Cheevyjames’ Musical Roundhouse

Last night was an unofficial PM gig…I guess I’ll call it Gig #2.5. Julie’s parents were in town (flew back to DFW this morning) and so instead of our usual practice Jenn and I “performed” for Julie and her parents. Eric was supposed to be there, but something came up and he couldn’t make it.

Lee and Susan seemed to really like it and the intimate setting gave us more opportunity to explain the songs and our various contributions to them. How “well” did we play? I think we were fine. We both sounded good and (I forgot to mention it to her) I thought that Jenn’s guitar playing sounded a lot better than at our past gigs. Her vocals definitely sounded great though. Me? I had the usual messups, but it was so relaxed that they were easily laughed off. One song I started over after a flub and it was no big deal.

We ran through all of our songs we have worked up and so we played stuff that hasn’t been played live yet. Julie hadn’t really heard Travelers or Snow yet and she told me afterwards how both seemed to not exactly fit. I thnk Snow fits, although I am a bit embarrassed by a few of the lyrics. I just have to let it go, because it wasn’t exactly poetry when I wrote it (18 or 19) and it’s not going to suddenly turn into some masterpiece. I like having it in the set; adds some nice classicism to it. And Jenn sings it 10 million times better than I can. Now for Travelers…I don’t know. I want play it in front of an audience (not related and in my living room) and see how it goes. I think it definitely adds another wrinkle to our music and oeuvre, but I’m not sure how much I “like” it. Hell, it’s my song so I think I have right to question it. I do think spoken word can work in a “prog” band, so we’ll see how it goes at the next gig, where we’ll hopefully debut it.

Overall I think it was a good “gig” and I had a good time. After we attempted to explain the band name and we came up with a massive long-winded answer. We’ll need to work on condensing that. I did bust out with my Edith Hamilton’s Mythology book and talk about Proteus and some of the things he did and all that, so it was nice to be a little bit nerdy. I mean, hell, our band is named after a Greek god and possibly a mathematical term!

NERDS!

Current Location: around the corner

Current Mood: kinda sweaty

Current Music: Pantera - Walk

Normally, yes, I would be sleeping right now. For some reason I’m still awake. A yawn passes and I think, maybe I could go fall asleep, but…well, I’ll finish this thing first. Besides yawning (a sign, maybe?) there are a few things going in my world. Music is always enveloping my brain so it’s no wonder I blab about it constantly. And as much as I talk about music, I think about it at least 20xs more. I *know* that’s fun for everyone else. Yeah right. The band currently has a gig lined up for July, opening for Don at his CD Release Party. July 14 at Pheasant Creek Coffeehouse in Apex. In addition to doing our opening bit, this time *I’ll* be doing double duty as I’ll be playing with Don on a few of his tunes. Yes, on bass. That should be fun; it’ll be a cool night. So yeah, that’s the only Protean Mean gig so far, but I have confidence others will happen soon (since I’m the one booking these things now). I can’t remember if I mentioned that we now have VIDEOS at the main PM site. Go check ‘em out if you have a few minutes.

Don and I have finished our 2nd Heavy Metal Lunch podcast and I hope that’ll be up in a few days. We’ve received mostly good reactions so far, so if you’ve listened and liked it, THANK YOU! It’s quite fun doing those things.

The acquisition of the new bass didn’t happen yesterday. The person handling my account wasn’t working and that meant not all of the information was available to me. When will I get it? Who knows. Hopefully they’ll call tomorrow and it’ll either be ready or I’ll have a time when I can come get it. Believe me, I’m ready for this toy.

Today started furious cleaning, as Julie’s parents are coming in to visit in a few days. We have a lot of good stuff planned and I think they’ll enjoy it. Then after a 2 day break, Julie’s friend Alexis comes in from Rochester for the weekend (Yay!) and the week after that we fly to Dallas for my Mom’s wedding. The nutty-ass weather prevented us from camping last night (so we hiked instead) and that means we won’t get to try that again until mid-May. I hope it’s not too hot by then.

Oh, I guess there is another Protean show coming up! Next Monday Jenn and I are doing a private show for Julie’s parents (and Julie and Eric). That’ll be fun. We’ll debut stuff! No, I’m not considering that a proper show, I’m just goofing off. I do, however, want to debut some stuff at the next real gig, whether it’s the one in July or something before that. Ideally I’d like to debut something or do something different EVERY gig. Yeah, that’s a lot to ask for; I understand that. That’s how I think though. Keep people on their toes.

See, there I am again, thinking about music. And when I look to the right at that certain image and then at the same image accompanying this journal…I am again reminded that I’m not working on that thing I started working on years ago. I’m worse than Boston for taking my time recording. It never leaves my mind though. It’s always in there, going, “yo, James, FINISH ME”.

I shall.

But before then, I have to sleep.

Current Location: Earth

Current Mood: contemplative

Current Music: Starless - Crimson > Pretty Little Ditty - RCHP > Love Me Two Times - The Doors

I went out to lunch earlier and on the way back to the office I saw all of the little kids having a picnic by the planetarium; obviously a field trip. I know this campus (UNC) is a popular place for field trips anyway (it’s a gorgeous campus), but the presence of the planetarium gives it a nice extra amount of goodness. But seeing those kids today eating their lunches on the grass and having just an amazing time reminded me of how much I loved field trips back in elementary school. Those were ALWAYS the best school days. It wasn’t just being out of school and not doing work (though that was great), I always loved going to new places and learning new things. And not learning them in a boring read-the-textbook kinda way, but in a real life way. I mean, I still love going to the planetarium here. Julie and I went last July 4th and had a great time. I’m definitely not afraid to say how absurdly cool it is to have a statue of president Polk in the rotunda on the side of the planetarium building. Oh, you don’t know how much James K. Polk kicked ass? Go do research; he did. He’s the only president to have graduated from UNC.

Anyway, field trips!

I have so many great memories of them, even the ones where we stayed in Duncanville and learned more about the history of our little town. By the way, I loved studying Duncanville history back in 3rd/4th grade. Even if you live in a suburb of a city like Dallas, I think it’s extremely cool to learn the history of your town. The field trips I remember most are: the one to Fair Park and the Science Place, the one to Old City Park (where I had a major asthma attack! That was fun…), the aforementioned one to Duncanville’s historic places…but my absolute favorite was the time we went to Ft. Worth and ate lunch alongside the Trinity and went the IMAX theater there and watched the film on Hawaii. I mean, experiencing IMAX as a kid was just an awesome event. Man, that was SO COOL! We also went to the ABC Flag Company there, which is still in business. Oh, in reference to the Trinity River…there’s actually a nice park there in downtown Ft. Worth where the river is surprisingly nice. It’s very different than the part of the river in Dallas, which smells worse than dead animals…and probably has some in there. However, when you go 30 miles west…it’s fine. I still totally remember that IMAX show though. I was actually kinda freaked out of the setup since it felt like I’d fall down the stairs. Plus some girl was acting like she was gonna do it. I wasn’t afraid of heights as a kid, but it was trippy being in there.

I miss field trips; they should have them for our jobs too. I’d love a field trip to somewhere in the area. Or one to the beach, that would rule. Oh well, I guess that’s what vacations are for!

Current Location: somewhere

Current Music: Mr. Bungle - California