14 replies to this topic

[UR12]

It seems it's either feast or famine around here but good fortune has been rearing its head for a change. The guys I have been playing with over the last 4 years have went their seperate ways. No big drama or anything to report. We were really just a bunch of guys getting together on Sundays for a jam. I was a little depressed so I started looking around and before I know it, I have people calling me and I have a job with one band and a tryout for another. Although I consider myself an old rocker (Very OLD! LOL) I was asked to play in a backup band for a sixteen year old girl who does mainly Pop and Country, (Adele, Miranda Lambert, Little Big Town, etc). The girl, Emily Kinner, has won the KY State Texaco Country Showdown and is now looking at competition in the regionals and maybe the finals. She has a lot of talent for such a young age and it has been a joy rehearsing with her. One of the local country radio stations has been promoting her so we may have some bigger venues ahead. I have never played country music and it has been a challenge for me to wrap my head around the whole idea but I have been having a blast. We are doing a local state festival tomorrow evening and it will be our first time out as a backing band in public. The second band called last night looking for a hardrock/metal drummer and I will be trying out with them Sunday afternoon. Both bands don't mind side jobs so it looks like it may work out. At 57 I'm playing more now than I did when I was in my 30s and having a lot more fun too. I just don't know what to make of all this.

[carox]

Just enjoy it !! I only started in my mid-50s and thought I was jolly lucky to get into a band last year and when that broke up I thought that was it, I'd never get another chance, who'd want me at my age? But I took a deep breath and advertised on a few band sites and couldn't believe the number of replies I got. Including my current band which I'm very happy with (and gigging in a small way).

It's strange having all these new, totally unexpected and really rather good experiences later in life. When I retired from my desk job last year I thought life was going to be all about gardening and looking after the grandchildren!

Good luck with the gig tomorrow. Hope the fun goes on for a long, long time.

[KBaker]

I went from playing rock/punk/alternative to Country.. It is a big difference in the drumming style for sure. Once you get the hang of it, almost all of it is real simple. A whole lot of shuffles and 4 on the floor.

[Chase David]

That's great news and I wish you good luck. Just sit back and enjoy the ride. I'm sure they wouldn't be asking you to play if you couldn't handle it. I really look forward to hearing of your updates on this. Congratulations!

[UR12]

Carox
Thats exactly it, "who'd want me at my age" is pretty much the way I was feeling too. My grandkids are just the greatest joy in our lives right now but I never thought I would be playing in bands at my age. I'm going to ride it till the wheels fall off!

Kevron
Ive been practicing my shuffels for sure. Havent used those for a while. So have you missed the rock/punk/alternative thing? I thought I was going to get to audition with another band
who was doing 3 Days Grace, Shinedown, Pearl Jam etc but their first drummer came back
before my audition date and they canceled. Trying to listen to and learn all of this new to me material is mind boggling.

Chase
Thanks for the congrats! If I get any video of this weekend i'll post some links.

[patch]

that's awesome news.. Congrats.. and enjoy...

you'll be great I'm sure of it....

[KBaker]

I do miss it alot. But I have some stuff coming up that will help with that. I'm going to be doing some drum tracking for a alternative/punk project.

My guitar player for the country band is actually one of my old guitar players from my alternative project. The bass player is from a metal band. So the singer and the rhythm guitar are the only "country folk" in the band. We take country songs and up them about 15bpms. Throw some distortion and occasionally throw in a double bass breakdown. It works surprisingly well. We still do the old school songs and don't really change them. (in fear of being attacked) You just don't go changing a Johnny Cash song, or Boot Scootin Boogie. That is worse than calling someone's grams a toothless whore.

[UR12]

Yesterday started out looking bad. I have a bad cold and wasn't feeling well but was going to be a trooper and get through the gig. I drove about 20 miles to where we practice to get my drums and as I pulled into the guitar players driveway I noticed that my car was over heating. This was about 3PM and the gig was at 7pm and 15 miles one way from where I live. I let the car cool down and added some water and was able to get it home but it was again over heating when I pulled into my driveway. So I got a neighbor to give me a lift to a car rental company to rent a car to get to the gig. Ended up costing me about $120 for the weekend car rental, so money wise, I lost money on the gig LOL. Once we got there, there was another band finishing up and their drummer took forever to get his drums off stage. He took so long that we ended up losing 10 minutes off our set time which pissed us all off. There was only about 12 people in the stands for their show and I thought this is going to be one of the worst day/shows ever. I had to hurry to get setup and wasn't paying much attention to anything going on except my setup. I just took a little 4 pc Pearl kit and it didn't take me long. I finally get setup and sit down behind my drums and look out from the stage and to my complete amazement, the place is packed with standing room only, WOW! Our 10 song set went off without a hitch and it was one of those nights that after we started you couldn't have asked for anything to go better. I didn't have time to setup my recorder after all that I had been through but saw some of the other band members familys with some video cameras so I hope some of it gets posted.

I will be auditioning tomorrow with the other band so I'll see how that goes.

[patch]

great end to a hard start.... awesome... good luck with the second band today...

[Chase David]

Even though you may have lost money, it could pay off in the long run. Sometimes it takes money to make money. I think it's great that the audience to be larger than you first expected. That had to be total enjoyment for you to play to a large crowd like that when you first thought it was going to be small.

Good luck on your audition. And we will be anxious to hear how it all went.