  Gannon Member Username: Gannon Post Number: 14537 Registered: 12-2003 |
All are welcome to join me and Audra Kubat for our weekly Open Mic tonight from 7 until 9, we're back indoors due the season change...so they are pretty strict on our end-time again! We have a great collection of musicians who gather to show off new tunes, collaborate on curious blends, and simply let their hair down in a totally comfortable setting. I run the sound board, so the volume is NEVER too loud...and the mix is always spot on, if I say so myself. (it is very tough for me to self-promote) We've got a wonderful group of regulars through there, and I'd love to see a few new faces. At least tonight, I'm sure you won't be disappointed. If we get enough musicians, nobody has to hear me strum MY axe...this night is already shaping up to be something special, I can just 'feel' it. Cheers | ||
Tkierpiec Member Username: Tkierpiec Post Number: 131 Registered: 03-2007 |
Gannon, would you welcome a reggae musician to your open mic night? My boyfriend is here visiting from England right now - he's rasta so he does socially conscious music, not strictly reggae. I know he'd love to meet some other music minded people and maybe share the stage. Perhaps next week....  | ||
Gannon Member Username: Gannon Post Number: 14546 Registered: 12-2003 |
Tkierpiec, Sorry, this turned into a novella...couldn't turn it off! Absolutely...while we were aiming for acoustic-only, because of the indoor, smallish-room, non-11 volume control setting...the first or second week a young fellow came in with with a funky electric guitar and an amp and all this gear and opened up my head and heart a bit. He setup when his time came around and proceeded to play some really avant-garde experimental riffs and distortion bends that to ME sounded like Jimi Hendrix reincarnate. Next time, he realized he didn't have to lug an amp...then over six or so months of developing a friendship, I simply cannot imagine him NOT being around. He even started doing his thing on my acoustic, and we've had a blast discovering the whole time. (our friendship was cemented one funny night when he realized I was the guy he read HERE, and didn't know it for six months!) That said...it took HIM to wipe away any preconception I had about what our meager Open Mic was going to become! It helped me loads when Jason and the Punknecks stopped through on their perpetual national tour. THESE extraordinarily cool cats (and one gorgeous gal) just blew us out of the room, and I was lucky enough to make their friendship and hang with them for the better part of four days the next time they came through town, a few weeks back. NEXT YEAR I'm going to promote the heck out of them and get them into a larger venue, and hopefully onto Craiggy's DetroitTODAY show for the Friday music segment. Funny thing, when they were in town, Craig had an Ypsilanti fellow on who had a very similar style to their VERY unique blend of Punkass Bluegrass! Tonight was the weirdest one yet. Audra was really on, if a wee bit sick with some lingering chest cold. I got there well on-time and was all setup for her...but not a SINGLE musician or poet stopped in, for the very first time in ten months of doing this! We've had some slow nights, but never zero. Actually, Jaye Thomas DID stop by, but he was sick as a dog and only dropped in to apologize for missing us...I was amazed he was vertical, by the looks and sounds of him. But we had spectators...who enjoyed the show, as far as I could tell. At least our regulars were back, one lovely senior lady from the retirement home across the street finally made it back after a few week hiatus. She is easily the hippest lady in Hamtramck, even though I haven't met many others, they'd have to go well into the stratosphere to approach her hipness. So...next week...gotcha. He is not only welcome, but if he's got any discs to sell...they often get snagged by our music lovers in the crowd. We're all about social consciousness, and I can never turn from a Reggae performance. I've been attempting self-Rasta-ization for too many years. He might even enjoy Blair's Tuesday night gig back in the Library Room at the Cafe, but Blair doesn't use any PA...it is strictly acoustic, and a WHOLE bunch of poetry. He's got an entirely different set of maniacs that hang around him...but your friend will not only likely enjoy it, they should meet...last I heard, Blair is probably moving to Paris soon for at least a little while, and having a contact in England might be good for him. IF he's around for the last Friday of the month, I invite you both as MY guest to Audra's Parlor music series, Dinner and a Show, in the spacious Woodbridge home she shares with some of the most amazing people I've met in town...and I'd bet we can get him squeezed into the lineup, she usually bookends two other musicians or groups...but the last time we made accommodation for another it was totally an amazing night! I will never, ever forget that night with Ian Cooke and his band, from Denver. I'm easy to spot...usually hovering over my little soundboard, or stepping out back for some fresh air...basic 5'10" skinny white guy with long hair and an easy smile. The Cafe 1923 in on Holbrook, just across and slightly down the street from the Kowalski sausage factory's huge neon sign...between I-75 and Joseph Campau. Cheers | ||
56packman Member Username: 56packman Post Number: 2483 Registered: 12-2005 |
Really! There's an open mic night in town? Why haven't I known about this? Is this a weekly thing? (Message edited by 56packman on October 17, 2008) | ||
Tkierpiec Member Username: Tkierpiec Post Number: 132 Registered: 03-2007 |
Wow, Audra's music is beautiful! I just checked out her myspace page. Lovely stuff there! We will definitely come out next week. I'm not sure if he will actually want to play or sing. He's a very serious rasta man so he does things on a "mystic" - gotta be feeling the right vibes. We both look forward to meeting you, Gannon! Thanks for your reply and invite....sounds wonderful. | ||
Gannon Member Username: Gannon Post Number: 14564 Registered: 12-2003 |
Funny thing, Tkierpiec? Compared with her live performances, when not distracted by bad sound guys making feedback into her monitors and other environmental and internal distractions, her recordings relatively suck! She NEEDS carbon-based, soul-filled lifeforms to respond with, and hasn't been able to muster her considerable magic in the studio...although you may catch a hint of it in those simple bedroom videos she desperately posted earlier this year from her meager Mac laptop camera and shitty mic! That is one reason why she is SO amazing in her own space for these monthly parlor music shows...at least after a few folk show up...yanno, when those early party-thrower's fears that plague any host fade away and the party starts to HAPPEN! I am honored beyond words to have this past year happen the way it did. I simply decided I would BE her sound guy after I saw a few horrid, but uncontrollable reactions to those bad, deaf, brutish 'professional' sound guys...and then at CityFest where two unbelievably loud radio station booth's basswaves crashed on the 'grassy knoll' stage, keeping her hopelessly confused away from flowing those heavenly harmonics. Audra is a very precious treasure, and after barely a year and a half I find myself within her inner circle of loving supporters and friends. I am nearly in tears now with this revelation and subsequent FLOOD of memories, I hadn't quite thought about it in bulk until now. It's been quite a ride in a VERY short, but amazing time. Cheers, if you can at least prime him...I'd love some tips on the mystic approach to performing. I've noticed some trends over the past ten months but would LOVE to learn his experiences in the matter! Packman, While we cannot muster an organ for you...at least one you can play publicly...I think you'd enjoy this scene. Have you been checking out the Garwood Mansion thread, btw? They've got a killer story about an organ restoration project that probably contained a few folks you know...I'd LOVE to hear your or their side of that story if it exists! Cheers and more...I've gotta go recover from this post. <<<<Big breath with a pained but thankful smile | ||
Norwalk Member Username: Norwalk Post Number: 402 Registered: 11-2006 |
Gannon, For once I have to disagree with you. Audra's recordings do not suck at least to my ears. Let me tell you those recordings have lulled me to sleep more than just about anything. Thanks Audra | ||
Gannon Member Username: Gannon Post Number: 14724 Registered: 12-2003 |
I piled on the disclaimers...heh...and they suck ONLY compared to her live performances! Geez, there was a time when I listened to "Since I Fell in Love with the Music" EVERY Sunday morning, running around the loft singing at the top of my lungs...I know of what you speak...only I'm not sure I could sleep off of them! You really should've been at the Coffee Shop last night, Norwalk. It was such an amazing night I couldn't contain myself. We had one new fellow, Austin, knock us out...and after a long hiatus, Craig came back with his classical guitar. We haven't seen him in six or seven months, and it was simply gorgeous the way his playing has developed. Last night was an example of why I help do this, I'm on cloud nine just thinking about it this morning. Cheers! Looking SERIOUSLY forward to Saturday night at Jacoby's upstairs...Stirling put Audra and Silent Violet together again on a bill...and asked me to do the sound. It should be one heckuva show, I highly recommend anyone curious check them out. It will be a little different than the usual hard-rocking upstairs, but highly entertaining. Silent Violet is another gifted individual, and a few of her songs are wickedly funny. I think there'll be a cover at the door, and I'm going to nuke the juke box downstairs if they insist on jamming it as loud as last time! I might have to shoot a bartender, too, but not on purpose. Ahem. Cheers | ||
Tkierpiec Member Username: Tkierpiec Post Number: 141 Registered: 03-2007 |
We are still hoping to come check out your Open Mic Night, Gannon...last week, we were both down with the flu and are still recovering this week so tonight is probably out of the question. Hopefully next week. | ||
Gannon Member Username: Gannon Post Number: 14773 Registered: 12-2003 |
Yeah, I'm slightly under the weather, too, and Audra has another gig booked for Angel's Night that was supposed to run afterwards...but she only realized two nights ago during their rehearsals that she would have to skip at least the second half of the Open Mic tonight. Feel better... |
