Every year in the summer and early fall we're always doing at least 4 to 6 outdoor concerts with the band. One 4th of July, it was 103 degrees outside, playing under no shade, sweat running off my fingers. The gold hardware on the bridge on my Les Paul turned green..... Street dance, ouside on a flatbed. We could see the lightning far off in the distance, and figured we had at least half an hour till it hit. Wrong...10 minues later it was a heavy downpour. Everything got soaked.... Playing on a flatbed outside a bar at night in a small town. 30 minutes into the concert, the whole city block blew a transformer and everything went pitch black..I mean pitch black. We had to shine our car headlights in our direction just to break everything down........Outside at the fairgrounds at night, the bugs were so bad you couldn't sing anything without the bugs gettin in your mouth. It was just a cloud of mosquitoes crawling all over you.....Playing outside on a flatbed late in the fall;first mistake. By 10:30 at night, it was so humid and dewey, there was a layer of moisture on everything we owned..

Any good stories??

_________________
Life is like a sh*t sandwich. The more bread you have, the less sh*t you have to eat.

Well this isn't a gig i played... and this is sure to make an $@! of my self if i haven't already but what the heck...it was fun.

When i saw Phish in 96 at Coral Sky Amphitheater it was very memorable. The venue was beautiful. Just a nice green hill surrounding the stage. I was joyed that they had these nice fellers with mini kegs on their backs so i didn't have to move from my spot to get a beer, just flag down the beer man every time i thirsted. Not sure if it was the beer or Trey, probably both but at some point during Stash or Run Like an Antelope... I don't recall, I decided to take my shoes off to feel the grass under my feet. However it didnt stop there... as the guitar solo wailed on the clothes wailed off I was so into it. My buddies intervened when it got down to the boxers and we had to find my shoes later but man... that solo was intense.

I saw Twisted Sister standing outside in the pouring rain. The weather was fine when they started then some major lightening and they had to pause the show for safety reasons. The majority of the crowd left but about 200-300 or so stayed to till the end. The rain continued but we didn't care.

_________________
Live guitars: 2009 LTD Truckster, 1989 Strat Plus, 2001 Am Standard Strat, 1996 MIJ Jaguar, 2007 Gibson Explorer 76 reissue, 1999 Ibanez RG7621, LTD MH-301, LTD FM400, 1999 Jackson Kelly, Mystery Les Paul, Hamer Chaparel, Fender FM 62SCE A/E Mandolin

August, 1969. Sullivan County, New York. It rained. A lot. Concert was the best ever held. Anywhere. Cost me $18 for a three day ticket. Still have the ticket...no one took it.

_________________
"To Be Is To Do" --Locke
"To Do Is To Be" --Thoreau
"Do Be Do Be Do" --Sinatra

I went to a Canned heat concert a local S. FL college, in the mid eighties, outdoors at night. Canned heat is playing, when the Northern sky turned green. Making a swirling pattern in the sky. Everyone really noticed that. It turned out to be a rocket launched from Cape Canaveral that had a major malfunction, and was destroyed down range over the ocean. It went great with Canned Heat's music. A return to the sixties.

I went to a Canned Heat concert a local S. FL college, in the mid eighties, outdoors at night. Canned heat is playing, when the Northern sky turned green. Making a swirling pattern in the sky. Everyone really noticed that. It turned out to be a rocket launched from Cape Canaveral that had a major malfunction, and was destroyed down range over the ocean. It went great with Canned Heat's music. A return to the sixties.

The current administration seems to prefer that NASA have nothing to do. That could truly be a constructive use of their time!

_________________
"To Be Is To Do" --Locke
"To Do Is To Be" --Thoreau
"Do Be Do Be Do" --Sinatra

im VERY jealous....... nice dude

_________________
Favorite bands:

Melvins
The Jesus Lizard
Cows
Big Business
R***man
Minutemen
Flight
Minor Threat
Big Black
Shellac
Karp
Scratch Acid
Wipers
Pixies

You don't know the half of it...My aunt and uncle lived about two miles from Max Yasgur's place--in fact, that's where they usually got their milk. So I had hot food and a dry bed every night. I may have missed some of the 'experience', but I was never cut out for sleeping in the mud. Hence my Naval career. But that's a story for another time.

_________________
"To Be Is To Do" --Locke
"To Do Is To Be" --Thoreau
"Do Be Do Be Do" --Sinatra

A few years ago I was at an Allman Brothers concert in Raleigh NC. It was a steaming hot day probably like 95 outside. These two guys in front of me who were ex-Marines were sloppy drunks and started fighting. It ended with both of them landing a punch to the chin and two of them knocking each other out. They laid there for a few mins and finally work up, stood up, hugged each other and took off then returned with a beer....within 30 mins they fought each other again with the same result. It was straight up comedy.

_________________
Blues with a feeling.

GUILD GUITARS: MADE TO BE PLAYED!

Not really a concert, but the very first paying gig I ever did was an outdoor birthday party. Our singer got us the gig but didn't mention that it was because he wanted to date who he mistakenly thought the party was for.

So we got the gig, the mom spoke to us on the phone and agreed to our $40 charge (for 4 guys ... $10 each, but it was 1968). What Kenny didn't realize is that the party was not for this girl (she was 17, like those of us in the band) but for her 12 year old sister and friends.

We play the first set and during break, the mom comes up to us and says "aren't you boys a little old for 9th grade? Are you dropouts or in trouble or something????" Er ... now the singer has to spill the beans. The mom was cool about it though suggesting that if we left "very quickly" ... no harm done and she gave us our $40.

Seven years later, the very last gig I played with those guys was an outdoor concert called "Foo Bar 75" held in upstate NY. Kind of ironic that just as we'd established a pretty big name, we were about to go our separate ways. And as most of the proceeds went to charity, a double irony was that I think I walked away from that one with about $10 in my pocket too.