Sunday, September 14, 2008

Zazoo's in August 2008

In August 2008, my girlfriend and I took a small vacation in which we went to Columbus, Ohio, Louisville, Kentucky and Nashville, Tennessee. The show I played during our vacation time was, by far, the worst part of the vacation. The band who had invited us were very kind and it was no fault of their own. Spacehooker was the band. But, I played some Third Class stuff solo and got heckled. It sucked.

The B & O Station in July 2008

Dog Ok invited us to this show. It looked, for a while, like not many people were going to show up. However, half-way through Dog OK's set The Zou (generally) and a few of their friends graced us and, essentially, saved the night as far as I am concerned. The friends that showed up, whether of the Zou Crew or of some other persuasion, were all really cool. We got to see Sam, Cathy, Corey, Mindy, Suz and many more who really made the night fun.
The venue was amazing. Originally a trainstation, this place actually had trains rumbling over some tracks by the rooftop windows as we were performing. It was a very fun, atmospheric experience. B & O had some sort of old-style quality.

Aldo Coffee Company in June 2008

There were about 10 people tops at this show. And, that's the combined effort of people who just stopped in for coffee and left as well as any people who were at tables. Our friends came up and supported us and we were grateful for it. We felt a bit disappointed because, apparently, there was an art festival of some sort happening in downtown Pittsburgh during our performance.
Aldo Coffee is just outside of downtown in Mt. Lebanon.
Afterwards, we walked around the sidewalks briefly and Pepe took a look at the Aladdin's Eatery in the neighborhood.

The Upper Room Fellowship in May 2008

This was a show that we played because some of the kids in the youth group at The Upper Room Fellowship Church requested us. We were flattered; happy to play any show, let alone a show for a younger crowd. Our strong points, as far as a local fan base goes, are and always have been children and old people. People our own age do not get us in most cases. Furthermore, the ones who do get us always turn out to be gigantic odd balls, such as ourselves. So, it is few and far between that we meet them anyway.
I got a bit nervous around the time that we performed the song "Rainy And Stormy" because there are lyrics that criticize the American conceptualization of God in the verses. Jack later pointed out that I had crooned that particular part of the song quite loudly over the microphone. I don't think anyone noticed and those lyrics certainly, whether considered in the context of the performance that night or the conception of the song in general, did not apply to all churches or organized religion for that matter. More so, they apply to the ignorance of assumption by some people that everyone is of one belief system. People that assume this are close minded.
After the show, we ate some pizza and snacks. Then, we took a tour of the new wing that was being added to the church.