Brain farts and distractions

This weekend has been all about band action, which always makes for a nice weekend. We played a gig on Friday night, went to a friend's gig on Saturday night, then played another gig on Sunday morning. I still have no working camera, so I couldn't take any pics at any of these, but I think I may be able to find some photos I can share for the Sunday gig, given a day or two. So for now, I'll recap the Friday gig and follow-up with another post later about Sunday.

SO! Friday night. We started the weekend by playing Latitude 30 in the 6th Street district on Friday night, which was mostly good, but had a few challenges. The good part is that we really like that venue. The owner and staff are great, they have a nice stage, and though shows can start a bit slow, they always end big, since 6th Street really tends to pick up after 11:00 pm. So, definitely a gig we like.

Also, we had several people come out for us, including an old friend of Johnny's who happened to be in town from Utah, Katy, and a friend of hers, who was exploring the Lone Star State with her, Amy. Katy is famous with her own blog and all, It's My Life, so I'm givin' her a public shout out. Thanks for coming, Katy and Amy! It's always fun to play to friendly and familiar faces.

The challenges came in the form of distraction and your garden variety brain farts.

The distraction was an enormous TV screen placed on the wall directly across from the stage. We're used to bars having TVs around, and they do their part in bringing people in and hopefully keeping them there to spend money, so we get why bars have them, and we can't argue the value to all parties. But it's always a struggle to not start watching them, particularly if there's something on that you like. And when said TV is wall-size and directly in front of you, it's almost impossible not to get distracted by what's happening on the screen!

Friday night the giant wall screen had a basketball game on, which distracted Johnny, followed by a Harold and Kumar movie, which sucked me and Joe in. It had subtitles (presumably it was on closed captioning since those movies are, in fact, in English), so I couldn't help reading the subtitles, and Joe said later that he didn't remember most of our last set. He gets points for being as good as he is on autopilot. His brain must be really big. Not sure if that means anything else, ladies, but he's available, so come to a show and check out his skillz (wink, wink).

I remember a similar situation at another bar on 6th, when the bar showed a loop of an old Elvis movie all night. I actually began looking for certain scenes to repeat when I was supposed to be thinking about what I was playing. This is not good if you actually want to know where you are in a song. I think I cut off half of half a guitar solo in one song and didn't even know it until Johnny told me after the show:

Me: "Noooo. I don't think I did that."

Johnny and Joe: "Yeah, you did."

Me: "Well.......okay. But blame Elvis and his damn psychedelic dance sequence. I can't be expected to concentrate with that going on."

I'd like to say the Harold and Kumar movie was the reason I completely forgot the lyrics to one of my songs Friday, which constitutes challenge #2 of the night. But the truth is, I just had a straight up brain fart. It's happened before with this song, which isn't hard, and I think I've developed a mental block about it. I actually fear it now when I see it coming up in the set. We may have to abandon it, unless Johnny thinks there's something really appealing about me standing at the mic, looking panic-stricken and glancing at him imploringly as I mumble fake lyrics, hoping no one will notice. I'm pretty sure that's not going to earn us any tips.

We've got about 90 songs in our repertoire now, and that just happens sometimes. You may know a song backward and forward - you can sing it in your living room, the shower and your sleep without a hiccup, then suddenly during a show, your mind goes blank. It happens. But if a song routinely throws you, sometimes you just have to let it go.

I know there are lyric savants out there, and I give them props. It'd be a really nice skill to have if you're doing this stuff professionally. But I claim no Rain Main skills for lyrics, so if you ever hear me flub something in a song, just let it go. Don't act like you're better than me. You know you that at some point, you heard "Runner in the Night" and thought Manfred Mann was singing something about douches.