Glenn and I have kept up with our Tuesday nights band practice. Every Tuesday with rare exceptions, which is usually some form of vehicular issue on my end. Both Michele and I have had a slew of minor vehicle issues, mostly dead batteries.

Our motivation has not been the more difficult part, nor has our muse left us ( The two of us have been able to work out some really fun segments ). I’ll have to post some of it when we can get a decent recording, right now we have been using my phone to record which only works to remind us of what we have done.

The only problem we’ve had is finding a solid place to practice.

Between the drum kit and my guitar, we generate a fair amount of noise.

I mean “structured noise”, not just regular noise. Noise with a rhythm.

Our first foray was the Tattoo Shop after hours. At the time, the shop was closed on Tuesday so we could sneak in there to practice. The problem with this spot was: we had to setup, and lugging around a drum set, setting up and finally, tearing it down and driving it back to Glenn and Erin’s soaked up at least an hour of our time. On a Tuesday night, loosing an hour is detrimental to me.

Glenn and Erin recently moved, so in between places, we jammed in the empty front room:

Blurry Glenn

After some though, Glenn and Eric decided to rent out a space in Seaside that was supposed to be art and music friendly. It was located in an industrial part of town where it seemed no one was around:

Plenty of space for the two of us.

We were incredibly excited! Setup was as easy as my unloading my amp and hooking it up. We had no distractions, privacy, and we could pin up song notes and new ideas on the wall.

Then, after our first practice, we heard a knock on the door…

A mother, who was clearly worked up asked us to stop and that we were disrupting her daughters sleep.

Both Glenn and I fell over each other in sincere apologies. We had no idea that people even lived in that area. So, after wrapping it up, and talking it over, we agreed that ~11pm was too late and we would wrap it up around 9:30pm the next time. He also wrote up a nice flier for the two houses we found within a two block radius:

{% blockquote %} Hello Neighbor!

I very recently began renting a studio space on Redwood and I play music a few days a week, electric on Tuesdays and acoustic on M, W, Fr. Please let me know if the noise is too loud or disruptive! Please feel free to call or text me if I am being too loud and I will gladly accommodate!

Thanks All! Be Well! <3 Glenn {% endblockquote %}

His number was included (I omitted it here for privacy sake) and we both were excited to work things out.

Two days later, the Manager of the studio contacted Glenn and said there had been a complaint about the noise. He was very understanding, and he had even know that Glenn posted fliers (this was admitted to the manager from the “anonymous” individual). He said that even though it was part of the rental agreement that music was allowed, he would have to make sure we did not continue if there were any more complaints.

We had two more sessions after that. On the last one, we felt great about everything. We stopped at 9:30pm, we did as much as we could to diffuse and direct the sound. Our music was just starting to find its own voice, and we’d hi-five each other and say how cool this was.

The next Friday, we received the final complaint. The “anonymous” submitter said we kept her daughter up late, and we were so loud she had to turn up her TV to compensate.

At this point, we were a bit frustrated. The person never attempted to work things out with us. We gave her the easiest and guilt free mode of communication (a text message) to ask us to stop. We could have started practice earlier and stopped earlier had she given us the chance to work things out. We have to stop playing there and find a new place.

So, for at least a few weeks, we can play at a farm in Aromas:

Outside in nature! And no, I wont take better pictures, my phone sucks as a camera in most conditions but its all I have

Here is a better one from this week. Glenn plays the drums and keyboard, such a talented musician. I just hold the guitar.

That is fun, however, as it gets dark and we have nothing but the stars and moon to accompany us, I can’t see what the heck I’m doing. I’m playing blind, and I’m not that great of a player to do that. I have to see!

I’ll bust out the ol’ headlamp, and I promise not to blind anyone.

After the farm, who knows were we will go. We could scale it back to his living room again, and we pull out the micro-amps. Its not the same though, it feels good to have my amp turned up a little (saturate those tubes!) and the to feel the kick of the bass drum is nice.

Speaking of that, when we first practiced, I was so unaccustomed to the sound of a real live and up close drum set that I thought I would pee’d myself… just a little… like a puppy startled by a loud sneeze. I have never played at a high volume, nothing beyond what only I could hear in my garage. That is also a startling realization, that I actually have to PLAY and be HEARD by more than just me :)

That made me spring a leak just thinking about it…