AG's Journal #18

day 3-3/17-humpty's-lake tahoe,ca.- lake tahoe is always a favorite spot. not only is it a beautiful place to go to, but we have a lot of friends to visit. first thing we do is go to our buddy chad hester's house. we arrive at 4:20 and exchange hellos. chad is an old friend of ours from ocean beach, just one of those really cool guys that everyone knows or wants to know. he tells us that he's having a st. patty's day party after the show so we know we're in trouble. the show is sold out and it's jam packed with sweaty, drunk people getting their st. patty on. a couple of my friends, heather and erica, from ocean beach, are there as well as our friends leroy and bill from arizona. we end the night with sweet leaf much to the crowds' enjoyment and head to chad's. his house is packed full of people dancing to a dj and partying their asses off. we see chad briefly but he is too busy with his host duties to really stop and talk. we get a ride home from a kind soul who's name i can't remember and crash for the night. thanks to peter abraham and all the people at humpty's and to chad hester for everything.

day 4-3/18-last days saloon- san francisco, ca.- first of all, i must say that i am in mourning because my beloved arizona wildcat basketball team lost in the ncaa tournament today. that aside, tonight is a big night because we have mr. dave ellis playing sax with us. in case you don't know who dave is, he has played with ratdog, and the charlie hunter trio amongst others and also has released several solo jazz recordings and is considered one of the next generation of up and coming jazz players. playing with dave always gets me hyped up because he is such an amazing player and i actually get a bit nervous. we do a quick review of the horn charts and a couple new songs that he hasn't heard. john brown's body is opening for us tonight, and i jump up and play a song that i heard on their cd and they give me a little solo. as usual with dave, the show is great and we all have a lot of fun. he'll be playing with us again at winston's on april 8th, the day we return from this tour.

day 5-3/19-canyon lodge, mammoth,ca.- mammoth lakes brings two words to mind. scotty manicotti! i'm talking about scott marzone, an old, childhood friend of chad's who has also become a favorite of the bands' as well. scott even drove our van and met us across country and roadied for us when we did our east coast tour a year ago. now he's the entertainment coordinator for the ski lodge in mammoth. how perfect is that! the show goes well considering it's the sunday after st. patricks day. there's a couple hundred people, although most look pretty tired. fortunately for everyone, it's an early show and we're done by midnight. our az friends leroy and bill are here again and we all go back to the rooms for a couple beers. thanks again to scotty for his generosity.

day 7-3/21-legends lounge-las vegas- yesterday we had the day off and some of the guys went skiing and the other half of us relaxed or practiced or did whatever. that night we had a big pasta dinner at scotty's house prepared by mr. sean hart and we feasted and passed out by 10 o'clock. the show in vegas was pretty good. not the biggest crowd but it was a tuesday night. the new deal, a band that we had played a couple times with on this last east coast tour, opened up for us. they rocked the house with their high energy techno, drum and bass music. because of the small crowd, it was a little looser atmosphere and we just had fun. we did a long extended space jam in the middle of the set that definately raised some eyebrows, ours too! after the show, we did our usual ritual of drinking and gambling and eventually bed.