March 30th, 2002

This is the most hellish day of the week, for Ben and myself. We drive away from the Vegas hotel at 7 AM, on our way to Bakersfield, and a brief appearance for 200 lucky radio listeners. I have talked it over with Marc Chevalier, and we have agreed that he will skip this and go straight to Anaheim, where the evening’s concert will take place at the House of Blues there, that is part of Downtown Disney. I will handle audio in Bakersfield. Joey D. leaves Vegas right after the show, and cruises south in the Penske with the piano, while it is cool and uncrowded on the desert highway. Marc rides to Anaheim with Neil and his party the next day, thus catching some more sleep in the morning.

Ben naps in the back of the van, as I ride along listening to a country station. I think the speakers in the back are turned off, but when I stop at a Burger King in Barstow, I check with Ben, and he says, no, they were on, and I feel terrible. I have a sick ability to listen to a dozen lousy “new country” songs, waiting for that one gem.

Desert mirage

We start busting west across the stark desert, that looks like Utah or Arizona. Ben pops up and asks if we can make a pee stop. The highway is bare for a hundred miles ahead of us. No cacti to hide behind. I worry for a few miles, and then, unbelievably, sitting in an empty lot at a crossroads, is a trailer with two Porta-Potties on it! We pull over and utilize them, and memorialize the moment with some photographs.

In Mojave is the spooky sight of an airstrip full of mothballed jetliners, their windows and engines covered with white plastic. This is where failed airlines send their planes, hoping to find financing to start up again, or if not, make a sale to a South American company.

Arriving in Bakersfield, we find Club Odyssey at the Doubletree Hotel. There is the Yamaha baby grand that I set up the rental for, and the PA from a local provider, Jesusshack, who do mostly Christian shows. They have their proprietary subs and mid-high’s, sitting next to the club’s gleaming chrome EAW disco subs. The piano is fine with Ben, and we work for a few minutes to get his vocal in the wedges.

C.K.’s mad experiment

In the piano, I had asked the Jesusshack guys to put a pair of Shure condensers mics, and a D-112. I am convinced that I am going to imitate Mark Hawley’s 3-mic setup for Tori. The only problem is, I am having a heck of a time making a classic X-Y shape with the tall boom stands, the booms keep clanking into each other. I give up, as we are short on time, and extend the condensers fishing-pole style.

I aim the D-112 down into the corner of the soundboard, hoping to catch a bass pressure wave.

In retrospect, I wish I had moved it up towards the hammers, to get more of the actual percussive impact of them hitting. But now that I know some of the cues for Ben’s songs, I can turn up the D-112 when he goes for a pounding finale, and get some air moving in the room, much to the delight of the fans, who are otherwise incredibly quiet and respectful.

Because of that, I can keep the speakers at a reasonable level, and not get any feedback happening with the body of the piano, which is in kind of a cove surrounding the stage. Ben asks for some more vocal in the wedge, and delivers a great little set, the deejays make predictably inane chatter, and we prepare to leave.

Speakers and Ben

Ben has a little piano cartoon that he draws sometimes for people seeking autographs, and he Sharpies it onto one woman’s shoulder. She immediately announces that she is going to the tattoo parlor and getting it permanently tattooed on!

Yes, the bar has been selling drinks the whole time we have been there. We leave the home town of the great Buck Owens, and resume our journey to Anaheim.

Just past Los Angeles’ downtown, we get bogged down in day-before-Easter traffic, and I do another hour at 20 mph. By now I am approaching 400 miles for the day, and still have to work a show that night. I am hanging in there pretty good for the drive, and the soundchecks, but fall asleep that night on the couch in Ben’s dressing room, only waking up when he and Joe walk in, before the encores. Ben isn’t bugged that I am crashed out, but I am embarassed, I feel like everybody’s drunk uncle that you find snoring in the recliner late at night, with the off-the-air noise from the blue TV. So I rush off to do the show settlement with the HoB talent buyer, and collect the T-shirt money.

We head over to our motel, where I have a beer with Joe and talk about the shows, and life, and mutual acquaintances. There is a Denny’s right there in the parking lot, which everyone gradually filters over to, the next morning, after getting a solid night’s sleep. Today we have a comparatively short drive, to Solana Beach, just north of San Diego.