Dec 3 at Last Concert Cafe

Friday night at Last Concert Cafe had been a bit of mis-communication on the part of the good people at Last Concert Cafe. When we (PLUMP) booked the gig, the booking guy (for whom we will now call by the alias of "Ricky 'The Dragon' Steamboat" for the purposes of this story) said, "By the way, there is a private party happening at the Cafe on Friday night. They will be outside from 7ish to about 10. " I then replied, "How about we load-in** at 10 pm?" Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat says, "That sounds great".

**"Load-in" is a term that we in the entertainment industry use to convey the time in which the band will show up and load/carry all musical instruments/amps/pa/etc. from the band's motor vehicle(s) to the stage area of the venue.

So, as planned, we show up at 10 pm. The guy taking the door (let's call him Karl Mecklenberg) is already outside with the cash register and table set up from which he will be collecting money from people at the door.

Karl Mecklenberg says, "What has been taking so long? Where have you been?".

There are people in the venue saying, " What has been taking so long? Where have you been?"

I say, "We agreed with Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat that we would show up at 10 pm because of the private party that was going on earlier this evening."

Karl Mecklenberg says, " The private party is tomorrow night".

I said, "Well, we can only go by what Ricky 'The Dragon' Steamboat tells us".

And Karl Mecklenberg says, "Well, Ricky 'The Dragon' Steamboat got it wrong tonight".

In the course of our setting up, some people that had shown up early to see PLUMP got frustrated and left. For that we are sorry. But please know that we did not show up late on purpose.

Now, Last Concert Cafe had a big white tent (roughly 20 feet x 40 feet) set up in the outdoor patio area. This tent had a "parkay" floor underneath. The tent and "parkay" floor were presumably set up for the private party that we now know will be held tomorrow. The tent/flooring situation was interesting--I had never seen this before at the Cafe. Indeed, it looked like a mighty fine dance floor.

As this gig was taking place in the jolly month of December, presumably a number of people had attended some sort of Christmas party prior to coming to Last Concert Cafe to watch PLUMP. There was one girl in particular (who is very close to the band) who did indeed attend a Christmas party before arriving at the Cafe. We will call this girl, "Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor" for the purposes of this story. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was shit-faced. Very, very, very, very drunk. As we were finishing setting up, she was cajoling and taunting us to start. And start we did. She danced to the music as hard as she could. She demanded that we play the song "Violent Pussy". We did. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor danced as long as she could. I think she lasted about 5 songs. Maybe six. The best part was during song #4 (Via Satellite) when Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was speed walking in circles on the parkay floor under the tent, arm-in-arm with another girl very close to the band (we will call her Barbarella). Barbarella and Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor were going round and round shrieking, laughing, and having a good time. The next song, or at the very least the next time I looked up, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (SCJSDOC--I really must abbreviate from now on--the entire nickname is simply taking too darn long to type) was still walking around in circles on the parkay floor under the tent with Barbarella, but clearly SCJSDOC was leaning very heavily on Barbarella. Barbarella was supporting most of SCJSDOC. It looked to me like those instances when someone has OD'd, and a friend is frantically walking the ODer around and around the living room, trying to keep said person from passing out before the ambulance arrives. SCJSDOC and Barbarella were kind of staggering around. Still in circles. It was awesome. I guess it really could have been some sort of advanced syncronized dance, but I really don't think that was the case. SCJSDOC was losing steam as the song went on. Their circles were smaller and smaller, and their rate was slower and slower. The next song (song #6 for those keeping score), SCJSDOC was sitting in a chair, passed out, her head leaning on Barbarella. SCJSDOC clearly does not have much stamina in the drinking heavily and dancing in circles department.

We laughed and laughed. Later. And also at that very moment.

Revolution on November 19

Either we couldn't find anyone to play with us at Revolution, or we chose to play this show alone. Regardless, PLUMP was the only band on the bill on this night. It being the weekend before Thanksgiving, it was definitely cold in Bryan/College Station. As such, we elected to play inside. Revolution has a really cool, small, inside area. The stage is extremely small, so when we need to play inside, we have to use a scaled down version of our PA, Josh only uses one of his two bass cabinets, and I don't use the floor tom drum on my drumset. Only by doing this can the 4 of us and all of our equipment be on the stage together.

I think the sound is always good inside of Revolution. It always feels good playing in there, and maybe because the 4 of us are playing so close together, it really makes it sound good and unique. Also, there is the potential of being about 2 feet from someone in the crowd, because there are some seats that are that close to where we put the drumset on the stage when we play inside. (When inside at Revolution, if you are facing the stage, I put the drumset on the left side of the stage, and I set it up in profile so that I am directly facing the other guys. The ride cymbal is on the edge of the stage very close to the crowd. The bass cabinet is about 1 inch from my crash cymbal--which is on the left side of my drumset. Then, Josh, Jason, and Al are basically standing in a row--as close as their instruments will allow.) Of course, on this night, I don't think there was anyone that close to the stage. For the majority of the show, we only had about 15-20 people in there. We probably did not do enough to promote the show for one thing. For another thing, the cold weather probably kept people away, as Revolution is known more as an outside bar, so people are probably not as apt to go hang out at Revolution if they know they may well have to stand outside in the cold if they want to check out the band because they think that is where the music will be--even though it is clear through the history of the venue that bands can and do play inside. So, small. BUT, there were 6 or 7 very nice chaps who were clearly there to watch is that enjoyed and were very much into each song. Which was very nice of them. When we took a break, they asked me where were all the people? I said, "Dunno--probably the cold". Still, the songs sounded good. It was probably a bit loud in there, but what can you do. I am glad those guys were so into the show. I would have been somewhat depressing if those guys weren't at the show. Playing music for just a couple people isn't the worst thing in the world (hey--at least we are playing some music), but when you expect to have a bigger crowd at the show, it can be tough to not go through the motions.

Friday November 12

If you are a band from Houston (or if you are a band based outside of Houston for that matter) the Continental Club is a really good place to play. For some reason or other, over the storied and hallowed history of PLUMP, we had never played there. Until tonight. Continental Club is modeled, named after, and is loosely affiliated with the Continental Club located in Austin. They have some guy that serves great BBQ, they have cheap lone star for the bands, they have a very nice backyard patio, and they are the crown jewel of the development of mid-town Houston. They also have a strange and interesting man that apparently helps direct people (and bands) where to park. This dude wearing full camo kindly directed me to free parking. He then proceeded to regal me for 5 to 10 minutes about this major cold front thunderstorm that would be sweeping into the area in the next few hours. I am not much of a weather watcher, nor do I typically heed the ramblings of loopy individuals wearing camo who are obsessing about major storms moving in, and in this situation I was not only not prepared to heed but in fact I did not heed his warnings. BUT, I will now say that I owe this this guy an apology as he would later prove to 100% correct. His ability to listen to a weather scanner that reported an incoming thunderstorm and then accurately relate the report's contents to all pedestrians and bar patrons was uncanny.

In the one instance of my being able to get a word in edgewise with the friendly but slightly strange attendant, I inquired about the seemingly 25 year old RV with the door open that was in the parking lot. The attendant told me it belonged to one of the owners. Though I don't personally own an RV, I am definitely a fan, and was notably impressed with this RV. I wanted to run over and check out the inside, but I was too scared and shy.

PLUMP was playing with Ryan Scroggins and the Trenchtown Texans, who are a great band, and another ska band from the area who for the life of me I can't remember the name of but who were pretty darn good. PLUMP played first. The crowd was smaller than we typically like to play for, which is our fault as much as anybody. But we played a nice short set. All the PLUMP girlfriend's were in attendance, which is always nice. One friend of said girlfriend asked me why I played on a pink drumset. I responded that the drumset was in fact blond maple wood color. She told me that in the lights it looked pink. I tried to take a look at what she was talking about from her angle, and I decided that maybe she should consider putting on some camo and helping the guy outside with the parking.

The nice thing about playing first in a 3-band show in Houston at a bar with a nice outside patio and all the PLUMP girlfriends in attendance is that we have a right smart little after show get together in the back with lone star beers and cigerette smoking a-plenty. Very enjoyable. Until all of a sudden it started getting very cold and raining, and we had to leave. Well played camouflage parking guy, well played.

October 30 at Zapatos

So, we were scheduled for a nice Halloween show over at Zapatos. As you may or may not have read in an earlier post, when PLUMP plays in Bryan/College Station, we are fond of stopping at one particular Love's on HWY 290 where they have a big convenience store and an attached Arby's. Sometimes the guys eat the Arby's. Sometimes we wait and get BBQ at Rudy's in College Station - but we pretty much always stop at the Love's. For a year or two, we always admired the imitation Nascar jackets for sale at the Love's. These are semi-warm jackets that feature the team jacket for a couple specific Nascar drivers, and are covered with all of the sponsors for that driver. They have about 7-8 different jackets to pick from. Jason Jackson actually bought one once, and we have always been extremely envious of him and his Nascar style and all, so Nascar jackets are really always playing in the back of our collective minds. So, as were were driving to the Love's we were thinking that it is Halloween, and we have never really done costumes, but we do like Nascar jackets, and by chance were would be heading to a convenience store that has a couple real beauties of Nascar jackets, so wouldn't it be fun to go a little "high on the hog" and use some band money to buy 4 Nascar jackets.

So we did.

It was glorious.

One of the best ideas we ever had.

I got a "Jimmy Johnson" jacket which was mostly black and gray and whose primary sponsors appear to be Lowe's and Kobalt Tools. Someone got a "Mountain Dew", some one a "Tony the Tiger", and Al got a "Go Big Daddy" jacket. Since we bought 4, I was able to "talk them down" (and by "them" I mean the good people that serve as Management at the Love's on Highway 290) to giving us a $10 discount on each jacket. In addition to having excellent taste in Nascar jackets, I also have the gift of gab in buttering up the lassies working the register at convenience stores into giving the band healthy discounts on merchandise, clothing apparel, and such and such.

We were so proud of our jackets.

Though, later, Al had a bit of "buyer's remorse" since he found out the "Go Big Daddy" jacket is based on the jacket for one of the female Nascar drivers. Not that Al doesn't think she is an excellent driver, as I (and Al) am sure she is, but the "toughness" factor was gone baby gone.

Anyway, we arrived at Zapatos, and we were flashing "our colors". We were definitely the envy of any and all who looked upon our person(s). The gods of music were with us that evening, my friends. Never has Al's fingers moved so quickly across the fretboard. Never has Josh thumped the strings as thumpy as he did. Never have I been able to harness the wings of the unicorn in my drumming. Jason Jackson actually sucked, but we other 3 were flying on the wings of eagles, so no one noticed Jason Jackson's severe and constant limitations. The jackets, friends, the jackets.

Drving home was easy.