Wi' (not) Jammin'

After 6 months of oscillating between playing rockstar and playing grumpy-organiser-man - the Coco's Jam Sessions are no more. It seems that the Jam Session was the only night that was a guaranteed success, and the bar is going to replace it's stage with a DJ booth.

It was a great experience while it lasted, and I learned a lot, but there is a part of me is glad for a break. As the nerves and worry of managing to get through the night with unknown musicians gave way, it became an organizational chore. How do we plug in 3 guitars in with 2 guitar cables? How long do you give the drunk guy a shot on the drums before you ask him politely to leave? How do you explain to the Reggae enthusiasts that reggae sounds terrible if their timing is terrible? And also is all this shit your responsibility?

Through the Jam Sessions I have met loads of new musicians and contacts and built a lot of confidence in playing and even singing. Thank you to everyone that put up with it and thank you to everyone that participate; we did ourselves proud. Onwards and upwards to the next adventure.

Another late night Jam.

Tomorrow is a public holiday in the Netherlands so the Jam session is packed. We have Aron Levin of the Heaters from Cincinnati warming up for his show on Saturday and various other people that don’t need to work tomorrow. Sefi is going back to Israel so it’s the last time we’ll see him for a while.

Liberation Jam

Sandra is leaving at the end of the month. Her departure has finally given us a deadline to work towards for finishing her CD. We´re aiming for 8 studio tracks and 4 live tracks, so Wednesday was spent recording bits and pieces of vocals and assembling some rough mixes of the tracks. We also recorded guitar for "better to burn out than fade away" and "born with a tail". 

Afterwards we headed down to the mine for the Wednesday Jam Session. it was eally well attended:

 

Sandra brought down several friends including Pierre Corneille who took the first videos from our Jam Sessions:

Karolina's birthday jam

It's been a busy week with a trip to Scotland for my birthday, straight back to an open mike night and  now a Jam night for Karolina's birthday:

Late night Jammin'

I had today off to go to Scotland for the weekend and Fraser had to take a flight early this morning, so we swapped roles and I did a late one at the Jam Session. It was fun seeing what happens after I leave for once. It tailed off towards 2am and then once all the local bars closed, it got busy again until about 4am... it was a great night and I didn't stop playing... It feels good to wake up with tired fingers.

Second jam session with low attendance

The Jam Session attendace fairies didn't do their work this week. It was our second "Dead" night. It's hard to tell why. It was the week after Easter... so maybe people had bank holiday hangovers, or maybe the draw of the Champions League games proved to much for some people. I don't belive there is so much crossover between guitars and football, but maybe I'm wrong.

I really enjoyed the session anyway. When it's quiet we get much more oppurtunity to play. We did an excellent(I think) cover of Man in the Mirror we murdered yet another beatles song and I finally mangaged to slip in a (somewhat reduced) version of Stairway in the proceedings. Oh yeah.... and we debuted our first ever female drummer(Tamira) at the Jam session. 

Busy Busy Busy Jam Session.

Last night's Jam session was packed. There was a great vibe.. Following a Les Claypool concert, Stephen has taken to Bass playing with a tad too much fervour, but we had stellar performances from all the usual suspects and I even managed to keep folk in their toes by slipping in a Tina Turner cover sung by yours truly in between the inevitable funky jams, and it wasn't Acid Queen!!! 

Rickrolling Jam Session

was a great Jam Session last night attendance was reasonable and there was something in the air - we were on fire. 

 

Jam not really flowing

The quietest Jam Session we've had last night; Who knows why... altogether it was a bit of a jumble... no one seemed to be in the mood.

Jam Night @ the Mine

Pretty good night again... it amazes me how sucessful these nights are. There weren’t so many musicians this time, but there were still plenty punters…my self indulgent highlight of the night was Maggot brain…If I honestly thought anyone apart from me would want to hear it I’d just play it all night. 

Anicdote of the night was a guest guitarist who kept on asking where the pickup selecter switch was on my one pickup guitar... 

 

Frustrating Sunday

The lyrics didn't lend themselves obviously to chords.... which frustrated me.... but maybe they will on another day.

We had a 5SOF practice, but Fraser didn't show up, so it was just me and Javier. We had some good fun jamming, but we cut it short and I'm home getting organised for a week of work. 

Jam Session

It was a bit of a slow start but by the time I left, the Jam Session was wailling... Giovanni Bassano and James O'Reilly  made their first appearance and really impressed. I managed to sit in on drums with them and provide some lead for some pink floyd later in their set. 

With continuing testicular fortitude I managed to sing Jimi, Led Zep and Tina Turner back to back.