I played with them any the Cats Eye. Tony had me sub for half the night sixish months ago to test true waters and I guess I passed the audition!

Tony will be back. And I’ll be there to watch them. 

10/18/23

I haven’t written about the Polish Home Club or the Blues Jam yet. It is time. 

I heard about this from a drummer that was playing with Dave and I figured I’d show up and play some bass while a hundred guitar players fought for solos. It’s ended up being a big part of my musical and social life. 

This is a Polish membership club and I had to ask want the hell that meant my first time in. Being from the south I’ve never heard of this type of thing.  They accept all kinds of folks, it’s a real warm community semi-lead by the bartender Teresa. One of the sweetest and shockingly salty lady in her 90’s. That’s right. Over 90 and still kicking ass. Best bartender ever, name who’s done it longer?

Scott is the main guy/guitar player that holds it all together and scans the signup list for temporary groups to put on stage. And then there is Tony, a total bad ass bass player that is a part of the house band and spent a lot of time down in Mississippi playing all around the delta. This man knows his shit and is Bad. As. Hell. 

Tony is in Europe for a month or so on tour with his old band playing gigs and backing up some Mississippi folks over there ,so the house band needs a bass player. Right place right time. That’s why I’m finally writing one of these up because it was an actual gig not just a jam. 

I show up 20 minutes before start time and my buddy Larry is playing with Terelle and another dude I’ve never met before , I hop in to warm up a little before Larry and I got out to smoke. 

Larry Dennis is one hell of a cool dude, 71 years old and has been a part of the scene up here for 50 years. He is a monster guitar player and generally when you see the two of us there is smoking going on! On occasion he and I meet up at this dude Steve’s house for some Sunday afternoon playing. Load of fun and when Larry says “Rice, let’s go play” Rice wants to go play!

There are three drummers at the jam I love playing with. Tim is the main house drummer and hits like he is trying to kill his kit or at least break it  in half and is one of the nicest dudes in town.  Terelle is a maniac that was trained and can hold down a small, quiet groove that is tight as hell when he wants but is generally changing the groove up every time we get back to the top. Usually he is just trying to mess me up or see what I’ll  come up with, keeping my head in the game. Finally (and not last) is Louis, mostly a jazz drummer and I honestly did not think we would mesh musically as well as we do but we ended up in the same “group” so many times that we are right together with no effort. As you might guess he can swing the hell out of a tune.  

This night only two other bass players showed up and one did not have a bass. When I handed him the lefty he looked at me like I was from another planet.  From “Oh Yeah” to “WHAT THE HELL!” In a half second.

The other fella hopped up for three tunes then took off. So I played the rest of the bass for three and a half hours. YES!!

This is exactly what I want. 

It’s pretty much straight blues but we had a little Chuck Berry/James Brown set with a couple of singers somewhere in there.  This fantastic guitar player Kevin, who has this rhythm/lead style where it sounds like he is doing both at the same time in a really magical way. Unreal. When you are up with him you’ve got to be on it. He always makes the room jump. 

I love it there. Not everyone is an amazing player but most everyone there wants to have fun with no bullshit so it’s always a great time. Also these dancers are there!

This group of 10-20 folks show up every jam to just to shake it. Lot of the same folks but new ones every time. As much as I love playing and being a part of this scene I think I have to admit those dancers may be the best part of the night. It would feel off if they weren’t there. 

To wrap it up I am absolutely thrilled to be involved in this thing.