Not another guitard story!
Well, anyway, it's a sad story. My cover band has been together for about a year as a five-piece, but we've only played out twice. I've been a bit of a stickler about learning 30+ songs because most of the venues here (Tallahassee) ask that you rock face for 2-3 hours a night, although I personally don't think it should have taken us a year (practicing twice a week!) to learn 30 songs, but that's neither here nor there at this point. We cover '80s glam metal tunes, so there are more than enough. The issue is with our 30-year old lead guitarist.
When I first met him about a year ago, he was separated from his wife and was living with his uncle. Fine. A few months after that, he then got booted from his uncle's house for raiding his uncle's wine cabinet without asking. He then moved into his friend's house before finally getting his own run-down apartment. He was then fired from his job as a repair tech. He starts a relationships, of sorts, with a 48-year old woman. She is actually really, really cool. The interesting side of this is that she doesn't work - she's independently wealthy and just paints all day. But our guitarist decides that he doesn't want anything to do with that, so he essentially steals the wife of one of his friends. These two start living together in his apartment. About two-three weeks ago, she woke up one morning and said she needed to run errands -- except she never came back. She got on a plane and flew to Miami to stay with her grandmother. She left a cryptic note with her mother saying that she still loved the guy but needed to sort things out. The following night, his nephew, who was driving his car, got into a car accident (not his fault) and totalled it. So, our guitarist is without car, without job, and without woman. He then calls me and asks for a hiatus.
Now, I need to interject here that this guitarist is actually a really good guy, all things considered and wife-stealing tendencies notwithstanding! He's also a damn fine guitarist. His motivation is a bit suspect, however. Common sense? Enh... not so much.
My issue here is that we just finished recording our demo. It still needs to be mixed/mastered, but the recording process is finished nonetheless. We also know (to various levels of completeness) 29 of the 31 songs I had chosen for this endeavour. We are really just that close to being fully ready to play out, and all this happens. I don't want to pile on, because obviously he's had a rough go, especially in the past few weeks. I called him Sunday night to check up on him, but he didn't call back. Last I spoke to him, about a week ago, he said he had essentially gotten a job and his dad, who lives in Utah, was going to help him get a new car.
So my question is... how long do I give him? I realize I probably shouldn't've let it get to this point, but there were other factors at work here. I figured I'd give him about another week to call me back (the other guitarist is defending his M.S. thesis in... well, about 75 minutes, so it's not like everybody else is free) before I deliver an ultimatum.
Well, anyway, it's a sad story. My cover band has been together for about a year as a five-piece, but we've only played out twice. I've been a bit of a stickler about learning 30+ songs because most of the venues here (Tallahassee) ask that you rock face for 2-3 hours a night, although I personally don't think it should have taken us a year (practicing twice a week!) to learn 30 songs, but that's neither here nor there at this point. We cover '80s glam metal tunes, so there are more than enough. The issue is with our 30-year old lead guitarist.
When I first met him about a year ago, he was separated from his wife and was living with his uncle. Fine. A few months after that, he then got booted from his uncle's house for raiding his uncle's wine cabinet without asking. He then moved into his friend's house before finally getting his own run-down apartment. He was then fired from his job as a repair tech. He starts a relationships, of sorts, with a 48-year old woman. She is actually really, really cool. The interesting side of this is that she doesn't work - she's independently wealthy and just paints all day. But our guitarist decides that he doesn't want anything to do with that, so he essentially steals the wife of one of his friends. These two start living together in his apartment. About two-three weeks ago, she woke up one morning and said she needed to run errands -- except she never came back. She got on a plane and flew to Miami to stay with her grandmother. She left a cryptic note with her mother saying that she still loved the guy but needed to sort things out. The following night, his nephew, who was driving his car, got into a car accident (not his fault) and totalled it. So, our guitarist is without car, without job, and without woman. He then calls me and asks for a hiatus.
Now, I need to interject here that this guitarist is actually a really good guy, all things considered and wife-stealing tendencies notwithstanding! He's also a damn fine guitarist. His motivation is a bit suspect, however. Common sense? Enh... not so much.
My issue here is that we just finished recording our demo. It still needs to be mixed/mastered, but the recording process is finished nonetheless. We also know (to various levels of completeness) 29 of the 31 songs I had chosen for this endeavour. We are really just that close to being fully ready to play out, and all this happens. I don't want to pile on, because obviously he's had a rough go, especially in the past few weeks. I called him Sunday night to check up on him, but he didn't call back. Last I spoke to him, about a week ago, he said he had essentially gotten a job and his dad, who lives in Utah, was going to help him get a new car.
So my question is... how long do I give him? I realize I probably shouldn't've let it get to this point, but there were other factors at work here. I figured I'd give him about another week to call me back (the other guitarist is defending his M.S. thesis in... well, about 75 minutes, so it's not like everybody else is free) before I deliver an ultimatum.
