Retirement Ain't Easy

This is the continuation of a series of posts – select Category LIFE AS A BAND MEMBER to read in sequence.

I wish we had captured some video from those band days but luckily my brother Johnny was taking photography in high school and had his camera always with him.  He was our de facto band photographer.  After the Fiddlers Green gig on Fort Hood, we still couldn’t play bars because we didn’t[t have enough experience to warrant a bar to give us a chance.  So, somehow Dennis, who had attended Killeen High School, contacted the school and they allowed us to rent their auditorium.  This auditorium was enormous and had a huge stage that sat about 4-5 feet above the audience. We couldn’t believe our luck. So we booked a date and decided to sell tickets to help pay for the rental fee.

We sold quite a number of tickets.  I don’t remember ever having to pony up any money to help pay for the rental of the auditorium so I assume we sold enough tickets to cover the cost.  I don’t remember ever getting any extra money for playing so I also assume Dennis pocketed whatever extra money we may have made.  It turned out we had quite a number of fans willing to pay $2-$3 or whatever it was to come see us.  Even our parents helped out and bought tickets.

When the day came for Second Chance to play our big gig, we loaded up our equipment and drove up to the school and set up. We were our own roadies.  We had invested in our own microphones, amps and instruments at this point. No more borrowed or rented equipment.  We planned to use the auditorium sound system.  I cannot recall how everything was hooked up.  I don’t recall if we had a mixer or how the sound was being pushed to the speakers.  I can only guess that Dennis had friends at the high school who knew how to set up the auditorium sound system.  Since I was not playing an instrument I never bothered with those details.

After setting up our equipment, we changed into our stage outfits.  While Dennis opted to wear suspenders and no shirt like his idol Ted Nugent, me, Howard, Steve and Mick got this strange idea to wear kimonos. Not sure whose idea it was but I guess it was the influence of Rush.  We had seen pictures of Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson wearing kimono type coats, so we thought they were cool. 

In addition to my my mother’s red kimono that she received as a gift from my father when he returned from a deployment to Thailand, I wore a black t-shirt and red pants, trying to emulate Sammy Hagar the red rocker.   I thought I was cool.  I had taken to carry around the top half of my microphone stand like Freddie Mercury.  I wrapped it in white tape similar to Freddie’s stand.

The auditorium, from what I could see from the stage, was about 1/4 full.  I could see the first 4-5 rows were full of friends and friends of friends.  I could also see my parents and Dennis’ parents parked in seats about 3/4 away from the stage.  I’m guessing to get away from the loud music.  As we started to play our set we had some of our friends try to work the theater lights from the side of the stage as best as they could.  Occasionally they would pull the wrong lever and we would be playing in the dark.  It was amateurish at best.

During one of our songs, I don’t recall which, there was an opportunity to get the crowd participating by clapping their hands.  I wanted to get everyone clapping, so what better way than to jump off the stage and run around the audience getting people to clap along with me.  Dennis couldn’t stop laughing at that.  For years we had a giggle every time we talked about the Killeen High gig. 

What I remember the most was our drummer Mick breaking his kick drum pedal halfway through our set.  Now we have 40-50 fans enjoying the show and no way to move forward unless we play without drums. Mick didn’t bring a spare pedal, he had one at his house.  Mick and Howard hopped in a car and headed for his house.  Killeen is a fairly small town and Mick lived less than 10 miles away. 

In the meantime, to keep everyone still interested in us, we improvised.  Dennis started playing Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin.  I knew the words but not the verse sequence, so I stood next to Dennis while he fed me the first line of each verse and I would sing that verse and then the next.  The crowd loved it.  When it came time for the drums to join in the song, Mick had returned with another pedal and replaced it just in time to come into the song as if we had planned it that way.  Totally improvised.  That was the first and only time we ever played Stairway to Heaven.  We had never even practiced it.  The concert was a success.  We were congratulated by all our friends and even our parents were impressed. 

The story continues….