This is a little late in posting because I wrote half of this tale before a buggy text editor ate it, which disgusted me from attempting to write it all down again until this evening. The short of it is, this past Wednesday night in Belmar my friends Jesse, Brian and myself played out at a local coffee house, a first for me and Jesse. Now for those of you near and dear who would have wanted to see this in person, take heart in knowing that we’ll be doing this again so bitch at me for not cluing you in the first time and I’ll be sure to tell you when the next time comes around.

Now for the long of it all.

I pulled into downtown Belmar a exactly 6 p.m., noting the time on my car’s dashboard while I was gathering my thoughts and my copy of “The Iliad”. I made my way into Coffee Blue, paid my three bits for the cover charge, scribbled the name “Hallucenagenerator” on the open mic sign-up sheet and went to grab myself a large cup of French Vanilla. As if I needed the caffeine; my nerves were pretty shot at the moment and wiring myself up was probably the last thing I needed, but when in Rome and all that.

I slid my way into the back of the establishment and started making some calls and texting people on the start time, cluing them all in on the what’s and whens. I’m finding that cell phone text messaging is a great invention — it’s nice to be able to send the same note to 5 different people at once. The only thing left to do was sit and wait for my band mates to show up, so I cracked into my tome and once again tryed to force my way throught one of the toughest reads I’ve had in a long time.

It’s not like I don’t already know the highlights of “The Iliad”, but the style of the writing is a little exhausting at times. Whenever time a character is mentioned, you get either their complete genealogy, a recap of all their balltefield glory, or a description down the the last hair of what they’re wearing. Not just once a chapter, or once every few paragraphs, but every single time…or maybe it just seems that way. The way the words and sentences seem to drag on and on…just like the wait that the book was taking my mind off of.

Did I mention that I was a little nervous at this point?

Sometime before 7 I started seeing familiar faces. I could have noticed the mountainesque frame of my friend and band mate Brian from across the Shark River, so it wasn’t hard to spot him, Jesse and Eileen walking in. Seeing them killed a major source of tension — it’s somewhat natural to at least pay lip service to the fears of car troubles or some act of fate keeping your partners from showing, especially on a first time situation.

We set ourselves up with some prime real estate in the back, giving Jesse and Brian plenty of space to tune up their guitars and me plenty of room to sit and drink my coffee (I mean, it’s not like I have to tune my djembe very often). Sometime a few minutes later Jesse spotted our friend Sue, who had her boyfriend Pat and one of his friends in tow. We now had a band ready to play, an audience that included friends to watch and nothing left to do but wait for out names to be called.

About three acts went on before the M.C. tried to muddle through the pronunciation of our band name, which is funny because the three of us can can agree with that aspect of it but the spelling is still up to debate. We made our way down the steps and over to that half-foot high riser of a stage. I didn’t have time to think about much else besides setting up in a quick and timely fashion, but I distinctly remember thinking how many years went into making such a small step and how close I came to doing it one night all by my lonesome, attempting to sing the very same song we were about to perform acapella.

Settled in that seat, with the mic right in front of me, I felt a slight tingle down my spine, icy cold. No going back now. Nerves be damned, let’s do this!!!

“Hi, we’re Hallucenagenerator, and we’re going to play our song ‘Resolve’.”

My eyes locked with Brian, a simple head nod and we were under way, playing through through the opening instrumental. Of course the crowd had no prior knowledge that the song begins with an instrumental, so when we came to a pause in the song, we had a slight case of premature appreciation with a few people clapping uneasily. That got a bit of a laugh, and helped to break the ice in my veins.

“Now the fun begins.”

We started the main part of the song, the part where I would have to sing and play my drum at the same time, a skill I’ve only been working for a few months. I had to close my eyes as the first line of lyrics started to flow from my lips to the microphone, concentrating on the words as I plucked them from the inside of my eyelids. I blocked out as much of my surroundings as I could just to get started, but four or five lines into it I started to ease into the flow of the music, and my eyes opened on their own, dashing about every corner of the room. That’s when I noticed it for the first time.

People were diggin’ what they heard. Heads were nodding. Feet were tapping. Hands and fingers keeping time. We were the center of attention for the crowd of 40 or so for that brief moment in time, although it felt like being the center of something an order or magnitudes larger than that in my mind. That was the first time I felt the rush of performing, that frighteningly intoxicating elixir I have heard so much about.

And then I noticed my sister had managed to slide in and was watching. She was back and forth between being able to make it or not, and the last I had heard she wasn’t going to be able to show, so seeing her there was a lifting moment.

My eyes refocused on my partners in crime on stage as we leapt into the next change, knowing that I had to pay attention to the song from here on in. See, we only had one real acoustic practice before setting ourselves in front of everyone, and that was the night before. On top of that, we made some last minute revisions to the way we played the song and the greatest potential to screw up was still on the horizon. But while the me that first started his so-called musical career singing off-key in impromptu jams at weekend gatherings would have worried so much about what could happen that a single muffed word or screwed up syllable would have set me into a pit of quicksand that would bring the works crashing down, the me on stage only focused on making to the last note. I had already flubbed a beat here and there, transposed a word or two, and the world had not come crashing down on my head, so that added to my now swelling confidence.

We nailed that ending. We nailed it good, all things considered. And that’s when all those years of screwing around, of pipe dreams and frustration spent trying to shape what talent I was blessed with paid off. The sweet sound of hands being clapped in appreciation. I looked over to Brian, and while he’s actually played out at larger venues (our current project being only the latest in a series of ones he’s been involved with) I could still see that the reaction had some kind of effect on him. Because of the way he was sitting I could only catch a glimpse or two of Jesse’s reaction, but I can imagine he was feeling some of the same things I was, considering he and I started this whole music thing about the same time.

The rest was all just a nice bonus — a victory lap of sorts. We have a lot of stuff in various states of completion, but nothing that was either complete enough or that all three of us knew well enough that we could play, so instead we just improvised a little four or five minute jam from thin air. About as pure of a musical experience as you can get — just straight sound for fun. And as the second round of applause settled down, I said good night to the audience and we walked back to our table and our friends.

We were officially off the clock.

Most of the time I just sat there listening to the other acts that followed us, occasionally getting a word or two of praise from the other performers. But one woman in particular came up and gave me some particular praise for the lyrics (which I take great personal pride in and can be found as an add-on to this post) and some constructive criticism on my singing, reinforcing what I already knew: I had to sing with a tad more strength. Between trying to juggle the drumming with the vocals and this being a first time thing, I knew that my voice was not at it’s best, but it’s all to improve for the next time.

Oh yes, there will be a next time, and probably sooner instead of later. I’m hoping that once a month or so we’ll get out for these open mic nights to put into performance what all this hard practice has been for.

We sat around for a few more acts before jetting. We got a chance to be heard, so it was only right of us to hear as well, but we couldn’t make a whole night of it. Besides, we had our usual 9 o’clock appointment to keep: three hours in the rehearsal studio (which were the best we’ve had yet).

It might have been just another step, but damn if it wasn’t a head trip.
(more…)

I took a lunchtime drive today, admiring the boney-fingered scenery coming back to life under partly-clouded skies. I couldn’t feel the briskly cool wind from inside my bucket seat behind the steering wheel, for which I was quite thankful. I’ve been doing a lot of this in the last few weeks, and doing a lot of thinking on a lot of things.

Birthday’s kind of have that effect on people.

We’ve all done it — woken up on that special day, looked into the mirror and tired to find a sign of wear and tear that shows you that time is indeed passing. Early in the game it’s hard to find it, further sowing the seeds of invincibility, but as the years tally onward you look less and less because you know they’re there.

Of course, to only look at that one aspect of aging and you’d go simply mad. I prefer to focus more on the wisdom gained, and I’ll be damned if I didn’t gain more than my share of it. Granted I learned some of those lessons a lot harder than I wanted to, but sometimes that’s just the best way to get the point across.

But with the spring comes changes, the clearing of old baggage, the outdoors, and the counting of weeks and days until I get to do some summer traveling, as apposed to the months and months I had to count throughout the winter.

And that, my friends, is why I’ve always liked my birthday. Well, that and this.

Happiness is getting a box of used Legos your sister bid on from E-bay in honor of your impending birthday. Joy is wrapping yourself in hours of conversation and coffee the night before with very good company.