You may not believe what you are about to read and may feel like the story is made up. But I swear it’s totally true.
And, the next time you feel sorry for yourself or your band for not having enough money, these truths about my first band in 1976 may make you realize just how financially solvent and wealthy you already are:
“THE LIGHTS OF THE SOUL”
Although we would experience dark days, we had the audacity to name our band “The Lights Of Soul”. We were so poor that, at one point, we seriously considered changing our name to “The Welfare Band” (which was much more appropriate) in the hope that our community would feel so sorry for us that they would put dollar bills in a pure tip jar. instead of just throwing us loose change. Actually, on second thought, we never had a tip jar because we couldn’t afford it either. If memory serves, our “tip jar” was a bag of Lays potato chips propped up by two popsicle sticks.
OUR MEMBERS AND FRONTLINE TEAM
I started the band with a lot of musicians…something like 20+ members (we were in Earth, Wind & Fire at the time and wanted a big funk sound). Have you ever heard of former NFL Dallas Cowboy Eugene Lockhart? Well, I grew up with him and he started playing trombone in my band. I later kicked him and another band member out for fighting after they broke our manager’s couch.
Two brothers played in my first band… Larry Whitting (bass) and Doug Whitting (keyboard). Larry played a hideous-looking hollow-bore bass, and even though I wasn’t a bassist yet (I played trumpet in the high school band at the time), I had to show Larry every note of every song. Because, not only was I clueless about music, I was also deaf (or was it the death of tone?). Actually, both phrases applied to Larry.
Well, after showing him songs about 999 times, I got so frustrated that I decided to relieve Larry of his bassist duties and started playing bass myself. Since we couldn’t afford a professional bass, my manager ordered one from the Sears & Roebuck catalogue. Those S&R catalogs were so big that I was told some people would go hunting with them during deer season.
To use this book as a weapon and save wear and tear on his rifle and save ammunition at the same time, all he needed to do was climb a tree with it, stand still, and wait for an unfortunate deer to get under his tree then, ( ((((BAM))))). You dropped it on his head and pulled it out. And best of all, there’s no mess to clean up in the truck cab, either.
I think the new bass possibly broke our manager’s bank account that week with its hefty price tag of $49.95 (plus tax). Talk about splurging! Oh yeah…after breaking a couple of strings one night, I played bass for several weeks with just two strings because we couldn’t afford to buy a complete set. As you can imagine my hands/arms were doing double time and afterward my forearms were so swollen they would have made Popeye jealous.
If you are a bass player, have you ever tried to play 4 note music with only 2 strings all night? No, I didn’t think so, because you’re smarter than that.
But, the silver lining of that experience, is that when people saw me do it, they thought I had suddenly become a very fast bass player in record time, even though they didn’t follow me home to watch me get drenched. sore arms in a tub of Epsom salt afterwards.
“Wow! Kenny, you can play SO fast now! How did you learn to play so fast? Can you show me?”
Uh, let me think about that for a minute… NO!
In fact, I have major arthritic pain in both wrists as a result of this.
Now, about Larry’s brother, Doug. Lord, mercy. Doug’s keyboard couldn’t even be called a real keyboard. It looked like an accordion player that had been denied access to the piano family reunion picnic. It was so small that Doug would hold it on his knee in his attempts to touch it. It was so small that a single finger, almost always, and unintentionally, played two notes at the same time.
It sounded worse than those cheap Casios from the 1980s… yeah, you know those… those little white ones that, to hear them, not only needed to be plugged into a PA system, but you also needed a microphone. the keyboard so the audience could hear your fingers hitting the keyboard and validate that you were actually playing it and not doing a “Milli Vanilli”.
Well, with our image to think about, this soon became too much, and I asked Doug to join Larry on the unemployment line, and also because he could never seem to play those extremely difficult three-note major chords correctly. . And he was terrified that asking him to venture into the areas of Dominant 7th chords, or worse, 9th or 11th inversions would turn out to be an impossibility and would ultimately send him over the edge. Now we were without a piano, but for the better. Come to think of it, I don’t think the little keyboard can do 7th chords.
Our drummer, Reginald Smith, is one of my closest friends to this day (I’ve known him since kindergarten). But let me tell you about his drum kit, or more accurately, his “partial” drum kit. Actually, Reg couldn’t afford all the equipment, so he just had drums (and sometimes drumsticks). The drum kit Reg played had no ride or crash cymbals. But worst of all, he had a kick pedal that only worked part of the time… I mean, when the adjustment screw wouldn’t come out, he’d fly across the room and almost blow out one of the other band members. the band. eye.
In fact, the kick pedal became so bad to repair that Reg eventually decided to throw it out entirely. But, every time we were on a hot streak, he would, believe it or not, kick the drum with his toe. I think I even remember him doing a quick double kick once when the spirit moved him to do it in what would normally have been a double roll with real drums. However, a positive side effect was his ability to rapidly build thigh and calf muscles, even if there was the occasional “charlie horse” as a drawback.
Our first gig was literally in a cow pasture, complete with cows (Texas only). To add insult to injury, we were wrapped in chicken wire in case the audience was upset with our performance for any reason, and we kindly and collectively decided to throw their beer bottles our way so as not to litter the grass. After all, you can’t have valuable livestock by stepping on glass, right?
However, the chicken wire siding did not prevent a drunken, toothless, snuff-smoking woman from climbing through the wire, grabbing Cedric Reagans, our lead singer, by the collar of his shirt when he got too close to the fence and then he will try to force his tongue. down his throat as he sang a rendition of Barry White’s “Can’t Get Enough Of Your Love, Babe.” Ooooh… just the sordid memory of the scene still chills to the bone 32 years later.
Our “PA System” (yes, right). We also couldn’t afford a real PA system, let alone a professional quality lineup. So, we had what I still consider to be an ingenious idea to this day. We decided to remove the drawers from a bedroom dresser and then mount a 15-inch speaker on its stationary stand.
Our manager then ran an electrical cable to one of the guitar amps. Lastly, we took a black drop cloth and covered the entire vanity to make it look like we were on the mend financially and could now buy some serious new equipment. Our manager is the only human being I’ve ever seen hook up a glowing electrical wire without the slightest shudder.
Once, when our manager was late for rehearsal, to start rehearsal, a couple of our foolish members bravely tried to plug in the bare electrical wires as they had seen our manager do, but were thrown across the room by a tall voltage. Nobody tried again. As for our homemade PA system, no one was the wiser, and several people said our sound improved. ;-(
Our lead singer would also sometimes forget the lyrics to the songs. Then he would look around us for moral support, guidance or telepathy (he never knew what he was looking for). In any case, we offered none and were of no comfort in his sudden plight.
During these wonderful special occasions, I would take the liberty and opportunity to seek refuge in a convenient part of the curtain to hide behind if we were lucky enough to be on stage until Cedric’s Alzheimer’s has cleared up and he is back to normal. and remembered. the letter. If we weren’t on stage, like any smart, quick-thinking ostrich does, I’d just lower my head, look at the ground, and pretend I was on a battlefield in a distant part of Okinawa.
I can’t, in all honesty, talk about the other members without revealing to you a personal mistake of mine. One of our gigs was playing for a high school FFA (Future Farmers of America) meeting. Well, in my excitement and haste, I forgot to tune my bass, and when we started playing it was obvious (to me) that my bass was tuned one step higher.
In denial, and unable to face my mistake of not having tuned it beforehand, and being the only member of the band who actually read music (and was highly respected for it), I firmly informed the band that I had never in my entire life I heard that a whole band was out of tune, even the drummer, on one song and they really needed to seriously consider getting some serious music training before it was too late.
The incredible thing is that they believed my lie, and to this day I do not dare to tell them that it was entirely my fault. Actually, I don’t dare to tell you now, since people nowadays are so hot-tempered and quick to get angry and angry without just cause.
Our manager, though warm-hearted and well-intentioned, was almost as poor as we were. Johnny had a Chevy that we used to drive some of the band members home. In reality, what the car was was a smoking deathtrap that thankfully never killed any of us, though he tried very hard. However, we do suffer from severe whiplash on occasion, and this is how…
GO HOME
Like I said, after rehearsal we had to drive some members home, and the guitarist lived about 15 miles in the woods. There were 45-degree turns like no one cared, and the car’s brakes were so badly needed that when he activated them, the car lurched at a 45-degree angle to the right.
Naturally, preparing for and adapting to this experience each time meant turning the steering wheel to the left at a 90-degree angle while simultaneously applying the brakes, only to have the car appear to stay straight to any kind, safety-conscious person. , well-intentioned police officers hell-bent on issuing a traffic citation for moving violation.
Sometimes, however, we forgot that the car could jerk and therefore this is when we experience the pleasant soothing pain that only whiplash can cause. Having dealt with this on more than a few occasions, I was already well trained when I entered the military and drove a tank for the first time. Maneuvering the tank, compared to the 4-wheel mobile deathtrap, was a piece of cake, and fellow soldiers marveled at how quickly I grasped the concept of the throttle, for which I have the “Deathmobile” to thank.
HOW DO YOU FEEL NOW?
So, I bet right now, your financial situation is starting to look a lot better for you, isn’t it?