With Fuzzy Cousins:
On Saturday, March 1st played up in lovely Penngrove, CA with Fuzzy Cousins at the lovely Black Cat Bar & Cafe. We opened up for our pals The Lemon Limelights and it was a pretty good local crowd. Jenya whipped up some banana bread and hazelnut chocolate cupcakes and we sold it all. It's been a (pleasantly long) while since my last gig, and during the hiatus my "nervous callous" disappeared, but it still was fun and went well, even though I gashed my right thumb pretty bad the previous day and it hurt to hold a guitar pick.

With Fuzzy Cousins:
Between the last gig (see above) and our gig on Thursday, March 13th at 12 Galaxies in SF we were both sick as dogs with this nasty ass cold. It was a miracle we were able to sing at all, but we stepped up and did the job, though Jenya had a long coughing fit perfectly situated between two of the songs early in the set. We realized ten minutes before starting that we forgot our fuzzy costumes back at the house. Oh well. Other than that, a good show. The bake sale was a success as usual. We opened for both Gabby La La and Mark Growden - Jenya sat in with him on a couple tunes along with Seth on bass - like a sudden band reunion right there on stage!

With Fuzzy Cousins:
Sort of a repeat of two weeks ago, we played on Saturday, March 29th once again at 12 Galaxies in SF, and still recovering from a battery of secondary and tertiary infections from this lingering cold. This time though, we were one of many acts doing short sets as part of a benefit for Mark Growden (still recovering from bike accident injuries and coping to pay medical/life bills), who of course performed as well. And we remembered the costumes. And we only played our four favorite songs. And we managed to sneak away and get some yummy Taqueria Cancun vittles. And there was a very large crowd, too. Jenya sat in at the end with the true Pinata reunion with Mark, Seth, and Myles. First time this group performed in this format in many years, and without rehearsal even. Just got up on stage and did it.

With The Fuxedos:
On Saturday, April 5th I was back at the Starry Plough (with a brand new sound system thank the lord) headlining with the Fuxedos. Opening the night was the always fabulous miRthkon with some new material, then the Murfreesboro, TN geniuses Juan Prophet Organization really kept the art rock momentum going until we got on stage and kinda went nuts. It was one of our better gigs, musically, and Danny was his usual unusual form. I was actually at the Plough all night the previous evening watching Jenya perform with Long Thaw and they killed. So it was a fun weekend pretty much living at the good ol' Plough.

With Hank Hooper: Dren, a.k.a. Hank Hooper, puts on wonderful shows for kids and their parents. He had an event on Sunday afternoon, April 6th, at Rhythmix in Alameda and he asked me and Jenya to help out - I ultimately mostly did sound and lights but since I sang a couple songs on stage I'll call this a "gig." Dawn and Nils were also chipping in their performance talents - Nils even put on a costume and played the "pizza monster." Funny stuff.

With Research and Development:
It's getting too hard to book shows like these in formal rock clubs where the bottom line is all too important. Why do we have day jobs? So we can put on our own damn show! On Friday, May 2nd, Nat actually rented out the Ashby Stage in Berkeley where we held this event, which featured a more relaxed setting conducive for listening, as well as utter control so we could have a full light/video multimedia spectacle. We rocked out with the new lineup and new material, and it felt great. Headlining was miRthkon, which kicked ass and really made use of the video stuff - adding a whole new major level to the whole show experience. Quite pleasing.

With Research and Development:
Turns out a week later another such rental venue in SF was available - CounterPULSE. So we pulled out the stops again on another DIY venture on Friday, May 9th, right there in SoMa where parking/unloading was total utter hell. This time we headlined, which the wonderful (and even larger) R&B Free Jazz Gospel Supreme 80 kicked off the show. Hammond organs are so worth the haul. Man there was so much gear between all the musicians from both bands the place looked like a music store.

With Solid State:
Had another one of those 24-hour stints down in Southern California. Orange County to be exact. When? On Friday, May 16th. Where? At a MetLife corporate party at the St. Regis Monarch Beast Resort & Spa - five stars! With which band? Well, it was a chunk of Casino Royale (me, Wes, Jamison, Scrote) and fellow cover band journeyman and guitarist extraordinaire Jon Axtell, all organized by singer Paul Jensen from Seattle's Dudley Manlove (Paul actually sat in on a CR gig up in Seattle several years ago). Anyway, we played the whole gig and never mentioned the name of the band as we didn't settle on one. Fair enough. Ultimately Paul/Scrote decided on "Solid State" which seemed perfectly fitting. It was a mix of AM radio hits from the 60's, 70's, and 80's, so I had to expand my repetoire a bit - finally played "I Will Survive" and "Dancing Queen" and stuff like that in front of people for once in my life. It was a swanky venue, and we got to stay there, and even got limo service to/from the airport. People kept referring to me as "sir."

With Fuzzy Cousins:
Our pal Annmarie is making a film about musical creativity and the Immersion Composition Society which needs funds - so we performed at the first of potentially several benefit shows. It was at the Uptown in Oakland on Wednesday, June 11th. It was a pretty good lineup: the always delightful Freddi Price did his solo thang, then we did a quick, rockin' set (the fuzzy costumes made a hot evening even hotter), followed by the also rockin' Freak Accident (haven't seen them in a while) and wrapped up with the incredible Kehoe Nation (so energetic for late on a school night). Larry, the new owner/operator of the Uptown was super cool and showed us all the improvements he made on the club since he took over. Plus word on the street is the Fox Theatre across the way is opening in a couple months. That'll really change Downtown for the better. Fun random thing: one guy in the audience talked to me after our set - turns out he's from Seattle and caught us playing up there with Faun Fables two years ago. Even more random: Marshall from Minneapolis (of "Run at the Dog" fame - a band the deserves much attention) happened to be in town and showed up at the gig as well. He crashed on our futon later that evening after staying up till 4am eating pizza and talking music.

With Fuzzy Cousins:
On Saturday afternoon, July 12th, we headed up to Santa Rosa to play a benefit show to help offset medical bills of a poor sick doggie. I forget that when you play "out of the city" you get to play in clubs that are big, have great soundsystems and soundpeople, easy load-ins, free parking nearby, and clean bathrooms. Unfortunately it's still a club and not as many people want to spend a sunny Santa Rosa Saturday indoors. Great music all around, though, starting with our pal Lisa doing her solo act (Conception Vessel One), then Soulshine, then us doing a quick but sweaty set (that fuzzy costumes are hot!). Sweat poured off my head getting hair product in my eyes which burned. Following us was good ol' Mark Growden and the fabulous Earstu who organized the event. We left quickly as we had a whole recently-butchered lamb to pick up in Penngrove on the way home. Then we had a major tire blowout on 101. The shredded tire whipped around knocking the bumper halfway off and scraping the entire side of the vehicle. Luckily we were able to change the spare quickly with the aid of a nice cop who pulled over to help.