Are You Dave?

World-class photographer (and close personal friend) Kenneth Chen e-mailed me after the holidays, about an event in Jersey City called J.C. Fridays, a city-wide arts event that takes place every three months. Restaurants, galleries and coffeehouses all over town display art by local artists and feature area musicians and entertainers. It’s a cool thing.

Anyway, Ken had some photos on display at a coffeehouse called Made With Love Organics and he put me in touch with the organizer, Jim Legge, who was looking for family-friendly entertainment. He’d already booked a face-painter and a balloon artist, so me and my guitar rounded out the day nicely.

I was scheduled to play from 1:00 to 2:00, but things were pretty loose and Jim invited me to play as long as I wanted. (Did I mention I wasn’t getting paid?) The place was pretty quiet at that hour; next time I’ll try for a later slot so I can catch the after-school crowd. A few families wandered in and I played a bunch of stuff from my kid-music songbook, with a little Music Together, some tunes from my childhood including “Rubber Duckie” and “The Billboard Song,” and some Fuzzy Lemons songs of course.

Jim is a sweet man and a talented photographer; he made me feel welcome and supported me enthusiastically even when I was just singing for him and the girl behind the counter. I hope he invites me back next time!

Our first anniversary gig! Wow, a lot has changed from last year, but a lot felt oddly familiar…

Different: We had a drummer this year!
Same: We were still stuck in the basement.

Different: No Maiken.
Same: One of us rushed in at the last minute (Kipley, this time).

Different: We had to assemble and run our own sound gear this year. (Big ups to Trey Ordaz of Garden Street Music for all his work!)
Same: We totally rocked the house, yo.  

Everyone in the band agrees that we sounded good, our songs are really tight and well-developed and our performance is constantly improving. We all also agree that the crowd size was disappointing this year. I don’t know if that’s part of the overall trouble HFA is having with membership, or if it was naptime, or if we were just too loud. Oh well.  

Kipley’s wife was expecting baby #2 that week, and as the day wore on and Kipley hadn’t arrived, we all just assumed the time had come. We started preparing for a Kipley-less show; we’d even made an alternate set that was heavy on Dana and Dave’s tunes, just on case. The Big Kahuna rolled in with plenty of time, however. Turns out it was just really hard to find parking.  (And I’m happy to report that the baby arrived safe and sound just a few days later). 

Once again, Ken Chen was there taking pictures, check ‘em out! We’re sepia-toned!

My first gig of 2008 was at the Hoboken Family Alliance’s Cabin Fever event at the Elks Club. I’ve played there the last three (?) years as part of the Music Together ensemble, alongside my fellow teachers (including Lisa, Marina, Pete, Catherine, Joi and John, among others). But for whatever reason, we couldn’t rouse a contingent of teachers to put together a show this year. 

Along came Kipley Wentz, musician and puppetmaster, who was also on the HFA’s list of invited entertainers. He and Dana Harrison (who teaches a class called Musicology in town) had already written and performed some songs together, and they invited me to sit down with them at the Frozen Monkey one rainy winter afternoon to talk about the possibility of joining forces. We agreed that, rather than fighting for space at Cabin Fever, a Musical Summit was called for, a meeting of Hoboken’s many and varied kiddie entertainers. We put out the invitation to all of the Music Together teachers, as well as Adam from Music for Aardvarks, Karen Kuhl, Sally Robertson and others. 

We wound up with myself, Kipley, Dana, and Maiken DuBois, who had been performing puppet shows with Kipley and on her own. My memories are hazy, but I recall them coming over to my tiny apartment for a couple of rehearsals, where we recorded Dana and Kipley singing their original tunes and I taught them “Skunks in My Shoes,” at the time my only original composition for kids. Kipley thought he might play bass guitar, since Dana and I both play guitar and we had no bassist. That sounded fine to me until he called a couple of days later and asked if I could recommend a good learn-to-play-the-bass book.

I gave the recordings to my friend Justin Michael and invited him to sit in on bass instead. Justin and I have been playing together in church for a few years now. I think he only had a couple of weeks before the gig to get caught up, but it’s not like we had a huge head start over him.

The HFA billed us at Cabin Fever as “Kipley, Dana and Dave,” but truly the Fuzzy Lemons had been born by then, and this was our inaugural gig. I got to the Elks Club with about 5 minutes to spare–I was doing a birthday party in Weehawken before the show (something that will constantly dog most of the Lemons as we try to book gigs around our party schedules); big thanks to Shana Lee for the ride back to Hoboken! Ken Chen’s fabulous photos of the event reveal that I still have my earmuffs stuck up on my hat–I didn’t even have time to take them off before we started. Later I asked Justin why he didn’t tell me they were up there and he said “I though they were there on purpose, that’s part of your look!” Looking back now I think that’s a cool idea, but I’d have to get myself some big funny fluffy earmuffs. Back then I was just embarrassed and annoyed. 

The Fuzzy Lemons debut at the Hoboken Elks Club, Sunday, February 10, 2008

Big ups, by the way, to Justin and to Scott Weiner for setting up all the gear. Scott’s been doing sound for the town for a long time, and he’s always friendly and professional. He has since moved on to other things, but he still hangs out at shows; it’s always good to see him. And Justin is used to being my guitar tech; he’s helped me out the last 2 summers at Gordys concerts (The Gordys rewarded him this year by making him their bass player–I’ll post all about that at a later date).

After the gig, the band’s e-mails started flying (we’re notorious with the e-mail). Kipley wrote:

Great job today, guys. I had a lot of fun and from what I can tell we all received great feedback. I certainly got some great comments and I guess when we listen to the recording it’ll be clear what worked and needs work. For me, it’s going to take some getting used to… it always sounds and feels so much different when we perform than it did in practice.

And Dana chimed in:

I had a blast today too.  I need a tambourine 101 class though.  I have a NASTY 2×4 inch bruise on my right leg. 

No victory comes without its scars. Overall I think we did just fine for a first gig–lots of mistakes, technical issues, and the town almost NEVER provides enough monitors (those are speakers pointed at the band instead of the audience, enabling us to hear ourselves and each other over the din!). You’ll notice in Ken Chen’s photo that not one of us is making eye contact with the audience. Or smiling. We had a long way to go in the audience-interaction department.

But the songs are great, we have a nice fat sound with multiple guitars, plus keyboards, horns and a mandolin, and lush 4-part harmony.  I think the audience had a good time, down there in the Elks’ basement. I really felt like, imperfect as it was, it was the birth of something new. The heart of the Fuzzy Lemons started beating that day.