purty good day

 

Ain’t nuffin’ going on but the rent these days, nose to the grindstone in all areas of my stupid life. I was painting my ass off at the first of the week down at the beach while Grace and Nathan hung out at the pool. I ain’t begrudgin’m though, they’ve worked hard with hardly a break. Nathan is just getting out of 6th grade and Grace never getting much of a break at all because I’m always running around like my hair’s on fire.
But yesterday was a break for me and I surely did need it. Without a babysitter or a place for Nathan to hang nearby me I decided to take the day off. I looked at the weather forecast (high of 98) and say “uh…nah…ain’t doing it”. There was tons to do though having not been home for a few days. I had to water my 30 or so Japanese maples #1, then I had to spray them for early signs of Japanese beetles, go to the dump, wash towels from the beach, go get paid for aforementioned work, go look for a belt for my lawn mower, and do all of this while also saving energy for the evening’s festivities of recording a new song and then going to see my buddy Dan playing with Will Hoge down at the Pour House.
So I get to the studio (Jack’s house) and the song that won’t leave me alone for the past few days is heavy on my mind. I'm constantly switching lines and verses right up to the time that I sing them. (Engineer) Jonathan shows up from the back door and no sooner than he says “Hey man!” a little puppy scurries under his feet. “What the hell is that thing!?” I blurt.
“This is Jack’s new puppy”, a real sweetie, but a ball of fire named Semmi. So for the next couple of hours I’m trying to lay down a rhythm track with 2 dogs fighting underneath, Pilate, Jack's older dog and this thing, not to mention the fact that I’m a REALLY sucky guitar player. I mean, I can carry my own with about 30 tries* but I ain’t no one-take wonder with the thing like I am drums (proven again last night).
We get on with it and actually get something going. I get a track down with the loop, then go sing it and then go play drums. Jack comes in from work right on time and grabs his Les Paul bass he had me pick up in Nashville for him about a dozen years ago and starts to channel McCartney. It’s a song called “Feel right now”. The melody haunted me until I finally put pen to paper and made sense of it all.
It’s about what else?...sex. Mostly about how nothing else matters during that time no matter how stressed you are and about how you should appreciate every moment that you feel like that. Everybody really got into the groove of it and sometimes I need that for a little confidence boost, but by the end of the night that haunting melody in my head was satisfied and beginning to not only leave me alone for a while but thank me.
“Doh!” it’s 10:30! Don’t Will and Dan and ‘em start at 10:30? We run out the door and sure enough they’re rockin’ the house when we get there. Every time I see Will I think about how great his hooks are and beyond that even how great his voice is. It’s a wonder to me why he hasn’t made it famous’er’n shit. Oh wait! I know why! Because he doesn’t suck! He keeps fighting the good fight though like we all do and keep loving the moments we have on stage.
“Nothing matters any more than the way we feel right now” - “Feel right now”


*I’m particularly proud of the 7 guitar solos I did on my second record.

Ronnie Woods

 

Hey, did y'all ever see this picture of Ronnie Wood wearin' a Woods t-shirt? Pretty cool, huh? It's on the inside sleeve of Ronnie and Bo Diddley's (The Gunslingers) "Live at the Ritz" CD, a Japanese import.
Isn't that the record where Bo introduces "Ronnie Wood from The Rolling Stones" and Ronnie introduces him as "Bo Diddley, of himself!"? I'll have to listen to it while I'm down at the beach this week. Back on Thursday for more Rock history.
Will leaves for Ecuador in the morning, thanks to all contributors and you know who you are. You guys rock! Keep him and his bunch in you're thoughts for a safe and successful trip.

My little one and...

 

Here's my kit in the studio with the extra tom, you won't see me out in public with it.
I'm still married to the 4-piece kit, I just had this added on for the over the top songs
we've been recording lately.

Tommy Lee's big one

OK drummers, y'all can stop now. Tommy's got you all beat.

 

His is definitely bigger.

 

Motley Crue launched their new tour on Larry King Live tonight and when I saw Tommy's kick drum I spit wine all over the TV.

Mr. Roboto explained...

Writer Dennis Deyoung (who?) finally explains what the hell Styx’s “Mr. Roboto” was about.:

“It’s the future in America! Rock and Roll has been banned, a rock star named Kilroy decides to challenge that law and form a concert, during that concert Kilroy is put in prison. The prison is guarded by Japanese robots called “robotos”. Kilroy escapes from prison by overtaking one of the roboto guards. That’s the story!”

Shit! It all makes sense now! I gotta start writing shit like that!

Tim Russert

I was just as shocked as the rest of America was last Friday afternoon when the NBC News with Brian Williams opened with a picture of Tim Russert with the years of his life underneath his name. I never knew or cared if Tim was a Democrat or a Republican because frankly I didn’t care. All I knew was that when he came on TV I always…ALWAYS stopped what I was doing to listen to him because I knew I was getting the TRUTH.
For or against my man, I just wanted the truth and I knew I was gonna get it from Tim.
I saw the screen and screamed in the room, “WHAT!” I, like everyone else, was in total disbelief. This cannot be true, I thought to myself. But sadly it was true, and life, as it usually does keeps going, now again with one less kind spirit in the world.
The heavens smiled on the mourners today as a ukulele version of “Somewhere over the Rainbow” played in the theater as they left the remembrance. They were met with a vibrant double rainbow in the sky over Washington, DC. What a remarkable life, one that I am personally very thankful for. Not that I knew him or anything, but he sure made me feel like I did.

Monday rocks again!

Last night Jack was in the state that is below us in every way (except trailer sales and unemployment, SC) and the rest of us got it on anyway with the whole making rock history thing, working on the next OakTeam record. I showed up with sushi and a six pack just before Jon got there and we got right to it. There was some fixin’ to do on the pop song Dave and I cut in 2 takes last Monday night, some slippin’ and slidin’ of a few wave forms and we were done with that. Right on queue, Dave showed up and I axed him what he wanted to do and in the words of Twisted Sister “I wanna rock!” was his response. Dave always wants to rock. He lives to rock. Jon really wanted to work on a song (“Pow’ful Merka”, I’ll get into it later) I had played him (a shitty demo I had done) last week that has the potential to rock like ass! Dave worked hard to get his brain around what I had done as I am sometimes want to rock some really strange notes and melodies. Finally, Jon set up some loops and I played Jack’s coffin/bowlin’ ball lookin’ bass and sang in the room and Dave grabbed his guitar and the reins and directed the arrangement. Next thing you know we had rhythm tracks. Greg walks in and we put him to work. He picks a grindy Deep Purple sound and all of a sudden heads were bobbin’ to the beat. Dave asks if he can play drums to it and I told’m “hell yeah”. Dave’s a great drummer. We decide though that it might be cool if I play drums on the verses and he plays on the choruses. So that’s what we did and then for the hell of it, split’m left and right. It was fun and dumber’n shit!
So the reason I wanted to cut “Pow’ful Merka” is that I had written some verses to it a while back. Where did it come from in the first place? On one of our trips up to Chicago, Cleveland and thereabouts our third grade senses were awakened by some over the top American propaganda somewhere, Wal-Mart, Tamarack (in WV) or a truck stop somewhere. We just kept noticing all of this ridiculous “Proud to be an American” stuff. Don’t get me wrong, we are proud to be Americans but not necessarily to the point that we wear American flag cowboy shirts with big eagles on’m and snake “Don’t Tread on me” tattoos across our chests and such. It got pretty funny how much of that kinda stuff we were seein’ up that way and it really made me wanna take what we had clowned in the van and really turn it into something. So that’s where this is going. Not to clown Americans, just the over the top ones.
Plus, it’s just fun shouting “Pow’ful Merka! Pow’ful Merka!”
Hey watch out, 80’s rock is becoming a hit again with the kids via Guitar Hero. They just might really dig us…about 20 years from now.

“In a Family Way” update

Kinda hard to blog when you’re working your ass of all day and then have to run over to the studio to work. I WILL report though that I got to duct tape my head phones on and give my best Keith Moon impersonation Monday night on a new very Who-like song called “Is We or Ain’t We?. Dave had the windmill going and everything. After that I showed him a syrupy sweet Pop song, “About You” and we nailed that, just Dave and I in 2 takes. Things are rolling along on the new record though as we’re prolly half way there. Just for shits and giggles we’re calling it “In a Family Way”, with visions of us on the front sticking out our beer guts.

she's so hot!

This HAS to be the hottest start ever for a June in North Carolina.
My Elvis thermometer reads 102 right now at almost 6 in the afternoon. It really sucks out there. I HAD to get out in it to go get my van in Raleigh that conveniently needed a $420 brake job on Friday. Sheesh! Ya ever get that hopeless feeling?
Anyway, on the way home I was thinking about the heat and was feeling really bad for all the women in the area that HAD to wear a shirt just because the gub’ment and local law enforcement mandate it. God! it must really suck to not be able to just take your shirt off any time you want to. I know y’all girls can wear halter tops and and bikini tops but even they have to be hot and uncomfortable! So let it be known here today, June 8th that I, personally have absolutely NO problem with you ladies walking around without a shirt, top or anything on. It’s perfectly fine with me and I totally understand. It’s hot and girls sweat too. I feel really guilty about being able to strip down and I’m sure there’s a lot of other dudes out there that do to! So hell, take it off! It really does feel better.

Back to work on the new record tomorrow night!

stick out your tongue and say...

OK, I’m done with being mature. Screw that! In the face of adversity most adults do the usual, shoot the bird or turn around and pull their pants down and point to their ass and give a smoochie kind of look. Nope! Not doing that anymore. From here on out I’m sticking out my tongue. Yep! Just like in 3rd grade, just like I learned when I was 4! You’re getting’ it buddy! Just cross my path! I’ll have my eyes closed, my nose turned up and tongue straight out to the tonsils! I’ll even turn my body sideways a little bit just to add to the stupidity.
I tried it out yesterday morning on Nathan when we did our usual go-around about getting ready for school. He wants to get up and start playing games instead of brushing his teeth, putting on clothes and eating breakfast. Well I had had enough and just squatted right down in his face and stuck out my tongue! “Oh! real mature Dad!” he sez. Oh yeah! THAT got his attention. Actually it kinda pissed him off, the desired effect.
Just imagine some dude cuts you off in traffic and you pull up beside him and stick out your tongue. I’m sure his response would be “What?! are you 4 years old?!” Yeah! There ya go! That’ll teach your ass, bitch! Or you’re having it out with your kid’s principal at school and you have nothing for her dead on reply to your stupid question, what do you do? Yep! Let it all hang out baby! She’ll just walk her ass away!
Getting audited? Just as soon as the IRS rep finds your first infraction make the ugliest face you can make and give it to him. Tongue still out, he’s like” Uh…dude? How old are you again?” See there, ain’t that good? He won't know whether to arrest you or call your Mommy!
Or what about when the cop pulls you over for speeding and he hands you the ticket and as he’s walking off you say “Hey!” and when he turns around just stick that bitch out! UH! Take that! And then step on it!
Nope! No more shooting the bird to the President every time he comes on my TV.
He’s getting’ the tongue baby! And I MEAN it!

while I was away

 

Believe it or not, this is the craziest thing that’s happened here at our house in Bunn. While I was in the studio last night I got a call from my wife. “You ain’t believing this!” she said. Will walked outside for a minute while his bandmates were playing our new Wii and came running back in screaming, “There’s a peacock in our yard!” “Aw come on man, you evidently don’t know what a peacock is.” They tell him. But when they go out to see for themselves sure enough there it is. Grace ran in to grab my camera while the other guys were taking pics with their cell phones. I had been hearing a loud screech off in the woods back behind my house for a couple of days and couldn’t figger out what it was. Now we know. He flew up into our big pine tree and spent the night there. He was gone this morning. I hardly knew ye!
So back at the studio, The OakTeam is laying down a new song that The Chi-lites would be proud off called “Wrong for That”. This is nothing like you’ve ever heard out of us. It’s got the sitar solo and everything, and out of THAT comes the supersaturated Prince/Ronnie Isley guitar solo. Dave could hardly play it for laughing so hard. I guess when we do it live we’ll all change into tuxes and do all the dance moves while singing to the sequencer. IG-NUNT!
Thoughts and prayers to the family of our ex-bandmate, Bo Diddley. I bet him and our brother David are up there trading licks right now. They sure put on a hell of a show that night at The Brewery. Bo was a great guy, not only talented but funny as hell. I really feel fortunate to have played with him…even though my arms were numb the next morning!
Will this be the last gasp for Hillary? God! I hope so! I likened her campaign in the later months of the primaries to the scene in Monty Python’s Holy Grail when one of the knights that say “nee!” keeps getting limbs hacked off and yet still taunts the Python guy with replies like “Minor flesh wound!”, “Is that the best you got?” and such. I can see Hillary now laying there limbless as Obama walks off with the nomination, “Come back here and fight like a man!”
There times that you just gotta admit defeat, ya know?

old to new

Why I be so tired these days, turning this:

 

into this!: