The life of a musician: 09/10/09

Day two, as promised...

Thursday Night:

So we slept the night away on Wednesday night, and Thursday morning eventually came. While sleeping in my quarters (remember, it was the couch), I was in for an unexpected surprise. While Houngry/Evvron/Aaron has a beautiful home, the room I was in had an unnecessary amount of windows. Is there such thing as an unnecessary amount of windows you may ask...?

Fuck yes is the answer. I swear that this living room had 4 walls, just like any other house. But this particular room was 24% walls and 76% windows. And not just any windows, I mean big ass windows that are so big it's probably not even safe. How is most of a wall going to be straight window? And on top of all of that, guess what? The fucks that designed the house made sure that during sunrise each day, the sun beamed right into the house! Now that I think about it, those weren't windows, they were giant fucking magnifying glasses.

So as I awaken to the sun on my face, I suddenly realize that it's early in the AM, and I just went to bed at about 4AM. FML. On top of that, the A/C was accidently not turned on, so it's hotter than Jessica Alba in that piece, and I'm sweating like I stole something. The fan is conveniently pointed into Freddy the greedy fucks room, which is 100% protected from the sun. But of course, that inconsiderate fuck had to have the fan. Fuckin' Freddy.

Back to my suffering: so I'm laying there sweating, and I realize that I'm dehydrated. So I'm sweating, tired, and dehydrated, all before 8AM. FML. So I get up and get some water, and I must have looked like a cast member from the show "Lost" because Houngry's dad looks at me like I'm a fucking refugee. Like I've never tasted clean water before or something.

So I get up and take a shower, and when I come out some people are awake. They look all rested and relaxed, those fucks. I'm tired and delirious and these fucks are looking at me like why am I all tore up. Because I was, that's why. Those fucks.

So the first bit of good news, I have a breakfast that was wonderous. That's my word, wonderous, don't be trying to use that shit. We sit down and are eating, and all of the sudden I have a case of burpitis. Now I, for one, am not known for my burping. Guess what, too late. I burped for the rest of this fucking trip. Like an idiot asshole. This trip was fucked since jump street.

Fast forward to the gig. We all get our stuff together and head over to the Conga room. I think that sound check was at about 7PM, if I remember correctly. So we get there, and already I'm impressed with the venue. That place is bad ass. If you're ever in LA, go to the Conga room. It is across the street from the Staples Center. It's the shit. Ok, enough of that.

We get inside and set up our horns and drums and such. The guy who tried to fire us the night before is there, he's basically in charge. He has us go over some of the stuff and with the new trombonist I can see that he's happier than from the previous night. So we go through it, and he seems happy - and dismisses us. We find our way back to the green room and they serve us dinner. At this point I'm starting to get nervous and I can't eat. It's about 2 hours before the show and I'm sitting on the couch behind stage all anxious and restless. I remember thinking to myself "What the fuck is this?" - like what am I doing to myself right now?

After about 20 minutes I calm down, and we hang out and talk and walk around the club's different areas and come back and finally settle down to watch the football game that was on. Now the fun part, time to suit up. These guys are taking for-fucking-ever to get ready. I'm sitting here thinking, are we fucking men or women in here? I sit there for maybe an hour and I'm the last one to get ready. I'm thinking to myself periodically, "put your fucking clothes on and comb your hair and get the fuck out of there." As you can see, I wasn't too happy.

Finally I get my clothes on and I look at the stage from the stairs we enter on. Each time one of us peeks at the stage, all of the girls/ladies/women that are there lined up are screaming because they think we are someone. Then it occurs to me, that we are someone! We are the band. The band that's backing Jerry Rivera up - and that matters. Especially to these girls out there. They are literally freaking out.

So finally it's our time to take the stage. As we walk out there, the place erupts into screams. The sound guy says that there is 1200 people out there, and by the time we get out there, it must be more than that. Maybe 1500? I don't know, maybe more, maybe less. It was so loud as we took the stage, it was deafening. It was the shit. I'd never been on the receiving end of that before, and to be honest, I wouldn't mind doing it again. It was crazy. I reach over and give props to the guys, and we're all amped up, and then the emcee, or whatever it is called, introduces Jerry. Holy shit. There is a video of this that I've posted on my facebook page. Check it out. They count off the song, and a few bars in he comes onto the stage. It was so loud at that point I could barely hear myself, let alone the guys across the stage. That was amazing.

So we play, and we're doing well I'm happy to say. Throughout the night Jerry has these girls jumping up on stage and clawing their way to Jerry. One of them actually falls down and lands on the monitor (the speaker that we use to hear ourselves). She can't even get up until her third try, I'm sure she was hurting the next day. So we have a few songs and then there is a ballad where I am the only horn player that plays, and it happens to be a solo. Cool right? Yeah, except for the fact that it's in F# - which is a totally fucked up key to solo in. One of the worst I'd say. So I pull it off pretty well I think, for not having a clue it was coming until that day, and nothing to practice with and prepare myself.

Throughout the gig there are girls screaming for me to take them backstage, to get them to hang with us after and all of that stuff. I just smiled at them and didn't say anything, because I knew that I wasn't going to be able to help them, what can you say? "I'm sorry bitches, I can't help you." It was crazy. How do people live that life I'll never know. Jerry must have 100 babies running around somewhere. I mean, these girls were just about begging to join us. Wow. That's all I could think, was "wow."

So after the gig is over, we're getting drinks bought for us and fools asking us to come to their place for after parties and all that. Drunk girls that barely remember their own name, but saw you up there so they come over and say something in a language that is neither english nor spanish. I don't mean to emphasize this too much, but it was crazy. What did I do? Let people buy me drinks and get faded. Why not? :)

After the show we take pictures with Jerry and say our thanks, and surprisingly enough Jerry apparently doesn't speak very much. He's nice and his entourage seemed pretty nice, but talking didn't seem to be his thing. Slowly the green room/backstage begins to empty out and the club is 100% DJ. We hit the floor for a while and then eventually pack all of our shit and head home.

Another night of being piss hot, but at least Marco jacked the fan this time. It was a little better, but fuck me if those windows were just waiting for me to fall asleep so they could fuck me up the next morning. Faded and tired, we finally went to bed. One hell of a night. One hell of an experience. All thanks to whom? Fuckin' Evvron. Thanks 'lil homie.

The life of a musician: 09/09/09

This past weekend was a valuable lesson for me. I traveled for a series of gigs in LA last week, leaving Wednesday and returning on Monday. What a trip that turned out to be. Here is a recap of that wonderful evening...

Wednesday Night:

I landed in LA via the always affordable (if you purchase your tickets ahead of time) Southwest airlines. It was a nice flight, and a round of Jack and Coke's for me and the guys made it a little sweeter. For future reference in this epic adventure, the guys = Carlos, Freddy and Bill. So tasty beverages for all, and let me tell you, they make strong drinks on that plane. I know it sounds crazy, but it is true!

For the next 45 minutes or so, I think Freddy and I successfully annoyed everyone around us with our unrelenting giggling. We were excited for this trip, happy to be traveling together, and had a nice adult beverage - which I killed in record time. We probably laughed most of the way up there. Either reenacting a gremlin on the wing scenario, or at the scary woman that was behind us. Truth be told, I was too scared to look at her, but Freddy's reaction to her was priceless - and cannot be put into words.

So upon landing we meet up with my boy Houngry - a.k.a. Aaron - and his girl. We get swooped up at the airport and make our way through traffic to Houngry's house where we will be staying for most of the trip. After unpacking and claiming my sleeping quarters (read: couch), we hang out a little and take off for rehearsal at the studios in downtown LA.

We are rehearsing this evening because we are the band for the singer Jerry Rivera. I had heard his name, so I knew he was somebody, but I had no idea that this dude was pretty legit. I'll talk more about that later......Upon arriving to the LA rehearsal studios, which I think it was actually called, I could tell this night was going to be fucked from jump street. Why you ask?

#1 - Houngry, Mr. LA apparently, couldn't find the place. Nice move Evvon (Aaron's other name), after this weekend it has become clear to me he has the grasp of LA that is only rivaled by a asian tourist. The only thing he was missing was his camera. Fuckin' Evvon.

#2 - It was fairly ghetto. A warehouse district, sort of, that reminded me of home. And by home I mean the flat lands around the Oakland Coliseum. Guess who picked this place? That's right, fuckin' Evvon. Again.

#3 - No parking at the studio, unless you had been there since the night before. Apparently people hang out there because they have nothing else to do. Cars being blocked in by Jamaican looking fellows really pisses off the angry Latino's in attendance. It was emotional.

#4 - The dumb fucks that ran the studio, and I mean that in the harshest way possible, allowed some equally dumb fucks to start rehearsal an hour late. Which of course meant that we had to start an hour later. So after driving an hour to get to LA, we sat around for another hour just waiting for the coalition of dumb fucks to get the fuck out of our studio. Yes, it angerst me. The silver lining? They were probably smoking as much as they were playing in that studio, so I'm sure we were all high a little when we finally did get in there. Yay, free high! Fuckin' Evvon.

#5 - Upon meeting all of the guys we would be playing with to back up Jerry, it was a decent mix. I knew almost all of them. The bone player, who was a pretty good player, hadn't worked on the music for his reasons, and it showed. That fucked us big time: see #6.

#6 - Ah, yes, here we are at number 6. It turns out that evening that the musical director that is rehearsing with us comes to the conclusion that the horn line, which is Bill, myself and this trombonist, cannot handle the music. What - the - fucking - fuck? It was resolved, but where the fuck did this guy come up with that? Well it turns out that the trombonist not doing his homework made us all look bad. The trombonist was replaced, and all was well in the end.

That sure did open my eyes, how easily you can be fired from a gig because of someone else's lack of preparation. That's what happens on these gigs, these guys are big time and if you're not prepared, you're done. And if someone else isn't prepared, you could be done just as easily. That night I learned a valuable lesson about being a "real" musician.

The drive home was long, and laughter filled as they always are, and we ended up staying awake until 3 or 4am. We did that about every night. It was an interesting start to the trip.

Day 2 of LA trip coming up next...