A Rainy Day in New York

Hello new yawrk… once again we’re in the Empire State, but today we’re in upstate New York.. Canneduiga.. Cannenduga??? Canduiga??? Canandaigua is how you say it but I’ve butchered it all day. Rainy all day on and off, nice and wilderness-like but no big hills visible.
Slept a lot last night, didn’t hang out real late but read instead. Finished my book “What to listen for in music” by Aaron Copland, it was good brain food- even though I’m not gonna remember half of it in a years’ time. Not sure what I’ll move onto yet but this just means I get to explore for a while.
This morning my energy and metabolism were both really low- I’m wanting to exercise in the mornings but I’m always too hungry. I’m reluctant to eat late at night so it messes with me. I think tonight I’ll try to have some power oatmeal so that I have enough energy in the morning’. Gotta keep everything on track.
Catering here was good (nothing like yesterday… read below cuz that was a pretty amazing place)… got my omelette, showered and warmed up, had a salad, and for a while I worked on designing a poster for my gig at the Mint on July 10th. About thattttt I still have yet to get a confirmation email from the guy booking me…. Little hesitant to post a big Facebook event if he’s not confirming it for me.
Exercised a leeeettle, hung out in the front lounge and listened to Beach Boys/Elvis (and compared early Beach boys to Chuck berry… sigh… not gonna go there)… Not super structuring my time like I might’ve planned on BUT I’m making sure that I keep my projects focused, effective, and driven towards long-term goals sooooo all’s ok.
Soundcheck was longer today- John wanted to hear the snare some more. Cool to see Kenny still so energized and on top of things 22 shows in!
I’ve been messing around on this website Quora… used to read it all the time but now checking it out again.. people post their specific questions on different subjects and experts or amateurs post answers… lot of fascinating stuff.

After soundcheck I came to the bus and, at Felix’s suggestion, hiked to the top of the venue- big grassy hill where you can overlook most of town. We’re pretty close to the lake- I could see a chunk of water, lil townhouses, mostly grass. Walked back to the bus and worked on my charts for my gig. Got my piano out since I got inspired to tweak some of the chord progressions in. I’m working on ‘Summer Home’ and ‘Waiting for the Show’… two tunes I started writing while on the tour pretty much.
Summer Home I’ve written entirely on GarageBand- that’s been a fascinating experiment! I think it’s led to really good results too, I’m working on it every day and at this point it’s just tweaking the GarageBand Drummer and moving the form around.
Waiting for the Show was an old tune I started a few months ago after listening to Gilad Hekselman (jazz guitarist) but I’ve entirely repurposed it… that’s the one I had Felix listen to a while ago.
I worked a lil bit on the terrace outside catering… I liked that we had table and chairs outdoors. The Fogerty family was eating dinner right next to me- went inside after a bit to eat with Nathan and Steven. While eating, Alex, the video guy who toured with Guns ’n Roses, was tellin’ stories…. He was on the road with them when some seriously heavy riots happened. They were in South America and when a literal coup happened of one government and their gear was upheld at an airport, they couldn’t do a show. This irritated a promoter so he sent out rumors that Axel Rose of the band wanted to do something obscene to the Argentinian flag. This was right before they were supposed to go to Argentina. Sooo there were riots. Heavy heavy stuff.
Eventually when they did a show in Argentina, Axel told everyone what was up and Alex says they had the BEST rock ’n roll show ever. He came out wearing the Argentina soccer jersey.  Wild stuff… ZZ Top’s guitar tech was also on that tour.
We opened today- 730 showtime- had to be pretty far backstage today because of the layout. It was crowded. Our playing was alright- Nathan said he felt a little uncomfortable, I missed some stuff (might’ve overplayed throughout the day at soundcheck). Oh hey I also dropped my third valve slide while onstage…. yikes.. working on getting a screw. The rubber band I’ve been using finally snapped. Jeez.
Enough about my mistakes… man that crowd of people dancing gets me every time.
I’m so lucky to be on this tour… here’s to hopefully having another one. ​

After show food was a greasy veggie burrito that I ate the innards of. I wanna watch Rick and Morty tonight. And download SpaceEngine. That’s a cool program, look it up- you can explore the entire universe in 3D with procedurally generated maps. OK I’ll write about late tonight stuff tomorrow, now I get back to other stuff.