That morning we awoke to the true horror that WAS the Riviera Motel... if
Norman Bates himself had made an appearance it would have shocked us less than
the true "nature" of our accomodations...
I had had a discussion about the rooms with John during the post-sunset hours
the night before and he told me he didn't see what I was talking about...
"Except that the furniture doesn't match from room to room it's the same as
The Six (our beloved Motel 6)..."
...but with the coming of the sun he was completely in my camp... the Garfield
"Cool Cat" curtains, the absolutely gross sheets, and the nasty showers took
on a whole new perspective when seen under proper ultraviolet light... as we
all began to emerge from our warrens, Ahmer came to my room and grabbed me,
saying... and I QUOTE:
"Cameron, you gotta check this out... for the Rash... man, you're not gonna
believe... but you have to SEE this so you can write about it..."
At this point let me interject a quick note...
One of my favorite authors when I was growing up all zit covered and socially
inept (as opposed to now... my skin has cleared up) was H.P. Lovecraft... the
guy wrote horror stories about bizarre monstrosities from another dimension,
but he never really went into detail about what these misshapen entities
ACTUALLY looked like, allowing the reader's mind to interpret and create it's
own Dunwich Horror, or any other in a true pantheon of evil gods and
creatures...
...my friends...
What faced me in that darkened room was beyond terror.. an image so foul as to
make your toes squish up and a scream to curdle at the back of your throat,
unable to issue... as my feet crossed the threshold of the room I felt the
sunlight leave my back... no light could enter here... and I felt the icy
hand of a disembodied soul reach out to caress my cheek... or was it just a
cobweb? No matter...
Ahmer began to display the sheets from his bed, and I felt my skin crawl... a
shapeless, formless, utterly horrible sight met my eyes... it was somewhat
translucent and had hardened to a scaley crust...
... I was able to comprehend the world around me approximately a half-hour
later... which was a shock, finding myself behind the wheel of the Touring
Vessel... Scott was talking...
"...so then the guy asked me 'How we like our stay' (tense intended, no typo
here folks)... uhg... I didn't have the heart to tell him... hell, I didn't
know where to BEGIN..."
...so much for the "American Owned"... but I can validate the fact that the
place had microwave ovens, in fact I'm pretty certain the microwaves were the
only surface I felt comfortable touching in any way... just too small to sleep
on or IN...
We were headed to Vail... that much I knew...
We drove there without incident... and when we finally figured out how to get
up to the club, we were faced with a logistical nightmare... Scott wanted to
use the organ again...
Garton's in Vail is a fairly sprawling place built on a parking structure
right at the mouth of one of the resort areas... with no real good way of
getting a 500 lb. organ into, might I add...
After reviewing our options (none) we decided to try and get the van up to the
club's parking lot but we're thwarted by a low clearance in the parking garage
and so the crew is forced to lift the behemoth into a truck dock (about 5 1/2
feet... no small feat), then into an elevator, THEN up another two small
flights of stairs into the club... woof...
I'd like to thank our crew at this time...
As we got settled in on the stage, we noticed a certain "give" to the dance
floor and stage... when you bounced it, the whole thing bounced back...
The reason for this effect apparently is based in the engineering of the
parking structure so that large amounts of vehicular movement don't take a
harder toll on the structure... hmmm... weird... but we don't really dwell on
this abnormality... we have a job to do, and we gotta be done by 6p... it's
now around 4p... no problem, right?
This was the first place of the tour we had some dificulty with (very
surprisingly, I might add)... the monitors were more of a hassle this time (no
fault of the equipment or house tech staff) and Mike Maraat takes his
trademark "forever" to get settled... this is also the first night I had to
set up a vocal mic for Hazdra, seeing as how he was GOING TO SING that night
and all... this hits him as a surprise later, but I'll get to that...
Sound check is dull and lifeless... we limp through parts of songs, adjusting
monitors, until our cut-off point... and then it's just gonna be "How good am
I? How good are YOU GUYS?" for the rest of the night, including a noisy
keyboard line for the first set that should have been caught but wasn't (my
bad) causing some distress, but that was only AFTER the band got used to
playing on the MoonWalk ride that IS Garton's... come to think of it, this
"problem" was to solve many problems in ways that could never have been
predicted...
The club fed us, and pretty well at that... our waitress, who probably lost
the pulling of straws, was so incredible in her humor and retention of order
variations she reminded us of a younger version of our favorite waitress Mary
at an undisclosed resturant here in town (sorry, y'all, Mary is all ours and
we want to respect her privacy but her service, humor, and milkshakes are the
BEST)... after which we all went to find our scattered lodgings...
When we got back to the club, there was a fair crowd assembled... we had
articles about us in two or three papers which had a very positive slant but I
had expected more, truthfully (as it turns out, this would be our third "sold
out" show)... anyway, we sat down in the band room and waited for showtime...
About twenty minutes until showtime, Mike Hazdra shows up, pissed that he's
going to have to "get right on" upon getting back to the club, obviously
agitated... we calm him with the fact that he's got some time to unwind (which
he does pounding COFFEE) and the room breathes a little easier UNTIL...
"'Box of Rain' to open the second SET?!?"
"Uh, yeah man... is there some problem with that?"
"Only that I haven't reviewed the @$%&! song in WEEKS... MAAAaaaaannn..."
He is back to agitated, to say the least...
Let me interject a few facts about Mr. Hazdra, bass god:
As much as we kid him about drinking coffee, the man is as laid back as they
come... I never hear him complain about anything and he NEVER gives anyone jib
about nothin'... PERIOD. Unless it's with good cause, anyway...
And true to form, he's quiet and resolute to get the job done moments after
this outburst.
This, above any other band out there, the DSO excel at... "Professionalism in
the face of getting F-ed"...
The show that night was 9/14/88 which was chosen for a variety of reasons, the
most important of which was the growing concept of not repeating any songs (or
as little as possible) for the entire trip... the first set opened with a "Let
The Good Times Roll" which again, best showcased the point that yes, they can
sing like 'em too... followed by "ALABAMA GETAWAY"...
Now as I had said, I wasn't happy at sound check so I was "about my business"
for LTGTR tuning vocals on each verse (very handy tune for this) and getting
the instruments settled, and for the first bit of "'Bama" I was doing the same
for the more intense and raw sounds, not really looking up at the stage
much... but when I DID, during "'Bama", I couldn't help but laugh my ass
off...
...remember what I said earlier? "MoonWalk Ride"?
My first and most lasting impression was watching Scott and his entire
keyboard rig (and don't forget the 500 lb. organ) bouncing... and I DO mean
bouncing... roughly eight inches into the air and back down again like some
sort of bad carnival ride... not smooth but sort of tossed around...
The looks on their faces were priceless.
To somewhat quote Scott on his memory of the moment...
"I was thinking at that point...'well, at least Hazdra's probably not thinking
about being nervous about "Box of Rain"... we have a few OTHER immediate
concerns..."
Corso told me later "...when the stage started moving I turned to Ahmer & said
'Here we go, hang on!'... it was like playing through an earthquake."
The "Box" was absolutely flawless, by the way... as I had said the man is a
consumate professional... This show also saw what I think was one of the best
"Victim or the Crime" renditions to date which in my opinion sort of refueled
the band on the song...
The elective was one Scott and I had discussed on our way up to Vail...
"China>Rider" for all the right clichéd reasons... and it kicked the last bit
of stuffing out of the first crowd who actually rocked the band in the most
base sense of the term...
I cannot WAIT to go back to Garton's... and THIS time, y'all best BELIEVE
we're gonna have a video camera!
After we loaded up, we went our separate ways... some of us to killer suites
in a local hotel, others to the fairly posh confines of a condo the club keeps
for just such transients as ourselves...
...and over and over, I kept trying to tell myself...
"This is my JOB..."
Yeah... I couldn't keep a straight face trying to say it either...
COMING SOON: "Too Hot In Th' HOT TUB", The Almighty BRECK, Weird Scenes Inside
A Furniture Factory, "Does This Stage Stay In One Place, At Least?", and an
elective encore deceptive in it's power...
Read on, if'n ya dare...