The Quarrymen. The High Numbers. The Warlocks. The Hawks. Mabel Greer’s Toyshop. Steel Mill. Stevland Judkins. Reg Dwight. Gordon Sumner. Declan MacManus.

Forgotten bands and unknown singers, held back by a poor choice of name. Some were “1-Hit Wonders” – others could only aspire to that dubious status. Just a handful of the millions of bands who formed and folded since the birth of rock and roll.

Turning frogs into princes.

There’s magic in a name. The right name ultimately turned these nobodies into somebodies. That’s why it’s so important to choose carefully. The right name opens doors, gets paid more for gigs, and entices passersby to step inside and find out what this band is all about.

The wisdom of the masses.

Every one of the bands and singers above thought their name was just fine, thank you. Even as they were going nowhere. So it’s important for us not to simply choose a name that we like, but to select a name that others gravitate to. If 80% of responders flock to a particular option, we’ll know that we’re on to something.

The difference a name makes.

By the way, each of the bands and singers above found success after renaming themselves. They became, in order: The Beatles, The Who, The Grateful Dead, The Band, Yes, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Stevie Wonder, Elton John, Sting, and Elvis Costello.

After 2-3 months of trying to find our voice, we’ve identified 30 songs that we are going to begin rehearsing prior to our first gig. At this point, the songs are mostly bluesy, with a bit of pop thrown in (mostly because we all know the songs). They are heavily driven by keyboards, with guitar being used as a fill instrument. There are few – if any – “guitar” songs in the list.

Last song to make the cut.

The last song to make the cut, before we stop trying to learn new songs and begin perfecting the first list of 30, was Vehicle by The Ides of March, an ass kicking “white funk” Chicago band from the 1970s led by Jim Peterik.

Check ’em out on YouTube.

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?

Practice, practice, practice. We’ll be practicing these 30 songs relentlessly over the next few weeks. The object is to get these songs down cold, and then create a set list from them. This will carry us through the first few gigs, when we can begin auditioning and learning new songs.

It’s all coming together now, and it’s wonderful. We are learning songs blindingly fast now. Two, maybe three run-throughs – and the song is in the bag. Born to Be Wild by Steppenwolf. Lovin’ Touchin’ Squeezin’ by Journey. And more.

But when we pull off a song that none of us thought we could do – now that’s special.

I’ve always wanted to play Live and Let Die by Paul McCartney. It’s one of the handful of post-Beatles McCartney songs that this mega-Beatles fan can listen to.

But on a closer listening, I realized that this song is way more complicated that it first appears. Odd measures. Orchestral funkiness over G minor. But – what the heck – I thought, we’ll give it a try.

So I marked up a chord chart, listened some more and made corrections.

First time through – not bad. It breaks down right after Live and Let Die chorus. Next time – about the same. By the time we tackle our third attempt, Dr. John has punched up orchestral brass patches on his synth. The chorus “Live and Let Die” now has almost the explosive power of the recorded version.

Listen for yourself. Here’s a live recording of our third attempt to play it.

We get tripped up by the orchestral bridge that precedes and follows the reggae bridge, and it’s pretty rough in spots. And yet, not bad for only the 3rd time through. It doesn’t take much effort to imagine how great it will sound like after we’ve rehearsed it 30 times or so.

More rehearsal bootlegs to come…

For those moments when you can revel in a groove that didn’t exist 5 minutes before.

For those moments when you realize the level of your musicianship, and experience the sum of the parts becoming greater than the whole.

For those moments when, after they are over, you look at each other and grin “Damn! Did we just play that?”

He’s for the money, he’s for the show.

All of us have heard Lido Shuffle, the classic by Boz Skaggs and the session aces from Toto, countless times before. But none of us had actually played it before.

I spent the week before painstakingly transcribing the song’s chord structure, going well beyond the rudimentary notes that I typically create for a bass part.

I arrived at the rehearsal promptly, and placed the 3-page (none of our eyes are getting any younger; it helps to use larger font sizes) arrangement at each of our locations. As the others drifted in, they scanned the notes with interest. Dr. Tom, one of our two keyboard “monsters”, began noodling through the changes as JC warmed up his shuffle groove.

After about 5 minutes: “Let’s try it.”

There’s magic in the air.

“Click, click, click.” JC counted us in by striking one drumstick against the other. The upbeat, and then a shuffle as thick and sweet as molasses came to life.

“Lido missed the boat that day he left the shack…”

Other than missing the synthesizer arpeggios in the instrumental break, we nailed this rock classic on the first take. We then listened to a playback of the original through our headphones and caught some of the subtleties that were missed the first time. “I hear horns” said Dr. John and he dialed up the patch on his synth. “Let’s try it again.”

“Click, click, click”, the upbeat, and the magic repeats. It’s 95% in the bag. Only a very close listener would have picked up any discrepancies. Again. This time, it’s closer to 98% perfect. We’re rapidly approaching the point where any differences can be attributed to musical creativity.

Again. Still at 98%. We come back to Lido Shuffle after a few hours, and we’re once again at 98%. A few tweaks to make, a few tricks to memorize, and this one is in the bag – with all the stress and effort of soaking in a warm bath. I love nights like these.

The new Organization Man.

After the great experience of last weeks’ practice, I take it upon myself to organize our upcoming rehearsal session. I’ve broken a 3 hour rehearsal down into four parts:

1. Warm Up – songs we know, but haven’t played in a while
2. Nail Down – songs we’ve recently worked on, but need to be run through a few more times
3. Try Out – songs we haven’t tried yet – maybe they’ll click, maybe they won’t
4. Work On – songs we’ve tried out before, but need to be learned

The agenda for next week’s rehearsal

Warm Up: Feelin’ Alright (Joe Cocker)

Nail Down: Lido Shuffle (Boz Skaggs), Some Kind of Wonderful (Grand Funk Railroad)

Try Out: Live and Let Die (Paul McCartney), Born to be Wild (Steppenwolf), Hold Your Head Up (Argent)

Work On: Ready for Love (Bad Company), Lovin’ Touchin’ Squeezin’ (Journey)

That’s going to take a lot of work to streamline down to 50 or so. But no one said this was the easy part. Even with leveraging Google collaboration tools…

We also need to select a name…

My latest suggestion: “Uncle Skeeter and the Juvenile Delinquents”. Another recent idea: “The Merchants of Cool”.

Any ideas? If so, send ’em my way.

We are racing through songs now, trying them on for size to see which ones fit. Different artists, different styles, two takes.

Does it work? Does it sound like it could work?

If so, Nan makes note of it, and then it’s on to the next contender. Using this approach, we’ll probably have identified about 50 songs that will work for us, before everyone scatters for the Holidays.

Does that mean that we’re ready to gig? Hell no.

This is just the beginning of the hard work. Once we have 50 songs that we’ve played passably once or twice, we then have to rehearse them. And then rehearse them some more. Work out arrangements, intros, outros, and segues. Memorize lyrics and oddball chord changes. And then practice them again.

How long will it be before our first gig?

Hard to say for sure. No sooner than March 1, 2010 would be my guess. On the other hand, we are also racing the clock. Playing live is the emotional reward for all of the hard work. Delay that reward for too long – even in the pursuit of musical perfection – and you risk losing musicians due to lack of interest.

All work and no playing out is a recipe for a broken band. So we’ll see how fast we can get 2 sets of music down pat – or at least close to pat.

The clock ticks on.

We lost a musical Prince last Saturday night

Norman Woolsey died on November 7, 2009. He was an absolute sweetheart of a man, and hands-down the best guitarist that I have ever had the priviledge of playing with.

I’ll never forget the first time that I ever met Norman. We had found each other on one of those musicians’ websites, and made arrangements for him to sit in with a few other musicians that I was jamming with. With his thick horn-rimmed glasses, shaggy gray hair, and middle age paunch, he certainly looked like no one’s idea of a guitar hero.

After introducing himself in his soft Texas drawl, I pegged him as a “weekend strummer” – someone who knew some basic chords, and pulled his guitar out from time to time and play songs from back in the day. “Wonderful…” I groused to myself.

We set up and began to play a 12-bar blues as a warm up. I noticed that he was tentatively playing some chords and staying in the background. “I knew it…” I said to myself. The other guitarist ran out of gas after a few minutes, and I shouted to Norman: “Go ahead – let’s see what you got.”

He stomped down on his effect boxes, and his guitar emitted a growl as his fingers slid down the neck. He proceeded to tear through a 5-minute blues solo that would have Stevie Ray Vaughn nodding in approval, followed it with finger-tapping riffs that Eddie Van Halen would have found eminently to his satisfaction, and ending with vigorous applications of the whammy bar that Jimi Hendrix would have wholly approved of.

By the time he finished, there was smoke pouring from his fingertips, and we gaped in disbelief at the sounds that we had just witnessed being created by this nerdy-looking guy with the coke-bottle lenses and the goofy grin.

I had the pleasure and priviledge to play with Norman many times in the last few years. He was always modest about his incredible talent, and always seemed to be surprised when I would tell him that he was the best guitarist that I had ever played with.

Norman Woolsey was a friend of mine, and I will miss him terribly.

“Thanks Norm, it was a real slice of Heaven.”

I finally got a chance to meet Joe last Wednesday, and on first impression I like what I see. Joe is 60-ish, which means that he is old enough to have heard and played a LOT of music in his time. There’s nothing worse than playing with a relative youngster who can only stare slack-jawed at the mention of Traffic, Steely Dan, or Little Feat…

Joe also has the tools of the trade: a custom Gibson Les Paul, and five or six stomp-box effects. By all superficial signs, he is a player and I am eagerly looking forward to jamming with him.

If a guitarist plays in the forest and no one hears him, does he exist?

For the first ninety minutes, I can’t hear a note out of Joe. He initially has problems with his effects loop, and spends a good 20 minutes fiddling around with his stomp boxes. When he does begin to play, I don’t hear a thing.

Not a good sign…

A confident guitarist will turn it up to “11” and drown everybody else out if you let him. In fact, the sign of a real player is their sense of tone and dynamics – playing softly and selectively, and then – when the time is right – letting it rip.

But an insecure guitarist will often turn down and try to play along without actually contributing anything. This is what I think I am seeing, and my stomach sinks.

Statesboro Blues to the rescue

But suddenly, as we kick into Statesboro Blues, Joe comes alive. The technical challenges that were plaguing him vanish, and he begins to play some snarly blues licks. With confidence. Stormy Monday is even better, with playing that is both sophisticated and powerful. JC and I glance at each other in relief – Joe is a player.

Some of the songs we played were: “Benny and the Jets” and “Rocket Man” by Elton John, “Statesboro Blues” and “Stormy Monday” by the Allman Brothers Band, “Tempted” by Squeeze, “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” by Bob Dylan, “Do it Again” by Steely Dan, and “Crazy” by Patsy Cline.

We have the pieces – do we have the whole?

We now have the individual components of a powerful band: two keyboards, bass, guitar, drums – plus male and female vocals. Will there be chemistry? Can we meld ourselves into a single musical unit? Can we do it quickly enough to begin playing out before our reserve of enthusiasm is exhausted?

Stay tuned!

JC is modest, so he would hate to be described as the greatest living rock drummer in San Antonio. But for my money, he’s the best that I’ve ever played with.

JC has a schedule that compares favorably to a top-gun Botox shooter in Beverly Hills. He’s usually booked solid with work, family, or worship obligations. Nevertheless, a fissure miraculously appeared in his wall of booked time. JC’s Wednesday nights were free, and he’s agreed to play with us.

This is huge.

My ability to play bass is primarily a function of the skill of the drummer that I am playing with. A good drummer can bring out a level of musical proficiency in me that simply amazes: “Is that me playing that? Damn, I’m good.” Likewise, a bad drummer can quickly bring me down to his level, where I struggle to simply keep the beat. And question my own musical ability when the beat is lost.

Moreover, there exists a simpatico between us that is hard to describe. We can communicate with each other using only our instruments. He’ll express an idea and convey it through his drums. I’ll then catch on to his idea and follow it with my bass. After a while, I’ll offer up a suggestion through my bass playing, and he’ll go with it for a while. We end up having a musical discussion beneath the song being played, without saying a word – or even making eye contact.

Some of the songs we played were “Soulshine” by Government Mule, “Louisiana 1927” by Randy Newman, “Stranger in a Strange Land” by Leon Russell, and “The Letter” by Joe Cocker.

All we need is a guitarist.

Nan will be bringing her guitarist to practice next Wednesday evening. With any luck, the pieces of a new band will have fallen into place.

Let’s hope that this guy can play.

John and Tom (the two amazing keyboard players that I’ve been playing with for a few years now) sat down to play with Nan and I on Tuesday night. This would be one of the first moments’ of truth. Would there be any chemistry between us? Or would it feel like we’re pulling an anchor…?

Happy to report that the session was fabulous. Nan has a soulful voice, like Linda Ronstadt in her prime. Combined with John’s bluesy, Joe Cocker-esque voice, Nan’s voice immediately added a depth and range to the music we played.

The best part? We walked away energized and excited about the prospect of playing together.

Some of the songs we ran through were: “Living for the City” by Stevie Wonder; “Feelin’ Alright” by Joe Cocker; “All Along the Watchtower” and “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” by Bob Dylan; “Stormy Monday” and “Statesboro Blues” by the Allman Brothers Band; “Mercy, Mercy, Mercy” by the Buckinghams, “Crazy” by Patsy Cline, and a variety of other snippets of other songs.

A song that we’ll try and work up next week: “Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again” by Bob Dylan. The version that we’ll try is one by Cat Power.

Next step: add Nan’s guitarist to the mix and see if the sum of the parts continues to grow.