Nights of Music

Wednesday night I finally did something I hadn't done in nearly a year-- hit the Old Town Tavern for karaoke with good friends. The last time I went, it was on a Friday night, and didn't get too crowded till about 9pm, so I hoped that the middle-of-the-week Wednesday would mean even fewer crowds. And I wasn't disappointed!

Tabitha blogged about some of the interesting characters we ran into at the bar, so I'll spare some of those details: http://probablytabitha.com/2010/07/15/karaoke-its-spreading-faster-than-the-pregnancy-bug/

Basically, we arrived at 7:30 on the dot, which is when karaoke actually started. The bar was practically empty, so for a while, the rotations went between me, Tabitha, another lady named Cathy, and the DJ himself. As you can imagine, we managed to get a lot of songs in. And since there wasn't really much of an audience besides us (me, Allan, Joe, Tabitha and Timo), it was a great opportunity to try out some songs I'd normally be a little hesitant about doing in front of a larger crowd.

Nick joined us at 8pm, and managed to get some really awesome songs in, himself. People say that I'm "brave" or whatever, for going up on stage to sing, but let me tell you: Nick is the brave one, not me. See, I won't dare do a song I'm not 100% familiar and comfortable with, unless I'm doing it as part of a group. Nick, on the other hand? Went up at one song knowing only half of it, and winged his way through the rest, making up his own lyrics and tune... and it was awesome! If you weren't reading the lyrics on the screen, you would never know that he was singing different words. When we did "Baby It's Cold Outside" as a duet, Nick actually "crammed" for it by listening to it on his iPhone about 5 minutes before we got on stage! And he still did well! That kind of improvisation is something I just can't do, and hence why I think people who are willing and able to improvise like that are far braver than I am. Kudos to you, Nick!

All in all, the lack of crowds for a long time enabled me to get a LOT of songs in. Here are the solos I did that night:

• "Blame It On Your Heart" -- Patty Loveless
• "I Do, I Do, I Do, I Do" -- ABBA
• "Waterloo" -- ABBA
• "Everybody's Somebody's Fool" -- Connie Francis
• "I Feel Fine" -- The Beatles

And here are the songs I did as a duet/part of a group:

• "Redneck Woman" -- Gretchen Wilson (with Tabitha and Colleen)
• "YMCA" -- Village People (with Nick and Tabitha)
• "I Love Rock and Roll" -- Joan Jett (with Tabitha)
• "Baby It's Cold Outside" -- Martina McBride & Dean Martin (with the ever-improvising Nick)
• "Sweet Home Alabama" -- Lynyrd Skynyrd (with Nick, who mused that it must be quite a sight to have two Asians doing Southern rock!)

That's 10 songs total within the span of about 3.5 hours! That doesn't happen very often ;-)

Joe and Tab left at around 10pm, and about 15 minutes after that, the place started to fill up with college kids-- Wednesday night is college night, apparently. Not only did those young kids make me feel OLD, but they really epitomized what I used to be/do at their age-- loud, drunk, and boisterous. And they could not sing worth a dime. Joe keeps claiming that he didn't do that well when he sang his couple of songs, but those teenagers college kids made him look like Frank Sinatra. Despite that, the DJ actually turned the volume UP. We got out of there not long afterward, but hey-- considering it was nearly 3 hours before the college crowd arrived, I'd say we got a pretty darn good night of karaoke and songs in. My voice was shot by the end of it!

Here's a video montage Tabitha put together. Enjoy!



Last night several of us (me, Allan, Joe, Tabitha, Timo and our friend Amanda from UCSB) went down to Chase Palm Park to enjoy a picnic by the beach and free Concert in the Park, featuring and oldies tribute band called Captain Cardiac and the Coronaries. They weren't bad, but they need a new sound technician :-P We had fun relaxing on blankets, sharing our picnic fare, listening to the music (when we could hear the singing over the instruments, that is!), enjoying the warm sun and ocean breeze, watching the people, and playing with the hula hoops!

Amanda brought several hula hoops, which she couldn't use at first because it was relatively crowded. I'm sure nobody appreciates being bopped in the head by a twirling hula hoop ;-) But after the break halfway through the concert, people started packing up and leaving, opening up some space around us. By the end of the concert, Amanda and her hula hoop tricks had attracted quite a crowd, and before we knew it, all kinds of people-- adults and children alike, were having fun playing with the hoops. What a great way to end the evening.

So... two nights in a row of nights filled with fun, good company, and music. And there's still the weekend (and the French Festival, yay!) to look forward to :-)