Eric Slick with Chris Harford, Scott Metzger, and Dave Dreiwitz at John and Peters in New Hope, PA

That would be Chris Harford and the Band of Changes, featuring Chris on guitar and vocals, Scott Metzger on guitar, Dave Dreiwitz on bass, and Eric Slick on drums; and Eric and Dave doing a bass-and-drums-only-it-sounds-like-a-full-band - Crescent Moon



Cool art shot of Eric, who, as you can see, sings when he plays with Dave in Crescent Moon

So last night's Chris Harford Band of Changes/Crescent Moon shows were amazing. Totally amazing.

I wasn't even going to go. I have a ton of editing work to do and as we were leaving, the dog decided to have an anxiety attack. I've never seen him do this in nine years - he hurled himself in front of the door and wouldn't let us get by; then he began to bark and howl like you would not believe. If that wasn't bad enough, he somehow squeezed outside and we couldn't get him back indoors.

I got spooked that maybe the dog knew something we didn't. I have no idea what I mean by that, but he was acting so adamant that we not go that he scared me and I was this close to saying Forget it, I'm staying home...I'm afraid this dog is going to have a heart attack if we leave him alone.

Anyway...

I'd forgotten how much I loved New Hope. It's been years and years since we've visited that town, even though we were weekly visitors back in the seventies when we were little baby hippies. I was worried that it had been taken over by the usual suspects - Starbucks, Banana Republic, Radio Shack, etc. Nope. Still cool, arty shops, funky restaurants...I need to go back soon and check it out further because I really felt happy seeing that. But walking into John and Peters was the biggest shock of all. It hadn't changed in the more than twenty years since we'd first hung out there. Gary and I gasped; it was like reliving our youth all over again. Every single fixture, booth...all of it...was exactly the same.

If that wasn't totally cool enough, the dj played the most incredible music pre-show...we practically fell off our chairs. Whiskey Train by Procol Harum; Ring in his Nose and a Ring on her Hand by Savoy Brown; Hurdy Gurdy Man - Donovan -- and then I find out that the dj is none other than Mickey from Ween. So we're totally into this and I'm drinking Kettle One vodka martinis and feeling absolutely no pain when Chris Harford and the Band of Changes took the stage.

Holy shit. Chris' songwriting rocks and this band is so fucking good it's ridiculous. Four incredible musicians, so tight you would not guess that Eric, for one, had never even played half of the first set before in his life...it was all new material or stuff he didn't cover in prior shows. But Chris would say something to him about the beat, Eric would look over at bassist Dave Dreiwitz from time to time, and he aced it all. Both Chris Harford and Scott Metzger (Particle, Rana) are amazing guitarists. Scott plays a vintage Les Paul and really has a cool, unique sound. Chris played a Resonator a good part of the night which I admit to loving. And Dave..what the hell can I say about Dave? He sounds like an entire orchestra when he plays the bass, which brings me to Crescent Moon.

Unbelievable. Just Dave on bass and Eric on drums doing a punk thing with both of them singing and it's impossible to sit still when they play...okay, I was drinking martinis but I still say it's impossible. They rocked so hard it was insane. I have one request: Please, please, please record a CD!

Oh man, one more thing. When I was talking about this being a band of consummate musicians,a couple of times I caught their faces...they all had their eyes closed with half smiles, so into the music they looked enchanted. I think the black and white photo of the band I posted above shows that...except for Eric whose eyes somehow came out looking like Children of the Damned and I have not a clue how to fix it. Note to self: Take a photography class, dork.

Here's some stuff I found on Ween forum board about the show:

"great show last night. Eric 'the kid' Slick was awesome with both the BOC and Crescent Moon in his innaugural performance at John and Peter's. It was only my second Crescent Moon show, and it was great to see Dave do his thing again. 'Fearless' was sick. The BOC also included Scott Metzger, who is always a treat to watch. 'Catacombs of Paris' was super fucking wastey. Some kid from Colorado whose name I forgot ripped on guitar for the show closing 'Leaf of Fall' while Chris free-associated his rap."

"Chris sounded great & really
had an awesome groove going last night.
I love it when those guys just go off on a tangnent...
Double Dip was on fire, & it was the best show I've
ever seen him play...which was totally enhanced by
Eric Slick, who is so talented & fun to watch too.
That "Fearless" did kick ass!
Oh & let's not forget how lucky we all were to have
dj softpack in the house...what a blast."

"Great nite of music! Those guys were on! Chris and Scott tore it up. Kid Slick brought it!

CRECENT FUCKING MOON!
Dave was on fiyah! Thanks Chris and the rest of youse"

So that's pretty awesome. Eric was also stoked to meet Andrew Weiss at the show last night and had a good time talking music and messing around with him and Mickey, or Dean Ween to you, who, oh my god showed up at the gig with bandages on three of his fingers from an unfortunate incident with a barbecue grill. He was going to play with the band last night, damn it, but his injuries made him the designated dj. Hey, going by what he played, I wish he had his own damn radio station -- I'd be listening 24/7.

Here's the link for Chris' My Space page. Every single song is amazing but right now I have a thing for "Teach Me".

******

In other music news, yep, The Adrian Belew Power Trio is playing the Quebec Summer Music Festival on July 11. So I was teasing Eric this morning that he will be in four countries in 18 days - US for the east coast tour late June; Canada July 11; Japan July 13-21; Germany July 28-August 8 with maybe some other countries thrown in between. Also, the Nashville gig is going to be at The Mercy Lounge on June 19. Basically I will not see Julie or Eric from the time Eric leaves for Bonnaroo on June 13 until sometime in late July. Arghh....

Okay, I'm exaggerating. Naturally I'm going to all of the east coast shows in June. But okay, after July 11, I won't see them, especially Eric, for a while. Though I'd love to stow away in their suitcases to Tokyo, I think they are sick of their hapless groupie mom and sadly, they are probably right.

Nah, it's more like Gary and I have a prepaid vacation at a beautiful beach.

But just try and keep us from those east coast shows.

Later,
xo

How 'bout Some Breakfast?

So thank you to Dave at The Breakfast who enabled embedding on one of my all time favorite You Tubes -- Project Object performing Cosmik Debris with Eric on drums and special guest Tim Palmieri from the Breakfast on lead guitar. In fact, I love this You Tube so much I've made it a permanent feature on the right hand side here. Also note that I've added some new reading recommendations over there as well -- I highly suggest you check them out.

And why do I bring up The Breakfast? Because they'll be performing this Saturday night at the North Star Bar, and Eric's sitting in on two songs -- Cleetus Awreetus Awrightus by Zappa and Big Bottom by Spinal Tap. What's crazy is that Eric's only able to do this because The Breakfast isn't going on until 11:00 p.m. and they're playing two sets because at 7:30 p.m. that same evening, Eric's doing a short set with Dave Dreiwitz in New York City as follows, as per the Ween Forum Board:

Crescent Moon Live in Brooklyn March 24 (early show)

"Crescent Moon will be performing at the new Luna Lounge in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn...any folks coming in for the Gene een shows have something to do Saturday night...it's an early one:

7:30 Crescent Moon
8:30 Half Cleveland(w/chris butler ofr the waitresses)
930 Sounds of Greg D
10:30 Kapow
11:30 TK Webb

Eric Slick will be the featured drummer with Crescent Moon

The Luna Lounge 361 Metropolitan $8"

Reply:

"Crescent Moon! YAY!"

Reply: "Quote: Eric Slick will be the featured drummer with Crescent Moon"

"Sick."
*****

Yeah, so Eric's basically gonna play the gig with Dave in New York, immediately hop on Greyhound, and get to Philly just in time to jam with The Breakfast.

His kind of night! And yeah, yeah, his groupie parents (ha) will attend because thankfully the North Star is only six blocks away from our house. Yeah!

Eric's also got this coming up:



BLACK LODGE PRODUCTIONS
presents

ELLIOTT LEVIN - 'flautist-sax-ist-spoken-word-ist' extraodinaire backed by the dynamic duo Eric Slick and dmc*...special surprise guests, too!

CETUS - Avant Metal from the Gutter fronted by Rock School graduates Nick and Matt H. You saw Matt H peel the paint off the walls last month, now see him thrash this place fo real!

The Trio Nero - instrumental excursions into the heart of darkness starring our own Nero Catalano.

Women - Bill Rooney is the Man, The Musical!

m*callen - secret solo project (guitars, wailing, laughter, etc)

Friday March 30 8pm @ The Black Lodge
1508 Brandywine st.
$2 admission records & cds for sale!
*****
So that's the news in my son's world -- daughter Julie, thank God, takes a few finals this week and then goes on a belated Spring break where I hope to get in some quality time with her -- okay, what I really mean is that I really hope the two of us get to hit some cool new restaurants together but naturally the ridiculous has happened -- I got hit with jury duty again next Tuesday. That's twice in two years and absurd, especially since I'm automatically disqualified once they learn (again, for like the 5th time in five years) I'm not only a writer, I worked as a legal assistant for over two decades and know practically every lawyer in Philadelphia as well as having some definite opinions about the legal system, meaning, in civil cases I'm 100% pro Plaintiff and in criminal cases, man, if I think you ever even held a gun in your idiotic little hand and have the slightest feeling you would use it, well, let's just say you do not want me as your juror and I thought I made that perfectly clear to the judge the last time I was on the proposed juror stand...but oh well, this is what I get for being a registered voter in Philadelphia.

The worst part of the experience is that they are under the assumption that all prospective jurors are illiterate morons (well, they probably aren't too far from the truth) so they make you watch a film that tells you step by step how to answer each query on the juror questionnaire as if you can't read or write, and the last time...and this is completely awful...they had some one hundred year old, retired judge warm us up first by cracking some really lame and pointless jokes. It was like being in the audience at the Jerry Springer Show.

Or how I imagine that would be, anyway. Sigh...

So to save it from being a completely wasted day because trust me, I'm going to be left for eight hours to sit in the waiting room while others are assigned to trial, I'll print out a copy of what I hope is my finished novel and go over it again all day with a red pen and probably end up wishing I was in fact an eligible juror.

The only good news is that there are lots of great restaurants near the Criminal Justice Center and they do give you two hours for lunch, so Julie? Don't make any plans for next Tuesday afternoon.

Later,
xo

When the world's 5th best blogger doesn't feel like blogging.

This is one of my "rare gems". If you've seen the movie Rock School, the film culminates with the Rock School All-Stars, who, at the time were twenty kids, two of whom were a 16 and 17 year old Julie and Eric, going to Germany to perform at Zappanale, a festival held every summer to pay tribute to the music of Frank Zappa. I tagged along with the kids that year -- it was 2003 -- and here's a pic I've posted before where I'm posing in the town square with a couple strange guys looking on, and which town square, instead of having a bust of a war hero, has this:



Anyway, this You Tube is part of a film that follows the legendary Ike Willis on tour through Europe that summer, and if you look closely, there I am drinking beer in the background right after Mike Keneally was interviewed; you can briefly get glimpses of Julie and Eric...and then a nice large chuck of Eric playing the vibes on stage.

So when I first met Ike that year backstage, the two of us bonded right away and when he heard Eric play with Rock School -- and Eric had just turned 16 -- he looked at me and said "That boy is on the list. You mark my words."

"The list?" I asked, because, well, in spite of my claim to fame as a musicologist, I had no idea what he meant.

"It means someday your boy and I are going to be in a band together. He's going to be my drummer."

I grinned from ear to ear like the proud groupie/stage mother I am and strutted around Germany for four days on a total high from that statement, but who could have predicted that it would come true. Because as well as being drummer for the Adrian Belew Power Trio, Eric is also drummer for Project Object featuring Ike Willis on guitar and vocals, and in a perfect case of synchronicity, will be performing again at Zappanale this summer. This is the fourth time Eric will be there -- he played the festival in 2003 and 2005 with Rock School, 2006 with Adrian Belew, and in 2007 now he returns for what's actually a ten day tour throughout Europe with Project Object. Adrian was kind enough to schedule his summer touring with Julie and Eric around the Project Object tour so that Eric can do both. Pretty damn cool life my son has, huh.



And that would be Eric and Ike in Germany during the summer of 2005.



And that would be Eric and Ike/Project Object at Martyrs in Chicago on January 5 of this year.

Anyway, if you are interested in buying some or all of the CDs or DVDs associated with any of the Zappanale festivals I mentioned above, just follow this link. Or this one.

So I guess apologies are in order. Sorry. The world's 5th best blogger, diarist, has not felt like blogging this week. I'm sick of winter, sick of having what I still feel is an unfinished novel, and well, I still feel sick in general. Even almost two weeks after the great stomach virus of 2007, I don't have my appetite back and without good food, I'm miserable. So I'm trying the high octane stuff like veggies and fish but really, I think I'm currently a head case who is better off burying said head under a pillow until this passes.

Let's see. What would help. An acceptance letter from somewhere. An award? A spike in my Amazon ratings for sales of Three Days? Actually, my Amazon ratings did spike, and for one glorious day last week, I was at like 66,000. Now I'm back at 500,000 or something. But I am still number one best seller here.

Oh, this helps, too.

Eric has a gig with Ween's Dave Dreiwitz in his side project, Crescent Moon at the Luna Lounge, 371 Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn, New York on March 24.

Here's a picture Gary took the last time Eric played with Dave in Crescent Moon back in December, 2006 at Mexicali Blues in Teaneck, New Jersey. Do they have the coolest stage or what?



In writing news, I am pleased to give you a sneak peak of an exciting new print mag, Noveltown Review, in which I am proud to have a regular column and even prouder to see my name on the cover next to such luminaries in the writing world. (Note to founding editor N.L. Belardes: My column for Issue Two is almost done and I should have it to you by the end of the weekend).



Speaking of N.L., there are two things you should know:

One, please ask to be his Noveltown Review MySpace friend. They are going for a record 10,000 writers/fans/pals. And as I recently wrote to Nick, or N.L., that's one hell of a MySpace site and why oh why am I not able to do anything so creative with mine?

Secondly, you really need to buy Nick's book, Lords, Part I. I just received my copy and am currently being blown away. He's got other books for sale on his site as well but Lords is the first one I've purchased...you can be sure that as soon as I'm finished, I will be checking out any and everything else. Nick also keeps the world's most awesome blog right here -- in fact, he recently did an interview with yours truly and is probably still waiting for me to send him those "new, creative photos" he requested before he posts it so I guess I'll have to figure out something today. Both my kids shudder at the thought of taking my pic because I am so NOT photogenic I hate them all and make them keep re-taking them much to their mortification. Nick kind of let me off the hook and said, "Well, Robin, they don't have to be photos of you, they can be cool photos of stuff around your house," but then that would mean I have to straighten up around here today and I'm not sure if I feel like doing that or not.

We shall see.

In other writing news, I'm sad to be missing Epicon (a book convention in Virginia Beach) this weekend but am thrilled to be part of the RT Convention from April 25-29 and will be signing books all day long on the 28th. Check out what I get to do during this five day span:

"Experience seven concurrent educational tracks, with 125 workshops for readers, authors, aspiring writers, independent booksellers, publishers, book distributors and chain bookstore buyers topped off with lots of fun parties.

What sets the RT BOOKLOVERS CONVENTION apart from any other convention? We understand the productive impact of mixing business and networking with fellowship and fun.

Begin each morning with a meet and greet mixer hosted by various authors and publishers. Then choose from a rich variety of over 125 informative workshops for readers, writers and booksellers. Cap off the afternoon with a fun-filled stimulating networking party. At dark, it's time to get ready for our sumptuous evening events.

Our Theme Events Include Magnificent Costume Balls and Dance Parties:

A Bevy of Authors Host The Medieval Faery Ball

Heather Graham's Vampires of the Wild, Wild West Dinner Theatre and Dance

Ellora's Cave Fantasy Moulin Rouge Party

(Yes, I will come dressed as Nicole Kidman. All I have to do is lose 100 pounds and the err..Jewish face)

Dorchester Publishing's Immortal Extravaganza

Harlequin's Paranormal Party for Their New Line, Nocturne

Other Events Include:

Romantic Times Giant Book Fair - with over 300 authors signing their latest books. Our much anticipated Mr. Romance Competition - where fans will cheer on 10 romantic hunks as they compete for the 2007 title in several areas of competition: looks, pose-down ability (for a cover) and aptitude for romance; Romantic Times Awards Luncheon presented by Triskelion Publishing and their authors - and the Best Books of the Year.

(Excuse me? Mr. Romance Competition? Oh god, I'll be at the bar getting drunk during that one...as far away from that thing as humanly possible.)

The final day of the convention is Psychic Sunday which offers fascinating demonstrations that explore our spiritual pathways and psychic skills. Attend the talks and classes presented by energy healers, channelers, and psychics, some of whom are familiar authors. Learn meditation techniques that deepen your intuitiveness and creativity. There will be opportunities to meet privately with psychic mediums.

(Now that I am into. But only if they tell me 2008 will see me with a best-selling book and traveling the world)

New Concepts Publishing celebrates its 10th Anniversary at the Sunday night Pajama Party with snacks, drinks, karaoke, dancing and loads of fun."

(Ahem. Karaoke? Aha! The chance to sing in public without my family wailing and putting their hands over their ears? I'll do that after sitting at the bar for a few hours, too...what a shame it's not right after Mr. Romance is crowned.)

So while not all of this is my typical cup o'tea so to speak, it is a lot of fun though whether I'm showing up in costume for any of this stuff is pretty much a no brainer: THE ANSWER IS NO. I mean, this convention basically covers all genres of "romance" from chick lit (me) to paranormal stuff so a lot of authors dress as fairy princesses, vampires, you name it. So what I might do is switch out of black t-shirts and jeans to...gasp...a black dress, because that's as close to stepping out of my usual persona as I can do without compromising my integrity.

Har har. What integrity, you ask? Yeah, I know, I asked myself the same question, but seriously, there's no reason for me to dress up because even in my novels, my characters wear all black, too, so technically I'm following the rules and am attending in said character.

And with that comment, let's call it a wrap. Does this blogpost make up for my disappearance this week? Is it meaty, big, and bouncy enough?

Hope so. If not, I hope to have a lot more...

later,
xo