my experience at The Catalyst...

I'm not sure how to start to delve into the story of what happened to me last night. Through my life becoming less private (through the simple act of blogging) my world has become larger. I was invited as a guest to photograph a concert last night! Bleeding hell! You all saw the shitty snapshots I posted from the show at Slim's (which the allowance of my attending that show is attributed to the graciousness of Leah and the management at Slim's. Honest to god they have given me free tickets to 5 different shows there!). And one lonely mother sitting at home the next morning was searching the internet for pictures of her dear children that performed the night before. One soul found another...

I wasn't nervous in the least strangely enough. An hour before the doors opened I saw Julie Slick looking in the window of a music store next to The Catalyst. "Are you Julie?" I inquired. "Yeah." she said. -=Well, I've been talking to your mother on the internet... *Are you Daryl?=- I was talking to a musician from "the band"... I've never! And then after the show I walked up to Eric Slick and told him that my retirement dream was to start a Captain Beefheart cover band. He blew that idea out of the water by boasting that he was "already in a Beefheart cover band..." hahahaha! anyway, told him that I had been talking to his mom on the internet.. "Are you Daryl?" I almost feel part of the family, gosh!

Well, I don't know what Adrian thinks of having a camera pointed in his snoot all night long, and I did not use the flash... Shot over 500 pics, 217 of which were presentable to the public. I felt comfortable in the crowd with the camera. When I decided to move around a bit people let me move past them, respectably and when I wanted to get back to my spot (dead center in front of Adrian) no one had a grudge. It will take a little more practice for me to get even more comfortable doing this. I'm going to send the link to the photo album to Leah at Slim's and see if maybe they won't work a deal with me, free pass for shows if I take pics...?

This is a true issue for me, being able to afford the price of tickets to go to shows as I am on disability. I would have been able to pay for admittance to the show in Santa Cruz last night as a dear friend recently gave me a gift of cash money in exchange for some things I have shared with him. And I told him that I would reserve that money just for attending a special concert. So thanks again to Robin and Gary Slick for letting me attend for free last night. Oh, and they gave me 2 tickets! And the two people I know in Santa Cruz were unavailable last night...

Anyway, I just wanted this post to be a bit of a regroup about what this all means. I don't know if there is a future in the field of concert photography, but as a hobby, as something to do that I really love - I say it's high time I've gotten such an encouraging break as this. I thank you Robin so, so much for helping let this happen for me.

(Another cool thing happened last night. After the opening act I sat down to review the test pics I had taken and this man walks up to me, talking as if we knew each other. "Who are you? Are you Gary?" I thought he must have been Eric and Julie's father because he was talking about my pictures and my blog. And he said, "No, my name is Jerry. I just read your blog and figured out who you were." So he knew the up to the date story about Slim's and getting the gig at The Catalyst, and had seen my picture. I was only freaked out a little, because no one has ever walked up to me like that before. But he was a very cool guy. We talked for a long time after the show too.)

Oh, and a lot of people brought things for Adrian to sign. I had no idea that he would come out to sign things after the show. All I had was the spare ticket stub that says "The Catalyst" on it, and the whole trio signed it for me. I will definitely keep it. I'll scan it to show you. But when I met him all of my angst had dissolved and I forgot that it was a moment to say something of substance to a man that has genuinely generated happiness for me through his art over 3 decades now. I just said that I really enjoyed watching him perform... what an oaf! Well, if they do come back for a spring tour I'll be ready to make a better impression next time! Ack! and when I got back to the car I saw that I had two Adrian Belew cassettes on the seat! He could have signed those for me! Well, like I said, next time!