Being "Billy Joel"

I realized I never gave a proper ending to the "Band Thing" I went on about some weeks ago. Well, I learned that this band was being headed by the singer and one of the guitar players, and the other guitar player, who we'll call The Player, only owned the equipment and was helping these two starters out in their gigs and group. So after they rejected the next guy who came in for bass (since no one liked him at all), The Player and the guy who took me up there (we'll call him The Mixer, since he's the sound guy) liked me for bass, but the singer and guitar players weren't too sure, since I seemed kind of technical. Anyway, I've gone into all that previously...

Bottom line is that these two guys could never decided anything, and they even had a time where they didn't play, and had a short falling out, and then came to an agreement, and then sucked, and then played ok (and that's just just since my Band Thing II post). However, The Plyer and The Mixer thought I was cool and Player wanted me to come back out and play piano while he played drums (all this is detailed in Band Thing II).

So I did. I surprised the heck out of them when I actually sang while I played, and they loved my song selections (since almost all of my choices are five star tunes on my iPod). That was in May, and it was a month before we could get back together for one reason or another, and finally this last Tuesday, we were able to play again. Apparently, they had only placed a mike in front of the piano the first time as a joke, and didn't expect me to actually use it. This time, they weren't sure if I'd want it or not, but I asked for it, since I have songs, and as I chose a considerable number of original tunes, no one else would know them.

You see, the first session consisted of established songs and a couple of original ones. In the interrim, I was asked if I knew any Christian songs, and so I pooled those together along with more original material.

So the second section kicked off with a host of worship songs, and as before, they really enjoyed my song selection, even though they didn't know most of them. This surprised me since the Player has something to do with the praise band at his church, which is almost next door to his house. He also didn't know Larry Norman's "Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music?" which I just thought was required listening for anyone who dared play rock in church. Anyway, we took a break after an hour and a half of Christian music, but not before I snuck in three of my own songs that fit that genre.

I had inadvertently chosen a lot of Hillsong music, and so when it wasn't Hillsong, the intro to song went, "and this one isn't Hillsong." So I gave that intro for one of mine, and once we were done, I was asked who does that one, and I told them I wrote it. They were shocked. So begins their being impressive with my music. They said good things about the three we did before the break, and after the break, it was all about me.

We played for almost an hour on just stuff I'd written, and one song that I didn't, but counts as original since it isn't mainstream at all, and I know the writers and when it was written. That song is one of my personal favorites and one of the best loved of the evening. The composer and lyricist were in rare form for the writing of that one. It's called "More Stars Than In Heaven," and if you search for it on Amazon, you'll find it and the album that we have out there at the moment for the musical it's from. That song alone is worth its weight in gold.

Anyway, The Player declared that we had to lay some tracks down at some point since he enjoyed what we were playing before we ran out of time and The Mixer had to go. We're getting together again on Tuesday, and this time, I will be able to get through all of my songs (yeah, I had probably a half dozen at least that we didn't play). The Player seemed fairly exicted about it, and I played "More Stars..." for him off my iPod in both the English and Swedish production versions (sorry, only the English one is up on Amazon). He said he just loved it.

So I am interested to see where this will go. For me, I have a lot of work to do in preparing several outstanding items I'm working on, so that's it for now.