It's Better To Just Fade Away, Maybe

Back in 1994 I was playing in a band with my friend Colin and a couple other guys. That was my first real band and by real band I mean we actually played gigs. I had practiced with a couple other groups before but we just never made it out of the garage. As our first gig approached the anticipation of being on stage, in front of all those people was a bit overpowering. I just couldn't wait to step onto that stage.

The night of our first gig was a little frustrating. We had just gotten our drummer about a week before and things were a bit shaky. But being young and so full of energy and passion I didn't care if we sucked. I just wanted to step up to the microphone and shout out our songs for the world to hear. That first gig went okay. The true highlight of that band was the second gig we did about a month later. We had had time to practice and polish the songs a little (I'm not even going to say we were "good" because we probably weren't). Plus we were playing with some friends in another band and we really wanted to show them up. We still argue about who had the biggest crowd and best performance. I think we did.

Something that stands out about that night is that it was our drummer's prom night. So he came to show and then left to got o prom. He later said it was one of the best nights of his life. Another thing that stands out is how many of my friends came out to see us. And I mean friends from everywhere. Guys I went to high school with, friends from college, church friends, they all came out. It made it a great night. I was so excited after that show and I remember driving home about 80 mph all the way from downtown. I was unstoppable!

Little did I know that within a couple months we would play the worst gig ever and my musical tastes would take a wild mood swing away from our sound. It all fell apart in a perfect storm of ego (mine), depression (mine again) and general ineptitude (I was shooting three for three). I did form another band a few months later with Derek (he was our drummer) and even managed to get on the radio for about twenty seconds. But that all fell apart late in the Fall as I was kicked out of the band because they wanted to go in another direction. Bitter irony, I know.

From then until now I have played exactly one gig. I played with several people over the years but we never got out of the garage (or my living room). I spent massive amounts of money on equipment and learned that living like a rock star has NOTHING to do with being a musician. I played that lone gig in December of 2003, roughly nine years after I played my last gig. It was just me and Colin with our acoustic guitars in front of our friends. It was a nice bookend to the way we started. No noise. No ego. No youthful energy. Just two friends doing what they love to do. I miss it sometimes.