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Tuesday, February 28-2006
The Shining Stone:
Uniontown, Pa.
"Lazy Bones", "Boilermaker",
"Somethins Cookin", and "White Trash Tragedy" let da
locals know we didn't show just to pussyfoot around, we
came to play. Local hero-middle aged, sex symbol,
accordian wizard-Dave Dombroski played the second half
of the first set with us. I love da happy sound of da
squeezebox. We did "Wasted Days And Wasted Nights", "Who
Were You Thinking Of", "Just Because", "Help Me Make It
Thru The Night", "Wolly Bully", "Steeler Nation", and a
couple other tunes togather. We got a request for "Till
the Cows Come Home", cool. Send out a song for "da
chicks from da sticks", cool. My ole buddy "Red" jumped
on stage to sing background vocals on "Rock You", it
wasn't pretty but it was beautiful. Encore "Shake Your
Moneymaker" sealed da deal.
Saturday, February 25-2006
Excuses: South Side,
Pittsburgh, Pa.
"Bulldog", "Somthins Cookin",
and "Easy Money" set da table. Some nights it's just so
darn easy, and some nights it's hard as a woodpeckers
lips. Tonight I couldn't seem to find da sweet spot. I
struggled thru da whole two hour, first set. Everybody
seemed to have a good time, I just didn't feel magic. I
socialized quite a bit on da break, and I guess it
loosened me up. With the strong musical support of
Whitey Cooper and Harry Bottoms I made a comeback in da
second set. Now ya gotta deal with me.
Thursday, February 23-2006
Moondogs: Blanox, Pa.
Harry Bottoms and I played as
a duo tonight, and it turned out to be quite a nite.
"Nightriders" was our first tune, we followed it with "Playin
In A Rockin' Roll Band". We also did a new tune "Hells
Highway" and "Son Of A Gun", for the first time. Harry
played banjo for the first time, it was wild. I love da
happy sound of da manjo, sorry I mean banjo. We did "Pettycoat
Junction" to satisfy a request for a Flatt and Scruggs
song. Small but fun crowd tonight. We played one, two
hour set.
Thursday, February 16-2006
Club Cafe:
South Side, Pittsburgh, Pa.
When I arrived at the gig
tonight, Sarah Lee Guthrie was on stage.That's right,
Woody's grand daughter, Arlo's daughter. I saw her and
her husband preform their last couple tunes. They
sounded very musical. After their show the club emptied
out and started to fill up again for the late show.
Kevin and Jean-Marc of local Pittsburgh band Grapevine
opened the show and really kicked butt. These two
rockers are really gettin it together, singing, playing,
and writing. They did an original tune named "Small"
that was very powerful. Next up, duo, Coming up for Air.
Bob and Mark both played and sang well, although they
did no original material, they sounded great. Enter, da
Dork Boy, dat's me. Cool, huh? I got a chance to play
for a mess of folks that had never seen me before, so I
was just rollin. "Graceland" and "Two Story House"
warmed up the room, so I took a chance and played a tune
I wrote last week, "Hells Highway". Time for home town
pride, "Steeler Nation", rocked the house. "Sick n'
Tired", You Go Your Way", and "Today I Stepped In
Something", all hit their mark, so I closed out my set
with "I Was Blind". Kevin and Jean-Marc got back up on
stage with me and we did a couple of tunes together.
Tonight I brought white trash to town and everybody got
it. I guess there is a little trash in us all.
Saturday,
February 11-2006
Wilbert's: Cleveland, Ohio,
(by da Jake!)
When we walked on stage tonight I had no idea how much
fun we was gonna have. I think we was all a little
nervous because we were all playin in a different
format. Once again our drummer, Whitey, could not make
this date so we rocked on with Stutso playin drums.
"Bulldog", gave way to me doin "Somethin's Cookin".
Enter Stutso rippin into "Million Tears", "Just Like A
Woman", "Breakfast", "Victoria", "3 Times", "Heart
Break", and "You Go Your Way". Everybody really seemed
to enjoy da music, I think dat helped us to play well. I
think I might have scared a few folks with my goofy bull
crap, but that's half da fun of it. We were all
delighted that everybody stuck around for da second set.
We brought up a couple local buddies to close out da
night, Dave on drums and Johnny on guitar.
I must say, we
all had a ball. We wanna come back to Cleve with Whitey
on tubs, n' throw yins a beatin!
Friday, February10-2006
Moondogs: Blanox, Pa.
Whitey Cooper
could not make this show so Mark Stutso sang lead and
played drums.We kicked off with "T-Bird" and got a good
feel goin. The rest of the set ran somthin' like dis
"Million Tears", "Just Like A Woman", "Lets Burn
Breakfast", "Victoria's Secret", "3 Times Your Fool",
"Heart Break Shake", "You Go Your Way", all songs from
the Mark Stutso record we've been workin on. I sang
"Somthin's Cookin" then Stutso crooned da Eddy Hinton
classic "Running Back". We called up ole buddy Chuck
Koehler to sing da Elvis classic "Teddy Bear". We then
closed out da set with Stutso shoutin' "Bull Frog
Blues". We featured young guitarist, Zak Weisinger the
whole second set. Zak recently won the "Albert King"
award at the national blues competition in Memphis.
"Walkin To My Baby" got Zak goin. We then did a couple
tunes from a project we've been workin on, "If I Had A
Child" and "I Hate A Nickel ", both came off real well.
Both Stutso's lead vocal and Zak's lead guitar came on
strong on B.B. King's "It's My Own Fault". "Not Fade
Away" and "Round And Round" rocked da house. To
everyone's surprise, Zak then sang "Red House". Folks
went nuts! Local guitarist Joe B got up on stage to help
with da jammin. And da music went on and on and
on.............
Saturday,
February 4-2006
Starlite Lounge: Blanox,
Pa.
Harry Bottoms
and I did this show as an acoustic duo. We did "Steeler
Nation" four times tonight. Yea, we got a little goofy
talkin bout da "Stillers" of today and yesterday. Robert
Wagner played solo acoustic in between our sets and did
a good job, singin his original music. "I seen too much"
came off real well acoustically for Harry and I, as did
"You go your way". Robert Wagner came up with us for the
last couple tunes. "Take these chains from my heart"
kicked butt! GO STILLERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Friday,
February 3- 2006
Moondogs: Blanox, Pa.
I booked this
show to play solo acoustic, as the opening act for John
Eddy. I saw old friend, P.K. Lavengood, John's guitar
player, when I arrived. P.K. volunteered to join me, on
guitar, for my set. We had a blast, even though P.K. had
never even heard some of the tunes until we got on
stage. What a great muscian and guitar player he is. The
set list ran something like this "Nightriders", "I
tried", "Graceland", "Steeler Nation", Sick and
tired","The horse your ridin", Two story house", Playin
in a rockn' roll band", "Beyond the point of carin", "I
was blind". We did "Steeler Nation" twice, cause we're
nuts! Right? "Beyond the point of carin" is a song I
wrote with P.K., about 15ears ago. P.K. did a nice job
on the lead vocal tonight. It's fun playin acoustic, but
it's also a little like walking around naked. I wanna
thank P.K. for playin wit me and John for havin me open
the show. The Pittsburgh -New Jersey connection lives
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