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PapaBrewsky
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- Location: Old Hickory, TN
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PapaBrewsky
- Posts: 16
- Joined: Thu Nov 05, 2009 4:25 am
- Location: Old Hickory, TN
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splummer
- Posts: 563
- Joined: Wed Oct 07, 2009 3:13 am
- Location: western maine , the other alaska
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thanks i will we met them the last time they were in maine, talked with margo for awhile after the concert, have a lot of pics of them but not on digital, but will be taking lots of pics, thats who i listen to alot now but it changes i also collect record albums , who many albums can you putin a cad hearse
Rudy, when I was teaching at a private jr and high school in California in the late '70's I had a black kid as a 8th grade student named DeJohn Watson. He was unrully and sarcastic, so I told him I was going to call his parents and ask them to come in and have a talk with us. He got scared and asked me not to do that. I asked why.
He asked me if I knew who his dad was. I said I did not. He said his dad was Johnny "Guitar" Watson. Still did not ring any bells with me. He told me his dad was a well known black R&B player in his own right, had several albums out, and was good friends with folks like Mick Jagger, Ringo Starr, and others. His dad often played as a studio musician for well known musical greats. He claimed that often his dad hosted parties at thier home for big wigs in the music industry in LA.
I asked some of the other teachers if this kid was playing straight with me, and they said often DeJohn showed up at school being driven in a Rolls or some other luxury ride, and yes- his dad was a rock musician.
His attititude did not improve with threats, so one day I called his house and asked to talk to one of his parents. His mom put his dad on the phone, and I explained the situation to him. He said he would be in the next day after school and we could have a conference.
The next day after school a bunch of kids came running into my classroom all excited and asked me if I had seen Johnny Guitar Watson pull up in his car. Apparently this caused quite a circus out in front of the school. Pretty soon in walked this tall black man in a large hat, fur coat, loaded down with bling. He was very nice, down to earth and had DeJohn in tow. We went in my office and I told him the problems I was having with DeJohn acting up in class. He turned to DeJohn and asked him why this was happening? Of course DeJohn had no good reason, other then some kid was bothering him or some such thing.
His dad turned to me and said, "if you have any more trouble with DeJohn, you have our permission to give him a good whipping any time you want, he knows better then to act this way!" (After this, I had no more problems with DeJohn in class.) We visited a little more after this, and I walked him out to his car. It was one of those custom made Excaliber cars, all gold plated and loaded with bling. This was during the days of the Shaft movies, and this car and Johnny Guitar's clothes could have come straight out of the movies. He had a large solid gold guitar, about 8-9 inches long with his name in diamonds hanging around his neck with a huge solid gold chain. I heard later this was a well known trademark look of his during this time, and it was indeed solid gold and real diamonds.
My long term memory of this meeting is that he seemed just like plain people, down to earth, a concerned father. Except of course for his clothes, bling and his car. Pretty interesting! My only brush with a well known musician.
He asked me if I knew who his dad was. I said I did not. He said his dad was Johnny "Guitar" Watson. Still did not ring any bells with me. He told me his dad was a well known black R&B player in his own right, had several albums out, and was good friends with folks like Mick Jagger, Ringo Starr, and others. His dad often played as a studio musician for well known musical greats. He claimed that often his dad hosted parties at thier home for big wigs in the music industry in LA.
I asked some of the other teachers if this kid was playing straight with me, and they said often DeJohn showed up at school being driven in a Rolls or some other luxury ride, and yes- his dad was a rock musician.
His attititude did not improve with threats, so one day I called his house and asked to talk to one of his parents. His mom put his dad on the phone, and I explained the situation to him. He said he would be in the next day after school and we could have a conference.
The next day after school a bunch of kids came running into my classroom all excited and asked me if I had seen Johnny Guitar Watson pull up in his car. Apparently this caused quite a circus out in front of the school. Pretty soon in walked this tall black man in a large hat, fur coat, loaded down with bling. He was very nice, down to earth and had DeJohn in tow. We went in my office and I told him the problems I was having with DeJohn acting up in class. He turned to DeJohn and asked him why this was happening? Of course DeJohn had no good reason, other then some kid was bothering him or some such thing.
His dad turned to me and said, "if you have any more trouble with DeJohn, you have our permission to give him a good whipping any time you want, he knows better then to act this way!" (After this, I had no more problems with DeJohn in class.) We visited a little more after this, and I walked him out to his car. It was one of those custom made Excaliber cars, all gold plated and loaded with bling. This was during the days of the Shaft movies, and this car and Johnny Guitar's clothes could have come straight out of the movies. He had a large solid gold guitar, about 8-9 inches long with his name in diamonds hanging around his neck with a huge solid gold chain. I heard later this was a well known trademark look of his during this time, and it was indeed solid gold and real diamonds.
My long term memory of this meeting is that he seemed just like plain people, down to earth, a concerned father. Except of course for his clothes, bling and his car. Pretty interesting! My only brush with a well known musician.
One of the coolest things about performing on stage is the vocal mic. The reason that it is fun is because, by having the vocal mic, when you speak, everyone on the room hears you. Nobody in the audience has that power.
I was opening up for Molly Hatchet back in the days that I used to play fingerpicking guitar. It was a small venue for them (900 seats). It was a fairly large audience for me.
I take the stage a 8PM. I look at the crowd and say "Hi, I'm Rudy Harley." I turn around and look at my guitars that are behind me, on the stage and say "LOOK, I brought four guitars with me!"
The first thing I hear is some wisecrack from the audience from some guy saying "well, at least he can count."
Having played solo in front of audiences that were sometimes unruly had given me the tools to deal with those situations. I was NOT a meek folk guitarist. Verbal abuse from the audience was usually met by me with a counter assault. Remember, that it was I who had the microphone.
Well, on this occasion, I figured that I would let my fingers do the talking. Without another word, I turned around, grabbed my Guild 12 string (tuned to open C), and proceeded to give a ten minute relentless fingerpicking bottleneck slide powerhouse medley of some of my tunes meshed with a healthy dose of Leo Kottke stuff. I was playing through 10,000 watts of PA gear and it was indeed impressive.
That got their attention. The whole crowd was ecstatic in their response.
I was scheduled to play for 45 minutes. I continued to wow them for a little while. But being a crowd who came to see Molly Hatchet, they started to become impatient. After 35 minutes, a chant began from the audience. Within 60 seconds, many of them joined in by banging their drinks on the table and yelling WE WANT MOLLY WE WANT MOLLY.
At this point, most people in my position would have easily been intimated. BUT NOT ME. I yelled into the mic, "HEY, what more could you want?" "You're here, they're here (pointing to the large stack of amplifiers)" "You're stuck with me for another 10 minutes, so BE QUIET!"
It was amazing. You could have heard a pin drop. The audience was well behaved for the rest of my show. I got a very enthusiastic round of applause at the end. It was a good example of mob mentality.
I was opening up for Molly Hatchet back in the days that I used to play fingerpicking guitar. It was a small venue for them (900 seats). It was a fairly large audience for me.
I take the stage a 8PM. I look at the crowd and say "Hi, I'm Rudy Harley." I turn around and look at my guitars that are behind me, on the stage and say "LOOK, I brought four guitars with me!"
The first thing I hear is some wisecrack from the audience from some guy saying "well, at least he can count."
Having played solo in front of audiences that were sometimes unruly had given me the tools to deal with those situations. I was NOT a meek folk guitarist. Verbal abuse from the audience was usually met by me with a counter assault. Remember, that it was I who had the microphone.
Well, on this occasion, I figured that I would let my fingers do the talking. Without another word, I turned around, grabbed my Guild 12 string (tuned to open C), and proceeded to give a ten minute relentless fingerpicking bottleneck slide powerhouse medley of some of my tunes meshed with a healthy dose of Leo Kottke stuff. I was playing through 10,000 watts of PA gear and it was indeed impressive.
That got their attention. The whole crowd was ecstatic in their response.
I was scheduled to play for 45 minutes. I continued to wow them for a little while. But being a crowd who came to see Molly Hatchet, they started to become impatient. After 35 minutes, a chant began from the audience. Within 60 seconds, many of them joined in by banging their drinks on the table and yelling WE WANT MOLLY WE WANT MOLLY.
At this point, most people in my position would have easily been intimated. BUT NOT ME. I yelled into the mic, "HEY, what more could you want?" "You're here, they're here (pointing to the large stack of amplifiers)" "You're stuck with me for another 10 minutes, so BE QUIET!"
It was amazing. You could have heard a pin drop. The audience was well behaved for the rest of my show. I got a very enthusiastic round of applause at the end. It was a good example of mob mentality.
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