Month: September 2003

It was Johnny Cash tribute night at the Tree House and the man in black was tributed a single song, by me. Oh well, maybe we should have a Roz King tribute next week.

1. Leo – He traded in his old guitar for a new one and it sounded awesome.

2. Cynthia – She played a few slower songs than she has in the past

3. Ben Garvey – I worked on Johnny Cash’s “Big River” for two days, but couldn’t put it together in time so I played “Folsom Prison Blues.” Maybe Big River will be ready next week. I also played “I Hope I Die on the Moon,” “Thesis,” John Prine’s “That’s the Way the World Goes Round,” and “Why Now Satan” for the soundcheck.

4. Sarah Allen – Sarah brought out a bunch of people and sounded great as usual.

5. Bob Michel – I was glad to see Bob come back again. I had trouble getting his guitar sounding loud enough through the mic and I think its because the bass boost was off. Next time I’ll know.

6. Chris Emerle – Chris helped me out with the sound in the begining and likes to have the mic turned up so he can sing down into it. He was making songs up on the spot and toyed with the idea of playing “Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails, but decided not to.

7. Willie Tapps – He busted out a few protest songs to show his disapproval of the war. By then I had the bass boost turned on and the guitar sounded great.

8. Jack Sparks – I made a lame joke about how Jack and I went to the same high school and that I used to give him wedgies in the locker room. Jack played Toad the Wet Sprocket’s “Walk on the Ocean” and half of “Runaway Train” by Soul Asylum, which reminded me of how my old roommate said he used to want to have Dave Pirner’s hair.

9. Dom – I feel like a jerk because Dom stops by the Tree House open mic all the time, but I have yet to attend his at Port City Java in Deptford.

10. Tony Desantis – Tony also played a few protest songs along with this original where he sings in French. I bought his CD, but I haven’t listened to it yet.

11. Maria – It was nice to see Maria out again. Tony and I were talking during her first song and Tony said she reminded him of a young Ani Difranco. I smiled when she followed the first song with an Ani cover. I’ve barely listened to Ani Difranco at all, so it’s all new to me. I liked it.

12. Ete – He did one song that had a Jeff Buckley vibe.

13. Lisa – Ete and Lisa came up to do a song and despite the tiny bit of feedback coming through, they sounded great together. I got the impression they don’t play very often and I think they definitely should.

It’s Johnny Cash night tonight at the Tree House open mic. His songs aren’t mandatory, but I’d love to hear a few of you get into it even if it’s not even close to the original version. I love it when people take covers and mess with the structure, melody, etc.

You can sign up here and the show starts at 8:00PM. Remember, if you sign up after 6:00PM EST there is no guarantee I’ll have you on my list.

I have no idea if this email was serious or not, but its pretty funny.

Hello Ben,
Is your act available for touring overseas? If your band, solo act comedy or novelty act offers quality entertainment we would be interested in speaking with you.

Regards,

Christopher Ray
www.MusicPromoBiz.com
Nashville Headquarters

And from their website

We have been appointed to locate talent for the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) Tour Division. DOD favors bands, however solo artists, comedy/novelty acts etc. are also welcome. The tour roster includes the following regions: Australia, Bahamas, Caribbean, Europe, Egypt, Spain, Greece, Turkey, Italy, South Korea, Japan, Puerto Rico, New Zealand, Thailand, Diego Garcia, Most of the Middle East, Parts of Africa, Jordan, Israel, Afghanistan, Equador, plus Central and South America and more.

Compensation:

$150.00 PER PERSON per day. This is NON-NEGOTIABLE. Tours can last from 5 days to 6 weeks.

A Band with 6 pieces would make anywhere from about $4,500 (for a 5-day tour) up to about $64,800 (for a 6 week tour).

An individual would make anywhere from $750 (for a 5-day tour) up to about $10,800 (for a 6 week tour).

If anyone is interested in performing around the world for troops you should check them out. At least they guarantee $150/day. I doubt my draw in Diego Garcia is as good as it used to be.

Read on to see the response Brian wrote for me.God I want to send this.

Dear Christopher:

Thank you so much for your interest in my act. I’m currently fine tuning the production, but our target date for completion is Halloween, which I’m sure will provide more than enough time to make the necessary arrangements for overseas travel.

The logistics of my act can be quite daunting, however, so I will warn you beforehand. For one, I’m not sure about how the transportation of animals is handled, but I’m assured that your company is quite experienced with this issue. However, the three monkeys that make up my backing band are not well mentally and become very destructive when traveling alone without me in the immediate vicinity. This means that my chimps will also require one First Class ticket each as well as myself when traveling (of course, I expect nothing less than first class and I’m sure as a skilled talent recruiter, you can understand and appreciate this). I have been able to get away with dressing them up as children and saying that I sponsor them through a Christian charity and this has worked quite well (at least on Southwest). If time is an issue, I’ll wait until the very last minute to put them in their normal stage attire (pirate costumes with martian antennae and gerbils instead of parrots), so that the flight attenmdants will be powerless to remove me from the flight.

I will also warn you that my music covers very controversial topics like lesbians, martians, being a teenager, going to jail, serving servants and generally “sharp lyrics” with “a zany sense of humor”. I would be appreciative of not playing venues in nations were this would cause me to be stoned or branded. As I understand it, this automatically disqualifies Belgium.

I and my chimp band await your response.

Ben

The last time I went to the Grape Street open mic was May 13th. For some reason I thought Jeremy Hollis was going to be the spotlight artist last night, but it turned out to be John Faye of Ike, who I’ve been meaning to see for a long time. I’ve heard John Shaughnessy cover Faye’s song, “Deathbed,” a few times and now I’ve heard it from the source. Faye has a lot of talent and enough guts to use a phaser pedal in an acoustic act. I also liked Nick Annis who just moved to my old residence. Maybe DC is better these days or maybe I just didn’t know what was going on, but from everything I’ve heard the Philly music scene destroys DC’s. John McManus also played a few good tunes. Someone came up to me and asked if I was the guy with the website who writes all love songs. heh. I played “All My Dreams are in Cartoon” and “The Genius of It All,” and I think I may have been a little out of tune. I tuned my guitar three times before I went up, but I was nursing a string I added 10 minutes before I left and they don’t always want to stay where they’re supposed to.

Manayunk’s best kept secret, or most ignored event, has to be Sound Man Mike’s movie night. Every monday he shows various anime and sci-fi flicks at 8:00PM to a tiny crowd. If you’re into this thing at all you should definitely be there. The movies look awesome and sound even better on Mike’s high end equipment. Last night he showed the Fifth Element and the insane, but very funny, Excel Saga. Excel was so crazy I felt tired after watching it, as if my brain had to run to keep up with everything. Supposedly an even better screen for showing the movies is on the way. Mike said the new screen will reflect 25% more light which is hard to believe after looking at one of the best pictures I’ve ever seen.

As I sat waiting for the open mic to start I read the latest issue of Origivation with Burning Brides on the cover. I’ve had their CD for a while now and it’s pretty good, but after looking at their picture on the cover I’m almost positive I saw the singer at Tom Drinker’s Pub two weeks ago. I should have bought him a $2 PBR.

The RIAA have been contacting downloaders, so it was inevitable the downloaders would start contacting them.

JH: Hello. I just downloaded some illegal MP3s and my friend told me that the RAII is going to sue everyone who downloads music. What should I do?

RIAA: The best advice I can offer you at this moment is to go to dub-dub-dub-musicunited.org and you can learn there how to uninstall your peer-to-peer software or file-sharing service.

JH: But I don’t have a pee service. Someone just e-mailed me a song and I listened to it. Am I going to jail?

RIAA: Sir, I don’t know. I’m not in a position to offer you legal advice on this.

JH: Legal advice? Do I need to get a lawyer?

RIAA: You might want to. As I said, your best possible route is to go to musicunited.org. Beyond that, I’m not in a position to offer you additional legal advice.

JH: Can I write a check to someone?

RIAA: Has your service provider told you that you’ve been subpoenaed?

JH: A penis?

RIAA: [Long pause] What?

Read the rest of the crank call.

Sharpie is well known for the high quality, inexpensive markers we all use to mark party cups, CDs, and whether you paid the cover charge, but how much ink is really in those pens?

Enough to label 968 CDs.

Where do you think Mr Softee’s brain is? Is it where a normal person’s brain would be or is it in the custard? My guess is that his brain is in the normal place, because the custard would be too cold to keep his brain functioning.

So the next question is what is the custard for? My guess is that the custard on Mr Softee’s head is purely for show.

I posted the tribute picture of Johnny Cash on Friday, but I had to say a few words about the man. If you ask people what music they like a common response is, “everything except country.” Every time I respond with, “except Johnny Cash, right?” and they always agree. The guy transcended everyone’s preconceived ideas of what music they liked by creating an image everyone admired. His music is fantastic, but you don’t just like Johnny Cash’s songs, you like Johnny Cash. He did everything and even gained younger fans this year with his MTV nominated cover of “Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails. If you haven’t watched the video yet, you have to. I spoke about it once last March.

At this week’s open mic at the Tree House, everyone is strongly encouraged to play Johhny Cash covers.

John Ritter and Johnny Cash would probably never get lumped together for any kind of discussion other than for dying on the same day. I used to watch “Three’s Company” reruns as a kid and I certainly remember liking the show. My tribute graphic had to include him just for the odd fact that it represented every conversation I had Friday.

“Hey Johnny Cash died.”
“Really? That’s terrible.”
“Yeah, John Ritter died too from some heart condition.”
“The guy from Three’s Company? Didn’t he have a new show?”
“Yeah, he was only 54.”

I had that conversation 16 times on Friday.

Is someone trying to make life awesome for me? I just read over at Pitchfork that Beck is recording a new album with the Dust Brothers, who of course were responsible for alot of the sound on Odelay and the Beastie Boys’ classic, Paul’s Boutique. Beck will probably continue alternating rock and folk albums and follow up last year’s Sea Change with a rock album. The real question is whether Beck will revert back to his odd, incoherent lyrics or will be continue portraying the sincere, straightforward Beck from Sea Change.

According to his official website, Beck is returning to the studio next week to start on a new record with Odelay collaborators The Dust Brothers. Although a recent Rolling Stone report stated that the follow-up to last year’s Sea Change would be dominated by “aggressive” and “loud” guitar sounds, it appears their reporter might have read a little too much between the lines. “[Beck] hasn’t decided exactly what it will be yet or what it will [or] will not include from previously recorded material,” Beck webmeister Truck posted recently to the singer’s official bulletin board. “That [Rolling Stone] article doesn’t really represent what he wants the record to be… he didn’t know that’s what the focus of the article was going to be. You can look forward to his own assessment in his own words soon.”

Odelay is still my favorite Beck album, but I know plenty of people who prefer Sea Change and Midnight Vultures.

I was shocked to see 30+ people at the Tree House when I arrived at 7:15PM. Members from Urban Promise were all hanging out there together having a good time. We even started early, because of the huge crowd. They were a terrific audience and I hope they come back every week.

Keith Lewis took a bunch of pictures and I posted some of the better ones. On to the performers!

1. Jarrod Schafer – He hosts the Christian open mic on Thursdays and Sundays. Jarrod played two originals and Deep Blue Something’s “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Thanks for going on early for me.

2. Leo – During his introduction I said, “Up next is Collingswood’s classic guitar hero, Leo!” I didn’t realize that rhymed until just now.

3. Deanna Robinson – A girl who came out to play the violin for us. Not many people her age have the guts to get up in front of a crowd, but she did it. Stick with it!

4. Garth – Formerly known as “dogwallet,” Garth’s songs are even shorter than mine. I love short songs.

5. Ssaarraahh AAlleennnn – The crowd went nuts after her first song. Let’s hear some more originals!

6. Cynthia – She said she was intrigued by one of my songs. Thanks.

7. Eric and Mike – These guys are in need of a band name so when I introduce them I can say, “Next up playing some fantastic Celtic classics, it’s ….” instead of “Hey here’s Eric and Mike. Please clap.” These are my suggestions:

1. The Celtic Tacks
2. Son of a Banshee
3. The Eiring Aids
4. The Quiet Men
5. The Shamrockers
6. The Green Sardines

Ok I have no idea why they’d want to be called the Green Sardines, but feel free to use any of the ideas I gave you. Everyone else should offer suggestions in the comments.

8. Bob Michel – I can’t remember if this guy ever came before, but he sounded familiar. Great voice.

9. Buddy – I saw Buddy’s name on the list and I thought, “Hmmm… I’ll have to figure out who this guy is.” After a quick scan of the room I saw a gentleman with the name “Buddy” printed across his hat. It doesn’t get easier than that. Buddy’s poems were social, political, and littered with icons. In contrast to younger poets, I didn’t hear anything about personal issues or tragedies. It was all big picture stuff and I completely enjoyed them.

10. Willie Tapps – His guitar sounded awesome last night. It was his birthday a few days ago, so you’re too late if you wanted to wish him a happy one.

11. John Shaughnessy – I was glad to see him play again, since he hasn’t been around in a while. He jammed with Sarah Allen for a song and then played a couple covers originals. John claims he used to cover the Pixies’s “Here Comes Your Man” and he better start practicing it so he can play it again.

12. Anthony – He has a CD coming out pretty soon. I had to mic his guitar, but it sounded good. Some guitarists sound better miked up.

13. Mark – Brought up Chris on bass for a song and then did some Chilli Peppers’s tunes and “When I Come Around” by Green Day. He wanted some distortion so I turned up the gain a little on the sound board and lowered the mix. It was definitely distorted, but didn’t sound all that great. When Mark played “When I Come Around” he kept throwing in little improvisations between chord transitions that cracked me up.

14. Mike – He wore an Early November shirt, so I asked him about the band (I talked about them earlier). He mentioned his band, Finding Westerly, might go on tour with them soon. Hopefully the band brings a first aid kit along, because Mike tripped over the monitor, knocked over my guitar, and busted his lip wide open on his guitar. Some ice and paper towels prevented the stage from looking like a crime scene, but anyone who didn’t see the fall might have thought he was doing an Gene Simmons impression.

15. Adrien Reju – Her band is playing the Moorestown Family Fun Day this Saturday at 11:30AM. I got her to play one of my favorites, “Was it Candlelight.” The song is sad, but not tragic. It’s more of a “what if?” kind of sad. She also played “Two Sounds,” which I like a lot, and another new song whose name I lost or never had. It’s hard to tell sometimes.

16. Ben Garvey – I sound checked with Beck’s “Lord Only Knows.” I’ve been checking with this song every week for a while now and I think I’m going to have to get a new song. Any suggestions? At the end of the night I played “The Genius of it All” and “Mr. Grieves” in honor of the Pixies getting back together. Ever since yesterday I’ve been paranoid that it will turn out to be untrue. I hope I didn’t jinx it.