Subconscious Mind Collective Grind

Most of my friends know that I'm pretty dedicated when it comes to playing my sax. It's been an almost weekly event for the last 13 years with a brief sabbatical to play scrabble when Peach was ill. I suspect that after that length of time, most people would get pretty bored with the same thing week in and week out. Not me.

It's something that keeps getting better all the time. The variety of material is still a lot of the same stuff, but there are always a few new numbers to replace some of the tired old tunes that we've abused for a bit too long. What does vary is the chemistry and interaction that we have as a group. We're assembling something where the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts.

We're an unconventional sounding group because our instrumentation is a bit odd. What immediately sets our band apart is the pair of djembe players instead of a standard kit drummer. Sass and Sue hold it all together. The best part of this arrangement is that the two hand drummers have no choice but to invent something new to do, because it's impossible for them to replicate the sound of a drum kit. The ground rules are instantly thrown out the window. It gets better.

Every rock band usually has a bitchen geetarist, and that's my pal EM. We've been jamming since I met him 20 or 21 years ago. On and off, he's been the most frequent guitarist in the same room as me. The rapport that he and I have is pretty incredible. We're both able to read each other pretty closely, and it's like a little puzzle to make something up that fits what the other is doing. The two of us know a whole bunch of tunes, and we like to rearrange everything ex tempore.

The last member of the quintet is Lari. He plays the electric bass. He's got a great ear that serves him well. He's not a really technically oriented player, but he always manages to think up a part that keeps the whole thing grounded and solid. He usually plays more guitar, but he keeps getting better all the time on the bass. Between his offbeat humour and his playing, he makes sure no one is at a loss.

The current edition of the band has been together over two years now, and this particular group has something that I've never had in a lot of other musical situations. There's a kind of chemistry that we've got that none of the other bands I've been in have had. Maybe I'm stooping to superlatives, but they're worth using. It's really that good. The subconscious mind is always working on the things we encounter, and the collective mind takes over when we get started every Thursday evening. The quality of the sound we produce seems to get better every week, and it seems that everyone puts their utmost into it.

I think I'd lose my grip if I didn't jam every week, and the only thing that could improve the situation would be having Lividviv around to augment the racket. Rock and roll will never die. It will just need to quit drinking so much and get some occasional fresh air.

Long live Thursdays.