improvising myopic & empty bottle 1-10-2005

played at the myopic bookstore with guillermo gregorio, josh abrams, jason roebke and jason adasiewicz. it was a nice ensemble with myself on Eb and bass clarinet, guillermo on Bb; josh & jason on bass; shevitz on vibes. we played for awhile, all improvised - guillermo is just the nicest guy you can think of, i always would like to play with him more, but time goes by quickly, and all of a sudden it's been three months since you saw each other. this is how time goes by in chicago. i've recently been playing the little Eb clarinet again, i forgot how much i enjoy playing it - it definitely has a high range, but i can get some flute like sounds out of it and the actual tone is very pleasant..or so i think. after we finished playing i had to head over to the empty bottle to play in fred lonberg-holm's lightbox orchestra...
it was a free night at the empty bottle, and the way it goes is that on a tuesday, very few people will come when the cover is $3, but if it's free the place is completely filled. people really get scared by cover charges. i get scared by them too. also, i'll buy a $3.50 beer and tip a dollar, and think it's allright, but when i see that half gallon of orange juice at the supermarket for $3, i think, that's a little pricey.....go figure.
anyhow. the night was for a terry plumbing cd-r release - terry plumb(m?)ing is a prose / poetry/ music zine put out by our frineds eric graf, mike merck, rotten milk and others - it's a nice diy thing. rotten milk played a noice set with this other guy going by the handle bubblegum shitface - almost electro there mr milk - watch out. next up was the girl trio sofserve, they tried the moves and whatnot, but they need to work on it more to make it convincing....the lightbox orchestra headlined - a big group, we spread out on the stage and the floor, i used my clarinets again, tv pow was all there, zerang, karel, payne, corbett, kapsalis, vida, sullender, morrow, pomerleau, and a fellow named matt who played a little synth next to me. it was good playing in front of a big crowd, and though you could hear the huge amoutns of talkers in the back, they were kind of quiet, and not disturbing the music what with the bulk of bodies quieting the din. it was a good set, if a bit short - walked home over the melting ice with jen, a walk that seems long if you think about it, but isn't so long when you're walking it....