I started playing with a cover band that does 60's and early 70's tunes last summer. We played a couple of private parties in October, but our first "real gig" is in three weeks. On Monday night, one of the guitarists turned 60. His wife organized a surprise party and rented out a small Italian restaurant for it. Very cool place. All of his friends pitched in and bought him a very nice Rick 6 string electric guitar. The rest of us in the band brought our mini-rigs and were set up so that he could get up and play when he opened the guitar.
Even though this wasn't a paying gig, it turned out to be the first time I have played live at a restaurant/bar. I really wasn't as nervous as I thought I would be. We've been practicing once a week since October, so I know the songs backward and forward. I'm not saying I wasn't nervous at all. I sucked on the first two songs. Then the butterflies went away, and I just relaxed and played. I had a blast.
But that is not what this story is about. First, let me say that my wife has been my strongest supporter since I bought my first bass. And my second. And my third. And my fourth . . . . and all the ones I bought and sold in between. I was 41 when I started. My wife's philosophy is this: "Yes, my husband is having a mid-life crisis, but his obsession with playing bass is a hell of a lot cheaper than if he had an obsession with Porsches. Or blondes." I love my wife. We have been together 20 years, 16 of which we have been happily married. She and my three daughters are the reason I bounce out of bed every morning. One other thing about my wife: she weighs 100 pounds dripping wet.
Back to the Italian restaurant. We get there at 6 PM. The surprise happens about 6:30. Then we waited for dinner. And waited and waited some more. Dinner was finally served around 8:30 PM. During the 2.5 hours we were there up to that point, I had probably 4 or 5 Miller Lites, which is what I drink when I want something a little stronger than water. In other words, I wasn't even close to being intoxicated. My wife on the other hand, who I affectionately named "Two Sips" on our second date, was struggling. About halfway through dinner, which I engulfed in about 10 minutes (I was crazy-hungry!), I looked over and noticed her bobbing and weaving. In her chair. I knew at that point that things were heading down an ugly path. I encouraged her to eat up in an effort to minimize casualties and damage.
So here is the rest of my First Gig Story: we ended up playing 9 or 10 songs. Unknown to me at the time (I was in the zone, man!), my wife was redecorating one of the stalls in the women's room. I found this out from one of my bandmates' wives. After cleaning up, she marched right out of the women's room and up to the bar, where she ordered another drink. (My wife's a warrior!) She then managed to make her way to right in front of where we were playing, where she proceeded to repeatedly flip me off. I did not know exactly what she meant by this at the time, but I interpreted it as her way of using sign language to say, "You are so freaking hot and sexy right now; I am going to bang your brains out when we get home." According to my bandmates' wife, what she was really trying to say was: "Put that freaking bass down and take me home you stupid moron."
During the last song that we played, I was staring at my beautiful wife and I thought, "This is it." I am staring at my beautiful wife, I am playing bass and I'm loving life. What a feeling. And at about that time, my wife decided to lean back against the wall.
The problem was that the wall was a good 15 feet behind her. And suddenly, my bass career was at a critical juncture already. What to do? Stop playing, put down the bass and go help my wife up from the floor like the true gentlemen that I really am? Or keep playing, locked in baby, never letting the beat deviate even a millisecond from the groove. In situations like these you don't have more than a second, maybe, to think about it. What a person does next, at least in my experience on this earth, is a window of opportunity that we rarely get to peer inside the heart, mind and soul of another human being and see what they are all about.
That is when I knew I was meant to be a bass player. For the first time since I became a member here on talkbass, I feel entitled to put one of these into one of my posts:
(Honey, if you ever read this, please remember: 1) I love you with all my heart; 2) Without your support, I would never have had the opportunity to follow my dream; and 3) More than two glasses of wine on an empty stomach is a bad idea.)
