My gig last night at Maggiano's went really well. It was with a bossa nova group I play with called Billeeto. The singer is amazing. Her name is Jessica, she's going to record with me for my album. It's always a lot of fun playing with her. And the drummer was good too, it was Andrew the guy who I'd done all of those Middle School performances with. So it was a lot of fun. And towards the end of the night Carrie showed up with my cousins Tracy and Kathy. I was really glad they got to see me play in a setting outside of Tyrell's band. They arrived a little late as my wife is a little directionally impaired and traffic was really bad. But they made it and we had a good time.

Afterwards I drove them back to their hotel. I took the scenic route so I could drive them through the Sunset Strip and a little of UCLA's campus.

So today I'm just hanging with my cousins save for the gig I have to do in the early evening. It's a cocktail reception after a wedding. It only lasts an hour which is why I took it. But come to find out a couple of days ago that I have to load up my bass and my gear like FOUR HOURS before the gig starts! What a drag. If I'd known that I probably wouldn't have taken it, but my friend Gary got me the gig and I didn't want to back out on him.

Regardless me and the cousins are going for Hawaiian BBQ today ... I bet my mom's jealous!

The trip to Houston was pretty fun even though it was short. As I said before Tyrell is from Houston so it's always a big deal when we play there. A bunch of his childhood friends who are successful businessmen organized this really big concert. Wed. after we landed we went to a reception they were having for us. Free booze always goes over very well with the band. The guys and I all hit a sports bar afterwards. I befriended a guy from Arizona who was rooting for the Diamondbacks as they beat my Dodgers once again. He was cool and took us to a great club afterwards. There were some fine women there, unfortunately there were like 4 guys for every hot girl. Not that I would've talked to any of them ... not lil' ol' me! But it's always nicer to look at hot chicks than drunk dudes. By the end of the night it was clear that we'd all been "overserved" and it was time to head back to the hotel.

The next day was the day of the show. The soundcheck was brutal and I was stuck with a horrible bass (they've been renting instruments for me as opposed to flying around wiht my own). But we had some great BBQ for lunch and the show went really well.

I met up with a friend of mine from CBR, Crandal (CO Jones to you CBR-types). He's a great guy and it was fun hanging with him. After the show there was a big dinner (them Texans like to eat!) and it was back to the hotel. I just walked in my door a little while ago.

Now it's time to relax before I head to my gig tonight and meet up with my cousins.

Toodles!

I had a great time at the game last night. Boy is it ever nice sitting in a suite at a ball game. Free food (Dodger dogs!), comfortable seats, tv monitors ... it was a lot of fun. The only drag was the Dodgers lost. That's 5 of 6 that they've dropped and they're in a bit of a slump. They're still hitting the ball well, they just aren't driving in runners.

So I'm leaving to catch my flight to Houston in a half-hour or so. I like Houston, we always have a lot of fun there. Tyrell grew up in Houston so he has a lot of family and friends who all show us southern hospitality.

After the week of travel hell, here I am getting back on a plane. Wish me luck.

I made it over to Woodman late last night for a poker game. After a bit of a dry spell and not playing a whole lot I finally won. I was really down in chips at one point but fought back with the help of a great run of cards. Good times.

My friend Corey invited me to the Dodgers game tonight, he has BOX SEATS! I'm pretty stoked. I've sat in box seats only once before and that was for a tennis match at Indian Wells. Tyrell hooked those up after we had done a concert in Palm Springs. We watched Anna Kournikova get her ass kicked. But oh what a nice ass it is!

The Pacers won last night ... I love Reggie Miller.

I'm headed to Houston tomorrow for a quick gig with Tyrell. I'm backon Friday. My cousins Tracy and Kathy are coming to LA for the weekend. I can't wait, we'll have a good time together.

Yesterday Carrie and I went to the baptism of some friends of ours little girl. It was neat, I'd never been to a Catholic baptism before. Afterwards we went over to their house for lunch with their friends and family. It was a fun time.

So we get home, I make dinner, and we are on the couch about ready to call it a night (this was around 9PM I'd say) when I get a really weird phone call from a pianist friend of mine. It went something like this:

"Hey Lyman, I'm here at the Money Tree. I have a gig tonight but our bass player is too messed-up to play. He says his back hurts but I think he's too high and can't play the gig. Can you come out?"

Now I hate the Money Tree as I've said before. And I was on my couch in my jammies. But I figured here was a friend of mine who needed some help. Even though the gig payed peanuts I was totally capable of going down there and playing with him. So I said yes. The gig was okay. I really wasn't feeling the drummer. And it was a jam session so a bunch of folks sat in that weren't that great (I can be such an elitist sometimes!). But it was fine. Man, I don't want to play there again for a while.

Afterwards I went over to Woodman and caught up with some of they boys I hadn't seen in a while. Then me and my friend Pasta went to IHOP at 2AM. Real smart Lyman.

So I was home by 3:30.

I love it when your night takes a turn like that. Keeps you on your toes.

I had a gig last night at this restaurant in La Habra. It was with this piano player that I'd never met before. Now, jazz is very much like a conversation between musicians. Everyone is improvising at the same time but the improvisation doesn't';t make much sense unless everyone is on the same page. Well this piano player was a good enough player, but it was like we were speaking different languages, stylistically we didn't really match up very well. That added to the fact that it was just a duo gig for four hours made for a pretty long night. But it was good practice playing so much.

After that my boy Bill and I had a drink then I stopped by my buddy Pasta's to talk about the NFL Draft, football starts in mere months folks!!

And after a blazing start the Dodgers have lost three in a row. Ouch.

(current soundtrack: "Run For Your Life" The Beatles, "The Warmth of Your Breath" Fishbone, "Lausd" Jurassic 5, "What So Never The Dance" Bootsy Collins, "Got To Be The Way It Is" Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings)

The school gig yesterday was okay. Similar to the other ones I did earlier in the month. Fine but a bit futile. Then this morning I did a rehearsal with some guys I play with from time to time, that was pretty fun. The leader of the group is great composer/arranger and had some great new charts for us to read.

Carrie and I are going to see the new Woody Allen movie Melinda and Melinda tonight. I'm a huge fan of his but I have to admit, he hasn't made a great movie in a long, LONG time. I'd say The Sweet And Lowdown was his last great one and I think I was a bit partial to that one since it was about a jazz musician. Hopefully this will be a good one.

We saw Fever Pitch the other day. It was alright. I had higher hopes for it since it was about baseball and all but it got kind of slow and wasn't that funny and didn't parallel the drama of last year's Red Sox season very well.

I normally don't see two movies in one week. But this no cable thing has me at wits end.

Maybe they'll show Sports Center highlights before the film tonight. I can only hope.

The Lakers season officially ended last night and thank goodness. This has been the worst season in almost thirty years for the storied ball-club. And while they're not my favorite team, they are now my hometown team so I root for them all the way. Good thing the year of suckage is finally over for them. The next season starts today--so go get some talent Dr. Jerry Buss!

The Pacers play Boston in the first round. That's a winnable series for them.

New England and Indianapolis all over again! Hopefully this time we'll have better results than the football team ...

**********

After watching the final Lakers game with my boys over at Woodman I went out and saw some more local music last night. My buddy Bill was playing with his trio at this plcae called Jax. A few years ago I was playing at Jax every week but I haven't been there for a year and a half or so. It was fun. The band sounded good and I sat in and played a couple of tunes.

There were these girls there who go see Bill's shows because they're huge Buble fans. They of course recognize me from the DVD and were very complimentary of the two tunes I played ... heh.

I have another one of those school gigs today. Wish me luck.

" ... I'm leaving in November"

I'm going to be a New Yorker folks. For a couple of months anyway. Steve Tyrell has accepted a two-month residency at the Carlisle Hotel in NYC from November through the New Year.

I'm pretty excited about this. For a few reasons; NYC is Mecca to a jazz musician--the center of the jazz universe, I have quite few friends in the city (musicians and otherwise) so I won't feel like a tourist for two months, we have two days off every week, two months of steady income is a GREAT thing for a musician.

The downside of course is being away from Carrie and Murphy. But they can fly out a couple of times. When I was touring with Michael Buble I was gone for just as long (and most of it was out of the country) and we managed. This might be rough but Carrie thinks its a great idea.

Weird thing is it's so far away. But it's tough not to think about something you're so excited for.

*********

In other news Carrie and I are trying to cut back on bills since getting bent over by Mr. TaxMan. So we decided (well, she decided, I had to go along) to get rid of the cable. And it sucks. The only TV I watch are ESPN, Fox Sports, Food Network, and Comedy Central. Now I'm left with none of them. I'm missing Dodgers games, it's a total drag. Hopefully I can get it back soon.

After a pretty slow day of running errands yesterday I went out and saw some friends play in Hollywood.

I haven't really gone out and checked out local jazz music for a while. I feel like I need to get back on the scene. I'm in and out of town so much I fell like I've fallen out of the loop. I want to play more jazz, maybe get my own group together and try to hustle some gigs. I like playing with Tyrell and all, but the gig is pretty light on the creativity side. So I've decided to start going out more, like I was doing a couple of years ago. Besides, Tyrell has started recording his next record in NYC which of course means that I'm not on it. My career is going to stand still if I expect his band to lead to bigger oppurtunities.

The sun's out after a couple of grey days in LA, that's always a good thing.

The gig last night with Steve went really well. Nice crowd, nice theater. Good thing since we went through so much to get back for it.

Today was my first day off at my house in a week an a half.

Took two naps.
Walked my dog.
Went to Arby's.

And that's about it.

This was easily the worst travel week of my entire left.

The best way for me to go about this is to take you day-by-day. So let’s begin:

FRIDAY
Carrie and I leave for Des Moines from the Burbank Airport for the wedding with a layover in Denver (remember this).

SATURDAY
The Wedding Day. Good times. Carrie and I both had a lot of fun and a lot of alcohol.

SUNDAY
Time to fly back to Burbank. This is where the fun starts. We get to the airport and find out our flight to Denver has been cancelled due to a huge snow storm. I immediately start to stress out. My flight for Moscow leaves at 7AM on Monday morning and I cannot miss it. We are put on standby for a flight to Dallas then back to Burbank. But the standby list is too long and we miss the flight.

The only way we could get confirmed for a flight that would get us back to Southern California on Sunday was to fly in the wrong direction to Chicago then fly from Chicago to LAX. We had no choice; we had to do it even though we wouldn’t get back to LAX until 11:45 PM. But we didn’t fly out of LAX; our car was at the Burbank Airport! Luckily my good friend Vinnie and his wife agreed to pick us up at LAX and give us a ride to our car.

But here’s another wrinkle in the story. I didn’t have my passport yet. The Russian Embassy was late mailing them back to us in LA. I realized by the time the passport would arrive at my place both Carrie and I would be in Iowa and no one would be around to pick it up. So I told our tour manager to mail my passport to our piano player’s house.

But in one of the many ironic turns of the week, our piano player was in Denver over the weekend doing another gig. He was stuck there and in all probability was going to miss the flight to Moscow. Luckily his wife was at his house and drove my passport and ticket to our trumpet player who would give them to me at LAX in the morning before we left.

We roll in to LAX and get picked up. By the time I get home and pack it is 1:30 AM. I have to wake up at 4AM to get on the flight to Moscow.

MONDAY
After very few hours of awful sleep I leave for LAX. When I finally get to the airport it is around 5:30AM. We have a flight that leaves for JFK in New York at 7AM; from there we go to the Russian airlines to leave for Moscow.

The Airport is packed beyond belief. With all of these cutbacks the airlines have made, passenger check-in service has really suffered. Anyway, I had asked our tour manager the night before if we had to do international check in at LAX or JFK, to which he said he did not know. Well I waited in the e-check-in line at LAX for 45 minutes until I’m told that I can’t do that since I have an international flight. I get in another line but it is too late. Myself and our guitar player miss the flight to JFK. Luckily I had run into our trumpeter who gave me my passport and Moscow ticket. I was so pissed at our tour manager for not knowing the details. As if I hadn’t been through enough the day before, here I am missing another flight and trying to get on the next plane standby which leaves for JFK at 8AM. And if we don’t make that flight, we will miss our flight from JFK to Moscow.

Luck finally starts to change. Both the guitarist and I are selected for special security screening. This is usually a big drag but this time it was actually a good thing. We got to skip the enormous security line which would easily have been an hour wait (making us miss our 8AM flight) and we were at the gate for the flight by 7:30AM. And we get on. I can’t tell you how relieved I was. The flight was really bumpy but I didn’t mind.

We get to JFK and have to take a train then walk and incredibly far distance to get to Aeroflot, the Russian Airline. We get there, check in, and meet up with Mr. Tyrell, trumpeter, and our tour manager. I’m exasperated but happy to know that I’m going to make the plane to Moscow. We have a bite to eat and are off.

TEUSDAY
The 8.5 hour flight to Moscow was fine really. The plane was relatively empty and I had three seats to myself. My doctor had given me a prescription for Xanax so I was able to sleep for over three hours, which is good for me. My Game Boy was a helpful time suck as it always is on planes.

We land in Moscow and are met by the concert promoters and translators. The language barrier is tough. Not many folks speak very good English and we sure as hell don’t know any Russian. The promoter takes us to dinner and that night I walk around the city with a couple of the guys soaking the place in. Moscow is a different world, that’s for sure. The best word to describe it is stoic. The buildings are stoic with Spartan decoration and façade. The people are never smiley or gregarious but are all very nice. The whole place just has a very stoic vibe to me.

We hit the hotel bar for a nightcap and I’m off to bed.

WEDNESDAY
This is the day of our first concert. I wake up at 4AM due to the jet-lag. I just can’t go back to sleep. I read, play my Game Boy, nothing helps. At 7AM I decide to go to the gym and get on a treadmill before breakfast. A few of us meet up for breakfast (which is really good European-style buffet with Russian and Japanese food thrown in there too …caviar for breakfast—nice!) and afterwards walk to Red Square.

It was fantastic. Seeing all of the old buildings and churches with spires … I don’t really know how to describe it. But it was breath-taking. I’ll have some pictures soon. I heard a lot of rumors before I left about crime and danger in the streets of Moscow. None of that seemed to be true.

Moscow traffic is awful, maybe even worse than LA’s. In the afternoon we head to the sound check at the theater. We realize that the drive is too long due to traffic and by the time we get there we have to turn around, go back to the hotel and grab our suits as we realized we wouldn’t have time to do it after the sound check. Another organizational snafu! Frustrating. We do the sound check which is tough since the sound-man doesn’t speak English and we have to communicate through a translator. But we get through it. And our piano player makes it to the theater just in time for the sound check. He finally made it out of Denver and got himself to Moscow. Everything was shaping up.

We did the show in this enormous theater and I think the turnout was a bit disappointing. The place was less than half full. During our performance it was tough to gauge weather or not the audience liked the show. They were respectful but didn’t applaud as much or “get in” to the music in a way we usually expect from our crowds. And Tyrell talks a lot in between songs. He had to do this through a translator of course. Who knows how that came off?

But by the end of the show it was obvious that the people dug it. We did two encores. After we were done playing a bunch of folks ran up to the stage to get Tyrell’s autograph or a picture. They were all quickly turned away by the security. They wouldn’t let anyone stay in the theater once the music stopped and ushered everyone out quite abruptly. What a drag. Here we had all gone through so much to get there and give the concert and we couldn’t even talk to the fans afterwards. Disappointing for sure.

The next day we were supposed to give a concert for a private audience of 50 people or so. But the show was cancelled as the Russian government required the venue for some reason. The promoter told us that when the government wants something, they get it and there’s not much negotiating with them. So the show was canned and it looked like we had a day off in Moscow before heading back to LA on Friday.

But Tyrell starts to get nervous about the flight. We have a really big show today (Saturday) in LA and he doesn’t want to take the chance of missing it. So instead of a day off in Moscow, we have to fly back a day early. Bummer.

THURSDAY
So we get up and leave for the airport. Our tour manager had bumped all of our tickets up and we were flying back to JFK a day early.

Here’s the problem. We didn’t know if we could move up our JFK to LAX flights. In all likelihood we would have to spend the night in NYC. Great. Instead of a day off we get an added travel day.

This time the flight from Moscow to New York is 10 hrs and the plane is packed, fairly uncomfortable for me. We finally land at JFK and indeed we can’t get on a flight to LA. We sit in the airport for over two hours while our tour manager tries to figure everything out.

I’m convinced that there is no worse feeling than waiting around in an airport and stressing out because of the uncertainty of your travel plans.

It was awful. At this point I was about ready to break. We realize that we are indeed going to have to stay over that night and we head to the city to get a hotel. By the time we get there the flight plans are worked out. We are going to fly our Friday morning at 11AM. We get to the hotel and I ended up having a really good night. Our guitarist and I had dinner with a friend of his who is a great guitarist as well and a musician who I’ve admired for years. It was good meeting him. Afterwards I went to a new jazz club at Lincoln Center to hear my friend Quincy play. It was a lot of fun. This layover certainly wasn’t as bad as the one in Des Moines.

FRIDAY
We get to the airport and in one final slap in my already bruised face I don’t have a seat assignment meaning I could miss the flight if it is oversold. I get to the gate and am ready to go postal on somebody when I’m finally given a seat.

The flight back home was fairly easy. And I’m finally here with my wife and my dog. What a good feeling.

In a little while I’ll be leaving for another gig with Tyrell. Thank goodness I’m driving to this one.

(I wrote this blog entery before I left but blogspot was acting funny and wouldn't let me post for some reason, here it is now.)

Let me start out by saying that even though I've been a huge comic book fan for years I'm not the type to get all excited about comic book-based movies. The Spider Man films are great as is the first Batman. I liked the X-Men movies and Daredevil was pretty cool. I haven't even seen The Hulk or Elektra. And my favorite comic movie might be Road to Perdition and not many people even know that it's based on a comic.

More than the superhero stories, I love the idiom of comics themselves. Author Scott McCloud calls it "seqential art" which I think is a very appropriate name for the art form. Comics force you to take part in the story. There are a series of pictures but the action BETWEEN the panels, how Batman gets from one end of Gotham to the other, how Spidey moves his body between kicking Green Goblin and punching Doctor Octopus, is totally up to your imagination.

That's why I dig comics. So I don't geek out very hard for comic movies, it's just not the art form the stories were meant to be told in. I don't read comic prose novels, I don't watch comic TV shows.

But Sin City is nothing short of brilliant. The greatest thing about this movie is that it's actually a COMIC BOOK adaptation, it doens't merely take the story out of a comic and make a movie out of it. The story is only one small part of what a comic book is. This movie takes the "art direction," the mood, the color, and the dialougue right from Frank Miller's brilliant graphic novels.

I was very leary of this movie. I love Miller's work and have for years. The Sin City books are among the best comics ever made in my opinion and the opinion of many others. One of the great parts about it is the art. Miller draws shadows, not outlines of forms. I thought this would never be translated into film. You can read an entire 60-page Sin City story in mere minutes. The action and dialougue move quickly and there is heavy emphasis on the art. And it is not one continuous story but a series of different stories with the same setting. And this film captures all of that.

Not to mention the hard-boiled violence, the strict noir attitude, and the camera work. It's all there. And it is a dark pleasure to watch. Mickey Rourke gives the best performance I've ever seen him give. Bruce Willis is as solid as he always is. Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez, and Tarantino direct the stories brilliantly.

I usually hate sequels but I'm actually hoping for another Sin City. Particularly because there's more of Miller's original Sin City stories that weren't used (especially "A Dame to Kill For," I really dig that one).

Two thumbs up.

***********

I'm off to Iowa early in the morning. The brother-in-law's wedding should be fun. The trip will be a nice warm-up for Moscow. I hope to blog again before I leave for Russia.

Cold!

http://search.weather.yahoo.com/forecast/RSXX0063.html

I lost my winter coat on a flight from Kentucky to Los Angeles back in January. It dawned on me this week that I hadn't replaced it. Good thing I remembered, winter coats aren't easy to find in Los Angeles.

Last Friday and yesterday I did gigs at a couple of Middle School. They were with a trio put together my the Mancini Institute, we played some songs then talked about jazz and our instruments and stuff.

It got me thinking. I really feel it's only a matter of time before we see rock and hip-hop in academia like jazz. I'm sitting there listening to the drummer (who was the speaker for the group) talk about jazz and explain the music and I'm thinking "this is pretty far from where jazz was in the 20s and 30s."

You have to understand jazz started in nightclubs and brothels. It was the music of African-Americans who were expressing their need for freedom through their instruments since they couldn't do it in society. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with teaching jazz in schools like this. But it's rarely an accurate representation of what the music really is.

So when you think about a prof standing in front of a classroom and breaking down the rhyme schemes and lyrical subject matter of Notorious B.I.G. it's not unlike a prof who these days is in front of a classroom explaining the creative genius of Charlie Parker and Duke Ellington. That's hard for us to swallow, I mean, Biggie was a drug dealer and a thug who probably was murdered because of gang relations--how could that be brought into academia!? Well, Parker was a terrible heroin addict and a horrible person who would steal from his friends, lie, and cheat for his habit. Ellington hosted notorious orgies. I'm sure Biggie's ties to the street will be noted in classrooms as Parker's habit is. But lip service does nothing for context sometimes.

Well tonight the first game of the 2005 baseball season began.

For those of you who might not know I became a big baseball fan last year. Growing up Indiana we never had a baseball team. And even though I played T-ball and Little League when I was really young the sport never interested me much. Even after I moved to LA where the historic Dodgers play I wasn't all that attracted to the sport.

Then three years ago the Angels won the World Series. When a hometown team wins a championship it will make you pretty enthusiastic. (This is how I became a Lakers fan. After years of watching the Pacers get so close yet so far it was really nice to see everyone in the city excited about a ball team and happy about winning a championship ... although whenever the Lakers play the blue and gold I'm always rooting for the Pacers). But even that wasn't enough to get me really interested in baseball.

This is what did it. Last year Carrie got me tickets to a Dodgers game for my birthday. Great gift! We went to the stadium and it was simply fantastic. They were playing the Cubs, Sammy Sosa was there. And then in the 7th inning Dodgers 2B Alex Cora fouled off fourteen consecutive balls. CONSECUTIVE! The pitch count was at 18 and on the last pitch he knocked it right out of the park. The stadium went crazy. One of the most exciting sports moments I've ever witnessed. I was hooked after that. I went to two more games and have been a Dodgers fan ever since. They won their division and made it to the playoffs, a feat nobody thought they'd accomplish at the beginning of the season.

Of course now the Dodgers have gone the way of the Lakers. Just like Lakers ownership traded Shaq, ran Phil Jackson out of town, and ended a true basketball destiny, Dodgers ownership traded away and didn't bother to resign a majority of the scrappy, over-achieving team of last year that won their fans' hearts by showing so much character. Let's hope their season is not as painful as the Lakers.'

And while I'm talking about sports let me just add that my soul will be saddened to see Reggie Miller retire at the end of this season. He is without a doubt one of the most exciting basketball players to ever grace the courts of the NBA. And as the Pacers team has been decimated by injury and the terrible fan-incited riot in Detroit (whoo, don't get me started on that!), Reggie has stepped up to the plate and is playing like the #31 of 10 years ago. He's simply phenomenal and I believe he has some good basketball left in him. But if he thinks it's time to hang up the sneakers then that's what he should do. I just think it's a tragedy that Reggie will never be able to bring Indiana the World Championship is so richly deserves.

My head is starting to clear up and I don't feel as tired. Good thing. This whole sick thing was getting pretty old.

I did and interesting gig tonight with my good friend Gary Matsumoto. We played (along with a singer) for a Korean wedding reception. I was the only non-Asian there. And when I say I was the only non-Asian there I mean the ONLY non-Asian there, Jack. I told Gary, "Man, I'm outnumbered."

He says, "Now you know how it feels."

Pretty funny. It was a good time though. I love being put in situations like that, totally different culture, everyone speaking a different language, and the real-deal foreign foods. Didn't get many experiences like that in the midwest.