Are You Dave?

Trick or Treat! After a few weeks off, we did our 2nd annual Halloween show at the Knit today. I snatched up matching “Sgt. Pepper” jackets for myself, Justin and Chris at a Halloween store, and I must say we cut dashing figures. (Ask Dana about the text she mistakenly sent her pastor when she was shopping for a matching costume.) Lots of kids at the show had dressed up as well, and we had a ghoulishly good time.

I my last gig diary entry I mentioned that we’ve become a very flexible band. We’re able to pull out Halloween tunes such as “Monster Mash” and the Scooby Doo theme with little difficulty. Come summer, we’ll rip out “California Sun” and similar surf-themed songs. We’re a non-stop Kindie rock machine!

~ Dave

‘Tis the season for end-of-summer and back-to-school shows, but the weather doesn’t always cooperate. The All Saints’ gig in Hoboken, scheduled for the 7th, was rained out, and so was this show’s original date on Sept. 24th. But we worked out a new date and were blessed with GORGEOUS weather for our last outdoor show of the fall.

The library is nestled in a beautiful Westchester valley, and the leaves were just starting to turn, but the sun was still plenty warm enough for an outdoor show. It was simply delightful, and music lovers soon covered the expansive green with picnic blankets and enjoyed the show.

A huge thank-you to the Auxiliary Board of the Rye Free Reading Room for making it happen. From the moment we pulled up we were met by helpful volunteers, which came in handy when Vanessa’s keyboard would’t work and we had to send someone to Radio Shack for a new power supply! Vanny didn’t blink, she just grabbed her tambourine and rocked out for the entire set. This band has really become a fluid and adaptable rock’n'roll unit, and I love being a Lemon!

~ Dave

Woohoo! MusicFest is one of our biggest shows of the year! We’ve been here twice before; in 2009 it was really hot, and and 2010 it rained. This year was our “Goldilocks” year, everything was just right. The weather was delightful, the crowds were agreeable, and the band was at its rockin’ best.

These festivals are fun for me, not just because we get to play on a huge stage to huge crowds, but because we get to meet (and observe) other performers who are in our line of work. This year we missed sharing the stage with our friend Baze (he played on Saturday), but we met magician Dave Levitan and the awesome cats from Starfish, our neighbors from nearby Maplewood, NJ (Starfish drummer “Grateful Dave” also plays drums for our pal Big Jeff).

As always, HUGE props to the This Is It! people and to DJ Mickey G for making it a smooth, fun, ultra-cool day.

~ Dave

We were invited to participate in the Riverhead Library’s end-of-summer party for the kids who’d enrolled in their summer-reading program. They must have run a great program this summer, because there was a HUGE crowd of kids and families waiting to rock out with us! And rock out they did, dancing up and down the aisles for the entire show. They jumped, wiggled, and shook, and when we did “Don’t'cha Wanna Ride?” the kids spontaneously formed a loooooong train and choo-chooed around the entire auditorium. The local Patch.com site posted a story with photos here.

Riverhead is quite a trip for us, but we enjoyed it because Chris rented an enormous passenger van. All of the Lemons (plus Mark the sound guy!) and all of our gear fit in the van! Nothing makes a road trip more fun than a busload of friends to share it with. We even made an obligatory stop at Wendy’s. (On the way home that night, Vanessa turned my song “Sing Your Thing” into a gross-out anthem called “Pass Your Gas.” The Wendy’s was to blame, I suspect. She’s still giggling about the whole thing.)

We have a three-week break until our next gig, and that one’s in Hoboken. See you then!
~ Dave

Our crazy week continues! This was a Kids Kingdom Show, and it was good to see Deanna Hunt and DJ Mickey G., our This Is It! compadres. It was a lovely day, not too hot, and the kids were having fun. (Vanessa in particular made friends with a young man named Jose, who wasn’t shy about getting up and dancing with the girls!)

We shared the stage with Buckaroo Bindlestiff, a wild-west offshoot of the amazing Bindlestiff Family Cirkus. They spotted the Corn Mo sticker on my guitar case and we reminisced for a bit over mutual acquaintances (without going into detail, I’ll admit that in my pre-Lemons days I hung out once or twice with some of NYC’s most talented underground cabaret acts). If you haven’t seen the Bindlestiff performers in one of their many guises, you’re missing out.

Whew, three gigs in three towns in three days! This is the real rock’n'roll lifestyle, piling into the van first thing in the morning and hauling a bunch of gear all over the place. But it sure is fun, provided one does it with the right people. I like traveling with my fellow Lemons, which is good, because Justin and I got an unplanned tour of eastern PA when we got lost looking for a place to eat. The helpful folks at MusikFest’s information desk guided us safely to the Banana Island stage, where we were met by cheerful staff who got us parked and guided us to a place to unload.

The whole day went well, in my opinion. We played two big sets, got a bunch of kids dancing up on stage and (I hope) earned a return trip next year. Afterwards, we wandered Bethlehem and wound up enjoying an ENORMOUS Italian meal at a lovely cafe. Then it was time to drive home in the dark. A LONG day, but it’s a lot of fun to take our show on the road.

Almost a year to the day ago, we played a sunset show in this gorgeous park overlooking the water. It was delightful to be back! Of course, the weather did its usual threatening-to-rain bit, which had the show’s organizer concerned about the audience showing up, but the sun came out and so did the music lovers!

As a bonus, we got to meet even more of Vanessa’s extended family, including her stepdad, who saved my life by sending over a plate full of roast beef and shrimp before the show (I was quite ready to eat someone’s arm off).

The band’s favorite memory of this day was actually about the burger joint we hit afterwards, a genuine peanut-shells-on-the-floor dive. Delicious!

~ Dave

Our busy summer continues! My old neighbor Hank Kramer is now living down in the Morristown area and is on the board of the historic society. He’s been trying to set up a show for us down there for over a year. It finally came together today, and boy was it worth the effort!

Our keyboard player, Vanessa, grew up in that area and had been to the Morris Museum many times as a kid. She bought her first rock collection there. Her delighted squeals as we pulled into the parking lot entertained the band (and woke us up — it was an early arrival).

Setting up went smoothly with the help of sound-guy Dave Entwistle, and it was good to catch up with Hank and his adorable kids while I uncoiled my cables, etc. And because this was an actual theater, there was a green room backstage where we all chilled out with pizza, sodas, and M&Ms. A guy could get used to this.

In addition to the Lemons, Hank and his crew recruited some other talent, including Juggles the Clown and his partner to do balloons and face painting. Our crowd of happy kids was well-bedecked when the show started. Chris wanted a balloon hat, too, so a few songs into our set Juggles crept out onto the stage and wiggled one down on his head. We kept Juggles on stage for “Jump, Wiggle and Shake,” too! He had a ball, and so did we.

After the show we had a lovely afternoon at Vanessa’s dad’s house, snacking and gabbing about random topics. At one point we were ruminating on Dark Matter and the nature of the universe, like a bunch of college freshmen. Good times. Then it was time to drive home in an absolute frog-drowner or a rainstorm.

~ Dave

The Larchmont Shore Club is a gorgeous establishment on the banks of Long Island Sound. When we got there we were told that the sprawling, faux-Tudor mansion was haunted, and it was all we could do to keep Chris from going ghost-hunting rather than setting up his drums. But there were campers to entertain!

We set up on a deck overlooking the water, a spectacular backdrop, with a tent to keep the sun off. Dave Entwistle did his usual crackerjack job running sound.

A new tradition was born at this show! From the beginning, we’ve done a little huddle before our set, wiggling our fingers and shouting “Fuzzzzzzy LEMONS!” Dana was inspired to share this tidbit with the kids, and it worked great. She had them all join in, and leave their hands up as we jumped right into the first song. The children were very well-behaved; in fact they sat quite still for our first few songs! We had to give them permission and encouragement to jump up and dance. Not too much encouragement, mind you. By the end of our set we had the camp counselors up on stage singing “Twist and Shout” with us, which the campers loved.

Here’s hoping they invite us back next summer!
~ Dave

The Lemons will leap at almost any chance to rock in NYC, and this gorgeous community overlooking the East River is an absolutely perfect place to put on a show. Getting rained out last year was a huge let-down, so we’ve been counting the days until we could get back there for another attempt. We finally made it, almost a year later, and it was worth the wait!

The deck that we used for a stage was wide enough that we were able to situate ourselves almost completely side-by-side, rather than tucking Justin and Chris in the back like we usually do. I think that enhanced everyone’s enjoyment of the show; the kids could see the band, and the band could see the kids!

The audience was really great; there were lots of dancing kids right out front. Not as crazy as the Shipyard, but a lot of fun to watch. And we couldn’t have asked for a better backdrop, with the East River just a few yards away, with the occasional sea-plane taking off or landing. The clouds threatened, a little, but we were granted a reprieve and played a fantastic show. Can’t wait to do it again next year!