Show At The Factory

Saturday November 6, 2004

A show at the Factory with Wading Girl, Sequoya and the Lobsters. We rolled in about 7pm and no one had shown up yet so we went to the Angler Cafe to have a real nice dinner before the show.
People started to roll in at about 8:30 and we went on at 9. The sound was fantastic and the other bands were kind enough to stand up at the front and listen to my lyrics.
We started out with the "L&N" by Jean Ritchie. A beautiful song about a coal mining town in Kentucky. My favorite line from the song is "I used to think my daddy was a black man, with script enough to buy the company store. Now he goes to town with empty pockets and his face as white as February snow".
The Lobsters went on next and they were awesome. Their music is like listening to old 45's from the '60s that are impossible to find these days. They played a fair amount of covers that I recognized but couldn't place, except a Bo Diddly song. I got to meet Bo Diddly when I was a kid living in Florida. He shook my hand and looked down at me with his big coke bottled lenses and said "stay in school kid" I was so honored.
The Wading girl took the stage and kept the rocking tempo of the show going. The Wading Girl just got signed to an Independent label "American Laundromat Records". They've played several mini tours and single handedly put together farmout, a very popular music festival. Don't think that they are getting a free ride either. They got where they are through hard work and enthusiasm.
It was suppose to be their CD release party, but the art work wasn't working out so the CD was delayed a week. They recorded and produced the record by them selves. The record company only comes in to play for the distribution and booking. I think it's a good idea to leave it to the bands to manage themselves. The record label books them gigs and they show up and do the rest.
Their set was energetic and fun, and it's always nice to see the other band members sing along. It shows where their heart is (with the music). They even had a trombone player help out with one of the songs. Their music is upbeat and feel good but a closer inspection of the lyrics would show the depth of their writing.
I was able to get my crappy digital camera to work and take some good pictures of the show.

Free Beer

Those are two very good words from your record company when you're a band trying to get your start.
Jake Brennan & The Confidence Men headed for North Carolina for a very short record promotion tour. I spotted them at the Cave under a big sign that said FREE PBR! If you have more dignified taste in beer then you missed a very good show.

They started early as the place began to fill at 7:30pm. The look on the poor bartenders face at the thought of an entire shift of free beers made me sympathetic to say the least.
Every member of the band sang along with the songs, and they looked like they were having a very good time playing for us. I don't remember them mentioning if they had CD's to sell, and after all the free beer I had consumed It didn't matter, I was going to buy it regardless. I figured they'd saved me some cash so I had some to spare (Oh the poor bartender).
It was a value and included a DVD of the making of the record Love & Bombs. Their bass player Binky was very friendly and sat down to talk to us a bit. He was also kind enough to take my CD around to be signed by each member of the band.