Tonight we have our usual Wednesday pm rehearsal. We’re just going to do our last run-through of a new song we’ll be introducing on Friday. We’ve tried something different with our arrangement of the Allman Brother’s
Everybody’s Got A Mountain To Climb: the sax intros as well as ends the song.

This is a quite a departure for our band, so we’ll see how it works out live. In rehearsals it’s been good, and the Gourmet Gallery is the perfect, intimate venue to try something different like that for the first time.

It was a good crowd in spite of the weather, which was snow! We had three guitars in the front line with Dave, Cory Lavigne, and Larry Stiles, Greg Thompson on drums and myself squeezed into the corner. These guys will keep you on your toes with changes (it’s not all blues), but it is fun and challenging.

Art and Sharon Panchishin came in with Randy and Doreen Mathers as a last minute decision to go out, so I got to sit with some people I knew for the midnight meal and Gerald’s sets.

I also came in with Karen the following Sunday for the jam, there were several other bass players there and Bob was playing a Gibson Thunderbird Bass on the flat where his top keyboard would normally go! I went on for the last set, but the crowd had mostly departed as it had begun to snow quite heavily again, there were four inches on the car when we decided to go.

We were joined on stage by a keyboard player named Bob, who was a wiz at figuring out our Blues numbers. So for that 30 minutes, Deception was a 5 piece band. This was also a great opportunity for us to see how the local players who come out for the jam sessions, were used to the sessions being run.

After our set, Art & I stayed for the rest of the evening and enjoyed the music & some interesting conversations with some great local Blues players.

Special thanks to Dave & the rest of the house band who let us take over the stage for a half hour. It was greatly appreciated!

Art and Sharon are back from their well deserved vacation, so the band starts up again next week with rehearsals. Art can’t wait to try out his new “toy” with the band. He bought a wireless system for his guitar, so that means he will be able to “walk the bar” now too. More importantly, he will be able to hear the band from the audience’s perspective during sound-check, so our sound will be exactly the same each time when we have to do our own sound, since his ear for the band is way better than mine.

The new air conditioning kicked in for a while on Friday and kept things cool but on Saturday, although we were ‘cool’, it was hot. At one point a drumstick flew from my sweaty palm and, had the acorn tip on the end have been a real acorn bass playin’ Steve might have an oak tree growing out of his leg in a month or two….. he shouldn’t be limping too long but he does have a nice rhythm to his walk now. 

It’s a good job we have all been around long enough that our ego’s don’t get bruised when the audience is light but people are not too motivated to venture out and boogie on a hot hot night especially in our little city.  Stay tuned.

I think we played really well but the turnout was less than encouraging, however they were enthusiastic for both nights. I’m always one to worry about the volume, but I guess we got it right when one table of about half a dozen ladies celebrating a birthday actually moved closer!

One fellow who had seen us at “Berry Beat” came over to talk to us. He loved the music, and likened us to the Climax Blues Band from the 70′s who also featured a sax.

Now we’re hoping this great weather will hold for Friday’s performance at Heritage Park in Mission. See you there!

Tomorrow afternoon we take the stage at 1:15. There will be no rain! Got it? None!

We have put together a special 45 minute set of up-beat music that should satisfy the mixed type of audience one finds at these types of events. Come on out. We hope to see you there!

We really enjoy playing for the crowd there, because both the audience and the band has a great deal of fun.

Thanks to Diane for having us again, and we look forward to seeing all of our friends and fans again starting in the fall.

Check back on our upcoming shows page for more details later this summer.

Art & Helen

We also have some upcoming shows at the Bull ‘N Raven in downtown Abbotsford. For those of you that haven’t been there, it is the old Yorkshire Rose. Once those dates are confirmed, we’ll post the dates on the upcoming shows page.