5 Wankers & A Power Rack

Live from the stage - ready to share that mic!!

And so I’ve joined this local rock band.  Last Saturday night I did my first gig with them. Back in Kansas City I’d been an active member of some band since I was 18. I’ll never forget the first time I walked down the stair’s to the basement lair of the band, surrounded by guys with guitars strapped on, microphones at the ready, and I walked up and let loose “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” ala Ms. Benatar and it sounded just like the gd record.  Like crack, man.  Addiction followed and a lifetime of chasing my musical bliss, often at the expense of other things…uhh…like college, finances, etc. ensued.  But after arm wrestling cancer for 3 1/2 years, I was in no mood to accept drudgery and “hafta’s” ~ you “hafta” go to college, you “hafta” work full time. Fuck that.  Life is short and please let me tell you just HOW.  I’ve got the chemically burned veins to prove it. Anyway, since being unceremoniously dragged to Maryland as the good wife, I’d been without a band family, thus…miserable.  Thus, not myself. Rag doll, doing dishes and taking care of kids and writing durges at the piano.  A lot. In high school I used to get in trouble for writing fragments.  I refused to change them and took lower grades. Claiming “I know it’s a fragment” did not seem to help. Me and  Mr. Vonnegut, fragmenting all over the damn place. Snort.  Back to Saturday night.  First of all, I’d forgotten a few things.  I’d forgotten how bitchy I get in the 5 hours leading up to a gig.  Jeeezus Christ, do NOT speak to me.  I am quiet, pensive, insulated, isolated. Running lyrics in my head, singing multiple harmony lines silently to myself, mentally packing my gig bag. It’s a good time to just stay away from me and I’d forgotten that. Being my de-butt with the band, of course I was particularly intense, especially since I had not had a full rehearsal with the whole band!  At one practice the lynchpin keyboard player was not there and the dress rehearsal was missing the other lead singer – so no way to work thru dual vocals. That is NOT ideal. That is barely doable. I just kept reminding myself, “You’ve got 30 years under your belt, idiot.  If you can’t do this, who could?”  To make matters worse, the weather was a freak show.  You can blame me for bringing tornado’s from Kansas to Maryland, man.  I drove thru the wall cloud from hell to get to the gig. Tornado warnings going off around me, alone in my car, literally driving thru the fkn woods.  Brought a new definition to ‘white knuckling it.’  By the time I arrived, later than I’d hoped due to driving 20 mph. due to diminished visibility from downpouring rain, I was thrilled to find the bar had laid down a mandate for our P.A. that would prove to make our night on stage challenging and miserable – and I shall not go into it here because nobody gives a shit.  Band managers, bar owners and bar managers should mostly, without fail, be flogged in the town square if you ever get the chance. It’s just common knowledge…..

So we’re opening the show with NO sound check. Kill. Me. Now.  Seriously, a singer’s nightmare. But I don’t even wanna talk about the show. I’d like to talk about the secret life of a chick singer. Hey, it’s the “Boy’s Club” and as a girly person, you’re standing right in the middle of the three ring circus and you’re walking the right rope, baby. One must be sexy but not sleezy, cool but not cold, energetic but not spastic, you MUST stand up for your needs but of course, don’t put on the bitchy britches!  Oooohhh no.  Not only that, for every male in the band, there is an accompanying female of his that is integral to your success or failure in the band. Being a woman, I understand the power we have.  We have all of it ~ if we know how to use it. And I am here to tell you, if’n the womenz don’t like you, you are SCREWED. This includes the crowd. So you’re every move is being scrutinized by the almighty boob troop and if you let it, it can seriously mess with your mind ~ and self esteem?  You’d better have a freakin’ trunk load of it strapped to your ass.  And lucky lucky lucky me, I pretty much adore myself about 90% of the time….haha.  Even more fortunate, the women associated with the guys in my band rank somewhere beyond fabulous. They welcomed me with open arms, hugs, kisses, and cupcakes! Who gets THAT, for godssake?  I was as concerned about them girlies as I was the actual gig. Back home, I was always a core member of the band – a founding member. Here, I was the newbie AND the only girl.  I know I keep coming back to that, but it’s a tricky plight.  In the music industry, males comprise about 95% of the pants on stage. Skirt on the line!  On a tightrope. And once you cross over that very obvious line between the dance floor and the stage?  Well, you are in that exclusive little club called the ‘band’ and all others are not.  And they can hate you for it. Jealousy makes people…well, it’s been known to make people KILL people. But this nite, for now, the stars aligned and it was a regular love-fest up in there!  I layed out some Journey and Evanescence and the crowd was off the hook happy about it – tons of my friends showed up (driving thru that nasty-ass weather mess) and they were givin’ the love.  Also, something I had forgotten.  When people applaud and scream happy screams for what you’ve just done?  Dudes. Huh?  You mean my hours and hours of work actually have a pay day?  Ha – and that payday does NOT come from the bar, btw.  I made the same money Sat. night that I made on  Sat. night in 1981. Local musicians do not play for the money.  They play for the love of playing.  Period. The pay day is when you’re clicking along with your mates on stage and you make that eye contact with them and you’re both thinking, “Holy shit, are we lucky bastards or what?” And, “We rock. We bad. Uh-huh.”  And other such catchy things.

And now, what else I had forgotten…I had forgotten about drunk people.  Being a patron in a bar and dealing with a drunk is completely different than being their entertainment for the night and dealing with them. You can’t alienate them, with say… “Leave me alone, you asshole.”  You cannot say that.  Ever.  That is, unless you want you band fired and word to spread that you are not good for business. Drunks have to be coddled, handled, if you will, like fragile flowers. Their delicate petals, stroked and protected.  And here’s that funny girly angle again. As a female, it’s the finest line you’ll ever walk. Drunk guy, slobbering on you about how ‘great’ you are (and 10 minutes later he’s still repeating the same stuff  about how great you are and how  “I had a band once”….) and you have to nod, smile, and respond without encouraging him to take you home.  Also of note, inebriated people do not know when the conversation is over. Ever.

By the end of the night the emotional input has been quite high, the handling of everything has been exhausting, and oh yeah, somewhere in there you slammed down 3 hours of kickin’-some-ass music making which has left you sweaty, starving and questioning your own existence and your ringing ears.  I am in a rare and exclusive little gang, called a band.  Without hesitation, I can assure myself that when my kids go to school, they are the only ones with a mom in a rock band. It’s strange. It’s engaging. And I’m one lucky beotch.  I grew up with my father having band practice in my living room.  How they ever expected me to turn out normal is beyond me.

P.S.

To clarify: They have the wankers and I have the power rack.