The Weblog of Daniel Tashian

Walked early, and went to a Guilty Pleasures meeting at Athens. Those meetings are typically pretty funny. Grimey always has a Diet Coke at 8 in the morning, which is hilarious. John ordered this parfait looking breakfast thing, and the waitress said “That’s a sissy’s breakfast.” (laughs) Then it was the day of Butterfly’s gig, so I went home and took a nap and woke up and practiced with the CD a little. Then I wanted to pursue this exchange thing that Digidesign is doing, so I called Corner Music and Russell said he could do it for me, so I brought my Mbox down there, and then he wasn’t there, and the other guy didn’t know what to do, so I took it home. Then I went to Baja Burrito and met Keith Brogdon there, and we sat next to Jim Demain, and his client. They were funny, and Jim is getting into digital photography now. Then, Keith went to the rehearsal and I cruised back by Corner to see if Russell was there, but he wasn’t, so I went to the rehearsal. The band sounded good and we basically ran through the set once, then went home. Leslie and Sandra and Andy Torrente were going out to eat, and I wanted to go, but I had to go to sound check, and I thought we were playing at 9, so I got dressed and went down there. But there was this ridiculous “Producer’s Symposium” going on, so we had to wait on the curb for an hour and get no sound check. This made me mad. Then I called Liz, and she gave me the feedback from the New York A&R people who came to the Bees show, and this REALLY put me in a bad mood. They said the band had no dynamics, and it seemed like we weren’t “Selling the Songs” enough. I was so mad I wanted to bite myself. I hate it when people add an insult to injury, as in, “No, I don’t want to help you AND here’s what I think sucks about you.” That’s pretty cold. So I was feeling hard done by, and pretty sorry for myself, then Leslie called and she didn’t get my message that we didn’t play til eleven, so she had Andy and Sandra drop her off at 3rd and Lindsley and so I had to drive back down there and pick her up, and I got lost, then when I finally got there, she wanted me to go home by some quick backroads way, and we got stuck by a train for 15 minutes and I was in the worst mood. “Get over it!” was Leslie’s take. “Either do what they say, or don’t!” and she wasn’t making me feel better with the “tough love” tactic. But she was right, and I was just stuck in a moment of feeling sorry for myself: “I tried to show you something beautiful!” But I took her home, and she fell asleep and I went back down there and played one of the top-5 shows i’ve ever been involved in with Butterfly Boucher! It was so fun, it was incredible. She sang and played fantastically, and David Rawlings was there, and Roger Moutenot and Kristy West and Marna Taylor and Keri Pisapia and the only Snafu was the record player wouldn’t come on and that would have been easily remedied had we had a sound check. She seemed pleased, and my mood was totally transformed by her majestic, cathartic and brave songs. I felt like a rock star, and what can I say, The fog had lifted. Went home, and Leslie was still asleep. She felt sick from the food they had, but I wished she had been there for that gig. Went to sleep about 1:30. Still buzzed from the rock show.