Let's get the band back together!

Whad up, Homies?

You heard me. We are getting the band back together!

Let me explain. Many, many years ago my brothers and I started a band. I played guitar, my oldest brother played keyboard and did lead vocals. My next oldest brother played drums and/or bass and also did lead and backing vocals. My younger brothers played lead guitar and drums and sang backing vocals. Did I mention I played guitar? I'm not the best singer in the world and according to DW that will only change if I am the last person in the world. My brothers acknowledged my desire to sing by providing me with a microphone, and acknowledged my ability to sing by not plugging it in. I wasn't exactly the backbone of the band. Like they say, "its more important to have fun than to be good," which became my motto.

Well, despite my lack of actual talent, as a whole we were generally pretty rubbish but we had a lot of fun. At one point we decided to try to get serious and try to lift the overall tone. This resulted in each of us being replaced by actual musicians until it seemed wrong to call it "our" band, as none of us were in it. So the dust settled, mostly on the guitar case under my bed. I decided then I would get some guitar lessons so that if we ever got the band back together I would be ready to do my bit. I considered getting singing lessons but DW suggested that should focus my efforts on something I had a chance of being good at.

That was over twenty years ago and the call has gone out, "Let's get the band back together!" Obviously I haven't had a single lesson in that time, but I did make a few phone calls and decided formal lessons were not for me. I played guitar at our last family Christmas gathering and was keenly reminded how useful guitar lessons would have been.

It might sound like I am a complete hack when it comes to the ol' six strings, but to be fair, I was just as bad with four (I tried playing bass for a while - the theory that limiting the strings might limit the damage. This was a logical consequence of my playing a twelve string guitar once. I've even tried playing just on the one string, which technical cannot be out of tune with itself - and yet...). There is one song that DW does like me to play. Its very quiet and she likes me to be a fair way off but she always comes back in the room after I've finished and says it was lovely. She also says that its good for couples to support each others' creative needs and that support can be just as valid from a distance. It's like she doesn't want me anywhere near her wool when she is knitting and I can show my support by sitting in another room.

Anyway, twenty years or so after our band disbanded, we are going to have another crack. Not at stardom, as we are under no illusions that we will be any good, but rather, just a chance to get together and have some fun, because at the very least, we a very good at that. In fact, in the past, all of our songs ended in fits of laughter that usually lasted longer than the songs themselves. But to our credit, no matter how badly we butchered a song, we always struck up and had a go at another one. After we stopped laughing that is.

However, we are now older and, well wiser may not be quite right, but we are older. And I hear you can now get sheet music for songs so we may try that. I also expect that we won't play as loud so it will be less of a competition to be heard. And I may get some lessons. Who knows, I may have improved - you know, sometimes having some time away from a problem can help you see the solution more clearly. Perhaps music is like that. I know that you can't just put an instrument down and pick it up twenty years later and hope to be just as good - though that may be true in my case. I like to think of the last twenty years of listening to music as research so I think I've learned a thing or two. Surely one of those songs will have stuck. Anyway, I'm now ready to put it into practice. But first I've been putting off getting the guitar out from under the bed because it is covered in dust and you know how bad my hayfever is. I'll let you know how our first rehearsal goes.

Ciao!

Thought for the Day: A timely disclaimer can save your life

Disclaimer: DW is actually wonderfully supportive of my music and loves to hear me play. She doesn't like me to ruin it by singing.