Club Fred Grooves

Last night the Mercury Blues Band opened for Blue Haven at Club Fred. Club Fred is an awesome place to play. The stage has plenty of room and is covered with this groovy blue carpet. Made me feel like shagging baby! LOL.

Anyways we opened our set on a strong foot. We played "Blow Wind" with a reverse shuffle and I felt really tight with the drummer. For most of our set I felt like we played it better than ever before.

For some reason when we played "Waiting on Time" it just sounded wrong. I felt out of key but double checked and it was fine. It seemed like we were all playing a different song. So I just hammered down and hoped it was over soon.

The rest of the set went pretty well. There were a few songs where each one of us missed a break or two. We were all pretty nervous. There were a lot of musicans in the house and we were a bit tense. Seeing people grooving and dancing was encouraging. That kept me going through it all.

We finished the set and had time for a few more. We did "Born in Chicago" and I loved how it turned out. A little fast on the tempo but the groove was strong. Then Chris (the guitarist) called out "Thrill is Gone". This must have been the first blues song I ever heard. We kicked it into motion and from the first beat it just SUCKED! At that point, I couldn't find the groove. I had this cheezy mambo feeling thing going on and I couldn't escape it. The tempo was fast, the groove sucked, and the group was falling apart. We all buckled down and got through it, but it was aweful to end on it. I'm still bummed.

I heard a quote once from Stephane Grappelli that goes something like this:

As long as you start and finish the song right the middle won't matter.