Amy Lynn was kidding me about becoming a part of the WCYB house band a couple of weeks ago. She was amused by the fact I was working with two musicians and appeared on the last two noon tv news shows at this NBC affilate in Bristol. Josh Green asked me to be a part of his performance and on Monday the 11th, I’d appear again with Jared Bentley, and Lance McCloud with Clear.
Now they don’t really have a house band at this station and they could use better live recording facilities than what they have, but it’s always a great time and a terrific opportunity for any musician. My brother looks into the camera every night and I couldn’t be prouder of his accomplishments, but I never liked spending too much time with any mirror. Funny too because we both were in high school drama tournaments. He won second in the state for pantomime acting and for me…television newscasting – go figure.
Josh Green was in rough shape the week of the show as he was still suffering from a tailgater at UT’s first home game. He called a couple of weeks ago and wanted me to join him to promote a upcoming performance at Bristol Rhythm and Roots . He received a late date at the Festival and we immediately rehearsed a couple of times and now here we were. The door was open, the red light was one and I wheeled my piano into the quiet studio with robotic cameras and flat panel tvs pitching back and forth between news segments. Amy was at the news desk with local favorite Johnny Woods by her side.
Ours was the first act to promote the upcoming festival and when we first arrived, I wasn’t sure what we were going to do about sound. Josh was singing and playing his guitar and I was on piano. The only audio they had were two microphones, so we made do with what we had.
Despite the sound problems, John (a production assistant) helped us rig the power amp and run a mike to the speaker that had the piano, guitar and the other mike was on Josh’s voice. John had long gray hair wrapped in a pony-tail and had worked for CYB for about seven years, but as a musician, he has a special and tragic place in our local music scene.
In the nineties, one of the most popular local bands around was called Crystal Vision. They had a lot of great players and worked hard playing most everyone room in the Tri-Cities. I remember hearing stories about the band, but it all ended abruptly one weekend in a unusual murder at Beauty Spot on the Tennessee border. I’m not real certain about all the details, but evidently, the lead singer and his girlfriend were robbed and murdered by a 15-year-old troubled teen. Cut down in their prime, this certainly had a big impact on the band.
John is recording a solo project with several players around the region and recording at Tony Rominger’s studio. There’s some great players too on this project and I look forward to hearing the completed work. We exchanged emails and I hope to meet him again some time.
We watched Amy Daily straighten her posture and read the tele-prompter as pre-recored segments passed by on the televisions all around the studio. They have two robotic cameras and one “husband” cam (as one of their producers referred to it as one you could push it around) moving around the room.
Johnny Woods has been a television icon for over 4 generations now in the Tri-Cities. He came in the room as casual and relaxed as a Sunday School teacher. He immediately caught on to the Dr. Enuf in my hand and told me a story about Charlie Gordon, a silver-star recipient and his memories of recording Dr. Enuf commercials early in his career. That’s the way he is too. He’s probably one of the most recognized local personalities and it’s not his hard-core journalism personna that gives him credo, but rather his easy-going “he’s like one of us” down-to-earth country boys.
One of the stories I remember from a few years ago about Johnny was about his heart-attack. According to him, he came close to death. That’s what I heard too, but I asked him if he made any changes since that experience and he said, “after you wake up with paddle burns on your chest, you make a lot of changes…both physicially and spiritually.” He looked at me over the rim of his glasses and paused as if to tell me a secret.
As Johnny passed over the weather forecast, talking about his fishing trip and the way the full moon looked at 3am the night before, we knew it was just about time for our segment. A couple of theatre performers were in the wings talking about an upcoming stage production commemorating 9/11. We made a few last minute adjustments and sipped a glass of water and shortly after that we were in place and the lights and camera were on.
Josh was calm as Amy asked him questions before the live camera. He talked about growing up at Sullivan South High School, moving to LA, recording and performing music and his recent pilgrimage back home to record a new album. That’s where I come in and in a few moments, ‘Dance with Me’ was on the air.
I remember things going pretty smoothly through the 3 minutes and 40 or so seconds of this song. Josh and I had rehearsed a few times, but the song was natural for us and I was comfortable with the performance.
You never really know how these things will turn out, so I made sure to setup TIVO to capture the noon-time broadcast. As usual, I hate to watch myself and beside the young stud, I certainly looked like Jaba the Hut in the background, but it’s the best I’ve got to work with…so I wince and go on.
Nevertheless, I think Josh did a great job and his solo sung at the out-tro of the show was even better. He closed his eyes and sang from his heart and I sure hope this helps him continue to attract more listeners. He had gotten a late date at Bristol Rhythm and Roots and plays on Sunday afternoon, so I hope he does well and I hope to catch him.
It was a busy Friday, so I didn’t make much haste getting all the gear back in the car and I made the long drive back to Kingsport for lunch. Later on that night, I was at The Down Home with Rob Russell and The Sore Losers and Dave Hart wasn’t up, but I was a Kemos, having lunch and there you where.” Hey that’s good enough for me.
Finally, for those of you who missed the video, I’ll upload that file and the Clear file to You-Tube for amusement, coming soon….