Duo of Me with Bruce C.


In the summer of 1993, a computer co-worker at Fort Monmouth introduced himself to me, saying that he was a part-time keyboard player & singer/songerwriter. He approached me about playing acoustic guitar at his gig he already scheduled in August up in Jersey City. I agreed to do it, and we had a few rehearsals prior to this gig.

This gig was an all day event scheduled on a Saturday from 3:00 in the afternoon until close (2:00 AM Sunday morning), where we were supposed to be the very first act on-stage, scheduled at 3:00 PM in the afternoon. Bruce had brought up alot of his friends and family for this gig, infact, it was alot more people than any of the other acts brought, even the full bands. So the greedy club owner, whom already made a huge profit by keeping $9 out of all the $10 tickets that were sold by all of the ten scheduled acts, was being even more greedy still - Realizing that as soon as we played that most of our crowd, (which was also most of HIS crowd whom were drinking and eating), would leave, he kept pushing our slot back further and further. I realized what was going on after the first few times we got pushed back, and I told Bruce he should give the A-hole club owner an ultimatum, either put us on next or else we're leaving. But he was too afraid to do it. So needless to say, we didn't get to play until dead last, at 1:00 AM in the morning! (We had got there literally 12 hours earlier, at 1:00 PM, to set up). And surprisingly, most of Bruce's crowd still stuck around and waited for for us to play. Then when we finally went on, we got terrible sound - or to be more exact, no soundman - he was sitting at the bar drinking! There was one bouncer working the video camera a little bit from time to time, but that was it. We couldn't get any levels adjusted or anything. So to put it as mildly as possible, it "wasn't so good".

Also on a similar topic, there is one other seemingly negative thing what I actually like (now) about this. That is, I notice my vocal technique was significantly rougher and weaker than what it eventually became. This was recorded in August of 93, literally a week before I started taking vocal lessons with Robert Mason from Lynch Mob. Although I had already taken numerous voice lessons with several other well-respected voice teachers, they all had just taught me raw techniques, such as breathing control and exercises, but absolutely no practical applications or songs. As a result, my actual live performance didn't benefit too significantly from any of those prior lessons. I took lessons with Mason for a year from Aug 93 until August 94, and learned far more during that period than I had from all of the prior vocal lessons combined. So this video documents where my voice was "before", and my later videos and audio clips document the "after".

P.S. This guy Bruce seemed kinda "strange" at first, but since his wife was always with him all the time, I thought he must be ok. You'll probably see what mean in the video.


Here it is: Me_Bruce.rm



This picture is actually from 1991, but it was the closest one I had of me to this time frame.