Gig Diary - School for the Dead at The Elevens, March 9, 2007 - with Ari Vais and Ouch.

On Friday at 6:00 in the evening, I headed over to Stop and Shop and bought 10 bright yellow helium filled balloons, then I got a sandwich and brought it home. The balloons were outside stuffed into the car and I was inside stuffing my face with the sandwich when Tony pulled up out front. As I finished eating, I showed him the School for the Dead Instant Survey Cards that I had made the day before. They were bright yellow affairs with two fill-in-the-blanks on them. "The best thing about soup is ________" and "The worst thing about soup is _______." He was amused.

Then we went into the Rub Wrongways Rehearsal Room and learned the Robyn Hitchcock song "Freeze". Tony didn't really know that song and we pretty much went through the structure and I said, "and then you just kind of make sounds and freak out." I got a call from Ken saying that he was not well and couldn't make it to practice, so when Brian showed up just the three of us went over the new song and I discussed the Soup of the Moment Instant Survey concept. They were game.

Ari Vais and I showed up at The Elevens at a little before nine and we brought in the equipment and while Ari went for a rememniscent Northampton stroll, Tony and I set up the amps and balloons and folderol. I had almost all of the balloons positioned when the boys from Ouch walked in. One of them said to me, "Wait. You brought balloons too?!" They had brought a bunch of their own. Funny.

Ari took the stage at exactly 10:00 PM and proceeded to fill the next 45 minutes with old hits and new gems, rocking my acoustic guitar like it was going through a wall of speakers. It was nice to hear all those songs again and that distinctive voice. For his last song, he called up Tony, Brian, and me and we played the Big Star song "Oh, Dana". Good.

We had a great show. Before we started, I collected all of the Instant Survey forms from the crowd and placed them on the ground next to Brian's Kick Drum. Then I tied a balloon to my acoustic guitar head. We were ready.

We played more aggressively than usual, a combination of loud sound, not having played a rock show for a while, following Ari's rock sensibilities, and performing to an energetic crowd. I really enjoyed being able to switch from acoustic to electric as the songs dictated. We played an entirely up-beat set. The slowest song was Back To School wich is pretty mid-tempo. Lesa Bezo came up and sang "Mouth to Mouth", one of my favorite Tony Westcott compositions and a it's song that we used to play in Humbert with Ari. Later Lord Russ came up and sang the "Bagel Song" with us and Ari sang "Screen Door" whil I sat in the audience and beamed. It was nice to have these special guests - it kept the stage alive.

During the second chorus of Soup of the Moment, I picked up the Instant Survey cards and as Max and Brian kept the music going, Tony and I read the answers from the audience. I, dressed primarily in white, read the best thing about soup and Tony, dressed all in black, read the worst things. It worked out much better than I had hoped. I think it came off seeming rehearsed and thought-out. It certainly wasn't.

Our other adventures included debutting "Boring Dream", which went swimmingly. I received lots of positive feedback from people afterwards about that song. We played "Freeze" near the end. It was a shame that Ken couldn't be there since it was his idea, although I have been meaning to cover that song for years. It always a great experience to hear a song that we had only ever played quietly explode into life on a full-blown stage. "Freeze" also surpassed my expectations. Yee.

After a nice strong version of "Omnivore", during which I goofed around with the balloons, we were done. Phew. Thanks everyone.