I'd never been to Sacramento, and similarly, had never taken part in an explicitly noise-themed performance. Chinapainting had been slated to appear at last year's Norcal Noisefest, but we had to cancel. This year the dates worked out well for me to take part, and at the same time my own improv shows have gotten noisier, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity.

Driving on a Friday afternoon from one large urban center (San Francisco) to another is no picnic, and the journey took roughly double the time it would have taken with no traffic. I arrived at Luna Cafe a bit worn out, and ready to dump my stuff inside and go find solace in a tony sushi place down the street. But the crowd of largely black-clad male noisesters were so friendly and welcoming that I decided to just stick around and get a cheese sandwich at Luna's, a full meal for the price of two slices of yellowtail.

I sat at a table and soon struck up a chat with someone who, surprisingly, was not one of the 12 acts appearing that night. He didn't look the part at all; probably in his fifties, with a ponytail and a gentle expression. But he told me he always comes out to the Noisefest, and in fact had bought the three-day pass in order to catch everyone. Our conversation was soon interrupted by the first act, which consisted of a fretless bassist and a partner with a pile of electronics. It was a heinous, uninterrupted roar - and it felt great. Setting the tone for the evening, their set didn't even last ten minutes (we were each given a quarter-hour slot) and the next act went on with a tableful of pedals and what seemed to be old radio equipment. Again, there were harsh tones, but a bit more varied dynamically.

As the evening went on, I found myself entranced by the whole spectacle. There was no telling what the next obliquely-named (Cerebral Roil, Vankmen, Joltthrower, Nullwerk) act might produce, but for sure it was going to be a wash of surprising sounds with absolutely no boundaries. There were only three or four groups that produced sheer catastrophic white noise like the first act, but the one thing that everyone had in common was the lust to explore sound for its own sake, whether through a heap of junk percussion or an electric guitar run through 20 pedals. The short sets seemed very appropriate given the sheer intensity of the performances, and they also meant that things never got old. One of the sets lasted only five minutes.

My set came about halfway through the evening, and I was glad to have seen the other sets to establish a point of reference (i.e., that I could do whatever the hell I wanted, as loud as I wanted, and the crowd could take it). Though I usually do short pieces of about 3-5 minutes in my solo improv sets, this time I thought I'd just do one longer piece as the other acts did. I started out quietly, but soon was creating a whole mess of howling oscillation feedback between my tape machines and having a grand old time. People seemed interested, whether by my tapes, my odd-shaped travel guitar or the music itself, and when I finished up after 10 minutes or so I heard a number of nice comments. I felt exhilarated and spent, and completely satisfied with my contribution.

I stuck around til the end of the night, which was capped by Xome, a solo guy who apparently has closed the Friday night Noisefest show for the last five years or so. Like many of the others, he had no instrument other than a table full of pedals, which appeared to be taped down (I later found the entire surface was covered with sticky grip tape). For sheer performance value, he was unmatched. He launched himself bodily into his table, bending it this way and that and lifting it up while pawing at his boxes, coaxing out the most terrifying noises. Everyone stood up to get a better view of his enthusiastic deconstructions, and exploded into applause when he ended by ripping a handful of cables out of his mixer. Awesome.

Everyone crowded around the merch tables afterward, trading CD's and Myspace pages. While some might see this kind of music as an expression of nihilism and pure negativity, I found the entire evening to be a celebratory atmosphere, a joyous party of the extremes of sound. I'll look forward to taking part in this again, and was sad I couldn't stick around for the next two days.

First gig of the tour. Though I'd played the Luggage Store Gallery in the summer, with a "name" artist, the draw was very minimal that time, which is pretty typical for a series dedicated to new/experimental music. But tonight was packed out, with students from Mills College apparently, classmates of the people in the opening act. They were called the League of Art Game Composers, and actually were quite fascinating, though the concept generally outperformed the performance. To wit: one of the three different acts in their set had created a Guitar Hero lookalike game, projected on a screen. Four acoustic guitarists were dispersed around the room, and each followed one of the four fretboards/scrolling game displays, playing a note of their choice in the timing and rhythm value indicated. It was a great concept, and often made very interesting music. However, the guitarists had obviously different skill sets and possibly levels of instruction. As often as not, the rhythms would be flubbed, which was amusing but didn't really make for good music. More detrimental was the fact that two of the guitarists ignored the note values indicated, instead playing staccato or legato according to their whim. I saw an amazing potential for a new kind of score here - short of having a conductor, or a click track, I can't think of a better way to indicate precise unison timing to a group of musicians, and being able to suggest rhythmic value also is rather amazing. I hope this concept is improved upon, I was quite impressed by the idea.

I got the impression that these students didn't play out much, evidenced when they displayed no rush to clear the stage of their ample equipment after their set, instead chatting with their sizable group of friends, despite the fact that we were waiting to go on next. By the time we went on, the crowd had thinned out, possibly due to this wait. But a good group stuck around, and remained for our set.

It's very interesting for me to do improvised guitar loops with a horn player. Horns have a massive command of dynamics, and in a space such as the Luggage Store have no need to amplification whatsoever, whereas I am completely dependent on a PA. They also have options for sustain and legato I can't even touch. On my side, a guitar has polyphony and many of the qualities of a percussion instrument. With the loops, I also have a number of textures available which an acoustic instrument doesn't have. So it's a nice pairing.

I think Alan Anzalone (on soprano sax and bass clarinet) and I played really well together, doing short pieces as we agreed ..hand as opposed to a long block of sound. I realized after a few pieces that he would look to me to define the nature of a piece before beginning to play. I didn't intend to arrange things this way, but with the wider range of sounds available from my gear, perhaps it was natural to do so. I found myself adapting to his playing as well; finding that his preference follows the free jazz tradition in generally avoiding diatonic playing, I leaned towards nontonal stuff, and even when setting up a big drone I would include dissonant notes that would blend better with what he was doing.

I love the Luggage Store for being such a nice space and supportive environment, and tonight was another great experience. I hope that more people will start to recognize the interesting music that happens every week there.

I like using the term "dates" for shows. They are dates, really, and rather like blind ones at that. One asks politely to be allowed to share an evening, choosing the words carefully, then with high hopes and possibly sweaty palms you wait for the time to come. And there's no predicting how it's actually going to turn out and whether you'll end the night ecstatic or in tears.

I'm very excited about this short tour of CA. There are no "filler" shows this time around (I'll be the first to admit that in my big summer tour, there were a number of gigs that I booked with no idea what I was getting myself into, just to have a stage to show up on), and some of them are a big deal indeed for a small-time dude like myself. Every gig has something about it I'm really looking forward to.

The summer tour was a learning experience for sure, and I think this tour will be better for it. I learned pretty quickly, for instance, that playing by yourself in an unknown venue in a town where you have no contacts is almost certainly a dead end. It's always, always better to hook up with a local, or two. At the very least there will be someone else to share the misery if nobody else comes out to see the music, and generally speaking they'll have some handful of a crowd who will hear your stuff. And of course, you find friends this way, too, and the next time back you'll have somewhere to start from and somebody to hook up with.

The price of gas also puts much more into relief the fact that driving around costs money. I used to just fill up the tank and not really worry about it if a route took me three hours out of the way. But now, I can calculate that those three hours will cost me about twenty-five bucks, and then figure out if it's worth it.

After this tour, I don't have plans to play live again until 2009, probably until at least spring. Though that's disappointing in some ways, I have a ton of projects on the way, with lots and lots of writing and recording to do. It'll be good to have a big chunk of time at home. I've found that when on tour, and in the run-up to tour which starts at least a month beforehand, I don't get much done in the way of composing since I'm focused so much on practicing the stuff I'm going to play, not to mention dealing with booking and travel arrangements. In the two months since I returned from the summer tour, I have written or at least begun large parts of seven or eight vocal tunes, and two instrumentals, which feels good. But doing serious composition in the vein of the wedding stuff really requires single-minded devotion, and it seems that I can't muster that unless I can work on that alone for a long period of time without having to break to run through set material. As time-consuming as it is, writing the "serious" guitar instrumentals (the more classical-style pieces) is something that definitely calls to me, and I want to give that a bit of rein, especially since everything I've written in the past year has been vocal stuff or song-oriented instrumental tunes.

But for now, I'm all about these ten shows. I'm genuinely excited for it, and feel ready to pucker up.

It is with some sadness that I come to the end of the tour, in which I played 33 dates over the last seven weeks. Though I do welcome the thought of being at home for a while without the daily strategy of logistics that is the essence of touring, it's very strange not to have another show to look forward to for a couple of months.

I'm in Philadelphia, at the home of a friend who has gone off to work, and it feels a little strange to be on my own for the day. A tour is an extremely social experience. At each gig there is venue staff, other musicians, and audience members, and interacting with each of them is necessary to make the show happen. And when touring as I do - I build my trips around places where I know people - my time after and before the show is spent catching up with my peeps. I spoke yesterday with my girlfriend, who I haven't seen since the end of the California leg of the tour a month ago, and we both talked about how it can be an overwhelming experience to travel and catch up with many different people on the same trip. The successes, tragedies, joys and frustrations that are shared with a traveler become part of one's own experience, and it can start to feel like a flood of different emotions that never lets up. The drives in between towns are a welcome time to process all this stuff; out on the interstates by myself, if I'm not thinking about music, I'm thinking about people.

One important thing that I've realized on this trip is that I'm capable of playing day after day and still enjoying it. It was great to have booked a mix of improvised and composed music shows, which kept things fresh, and I think the very different sorts of music helped feed each other, too. Often when driving to an improv gig, I'd be listening to singer-songwriter music in the car, and the next day on the way to a quiet restaurant show I'd find myself just wanting to hear really out electronic noise. I don't think musical worlds have to be as alien as some people think...

I just really can't believe it's over. It's been a blur, particularly the past week with all the moving around up and down New England, from Vermont to NYC to Philadelphia to Boston, then back through NYC to Philadelphia again. Shows that I did a few weeks ago now seem like ancient history; there have been so many places and so many people to remember since then.

And so it ends, with some amazement at how full of experiences the last two months have been. In spite of flat tires (I had luck with me at the end, and Alamo didn't notice the one mismatched tire - whew!), often-small crowds and a whole lot of hours alone behind the wheel, I'm already looking forward to October when I hit the road again, albeit more modestly.

Tonight, the last gig of my tour, had an amazing setting, a lot of wonderful music, and very few people around to enjoy it.

There have been several shows set up by or featuring artists I've met through a listgroup dedicated to looping (Looper's Delight). Dennis Moser, who I met through the list, helped to coordinate this show and fleshed out the bill, which featured himself, Jim and I (Chinapainting), Tim Nelson from Maine, and Rob Byrd, another Boston local. The venue was The Nave, which is a very active gallery space inside a Somerville church. When Jim and I showed up (utterly soaked after a quick visit to Faneuil Hall where we were encountered a sudden, torrential rainshower) we expected to set up in the gallery, which is one of many good-sized rooms inside the sizable church. However, the other players were already setting up inside the main sanctuary, it having been decided that with our numbers (and our gear, which resembled a postmodern Mission Control in some cases) we needed the main space. No complaints there, churches are fun to play in and this was a particularly lovely building with a high-arching ceiling.

Since our plan involved an eventual all-members jam, and we wanted to minimize the between-set turnaround time, we all set up our gear, with two of us on the stage and the others on the floor. I didn't altogether like the way this suggested some sort of hierarchy, as our positions reflected our set order, but it did make a nice visual and it was terrific having enough space for us all to be ready to go at the start.

Jim and I led off a bit after 7 p.m., sweating from the heat and humidity of the early Saturday evening (only slightly assuaged by a couple of fans working hard inside the huge sanctuary). I didn't feel altogether composed at the start; though we had a good amount of time for setup, the combination of five players all working out their individual equipment issues at once had created a somewhat stressful atmosphere. Also, I was smarting a bit at the small crowd, the other players and their spouses literally made up more than half the audience. But Jim and I started out with a few quiet notes, and the venue was so lovely and spacious and the guitars sounded so good in that big room that I started to settle down. It ended up being one of our better sets ever, leaning more towards our more pastoral side. On the third piece, I backed the treble way down on my guitar, which had been sounding a little harsh through my mini PA, and was rewarded with a really nice, round tone. I started messing with something much more bold and melodic-based than usual, which ended up building into a great little piece, I thought. We did a Frisellian kind of thing in G, then Tim Nelson joined us for a cool trio piece before he continued on with his solo set.

I enjoyed everyone's music very much (particularly Rob Byrd, who improvised some beautifully modulating pieces on heavily treated and reverbed guitar), and the transition between sets was extremely smooth with everyone's gear already set up. The shared handoff tune at the end of each set was a really nice transition, too. However, I started to regret our decision to have each set be 45 minutes. Simple addition will tell you that with four acts, even if everything goes as planned it's three hours of music, which is an awful lot for most people at one sitting, especially if that sitting is in wooden pews. We started a little late, and some people went a bit longer, so before our concluding group piece it was already 10:30 and everyone had left except people directly related to the musicians. Oh well. The group piece was very nice, and then as we were packing up, the organizer handed us each a set of CD's with a well-done recording of the whole evening. Sweet!

Jim and I found our way to our crash pad for the night, at a friend's house not far away, loaded in our gear then headed out close to midnight in search of sustenance. Boston isn't known for late night food, as we were told by everyone we talked to - nobody could even point the way to a diner or (shudder) Denny's - but we managed to find a Stop n' Shop supermarket and created a vegetarian feast of hummus, bread, Dubliner cheese, chips, salsa, and taboule, which we downed gratefully in our friend's kitchen, whispering about our shows together while trying to stifle the crunch of the chips.

My former band Ojas was born in Boston, and while there we were a quartet, with a singer and violinist named Jonathan LaMaster. Jonathan has gone on to do a lot of great things in the new music and improv worlds, and now is a member of Cul de Sac. We ran across each other in New York ten years ago, but haven't really kept in touch otherwise.

When my tour itinerary looked to include a stop in Boston, I remembered Jonathan and looked him up online. It was great to catch up a bit, and we discussed doing a show together. The thing I love about improv music is being able to make music with people with no preparation; you just set a date to meet up, and go for it. We booked a date with Todd Brunel, a bass clarinet player with a regular improv series called Vortex. The series takes place at at venue called Outpost, formerly known as Zeitgeist which apparently was around for quite some time.

I'd spent the night before in Philadelphia, an great evening going out with a couple of my friends to a fantastic restaurant called Pumpkin. I left for Boston around noon, but got seriously turned around getting out of town (at one point, crossing the Ben Franklin bridge thinking I was leaving, but in fact, was re-entering from another angle, so I had to turn around and cross the bridge again) so I didn't really get on the road until close to 1. It was at that point that I started to regret not having left that morning; it was a Friday afternoon during the summer, and I'd be passing through NYC. Oy. My fears were realized when, an hour outside of Philly, traffic ground to a halt. It picked up again for a little while, but once I entered New York, I spent two hours traveling 14 miles. Even after that, up through Connecticut, every time I reached the outskirts of a sizable town (and there are many in CT), progress slowed to a crawl.

I finally hit open water in Massachusetts, at which point I had 45 miles to travel, and 45 minutes to make the gig which was schedule to start at 9 p.m. I called Jonathan and told him I'd do the best I could, then pointed the Yaris toward Boston and floored it, finally careening through the narrow streets of Cambridge. At 5 minutes to 9, I pulled up to the Outpost, sweating profusely as I made my introductions, greeted Jonathan warmly and dragged my gear inside.

The Outpost is a nice room with a bay window and a good acoustic sound, perfect for this kind of thing. There were people there waiting for music, and though everyone was understanding, I wanted to get music happening as soon as possible. I found a flat surface to put my tape decks on, a kind of monolithic pedestal (I really need to get a portable table..), figured out power cords, and was ready to go in about ten minutes. Still hyperventilating from the ridiculous journey, I suggested to Todd that we start with a trio piece so I could settle in. He agreed, and the three of us picked up our respective axes.

Both Todd and Jonathan are fantastic musicians - Todd is a monster on the bass clarinet, while Jonathan is equally adept on bass, violin and the electrified Mr. Potato Head (no, really) - and I soon forgot about the traffic. It was heady stuff, very interactive (as opposed to the blowout at ABC No Rio, which was more about creating a massive sonic movement) between us and all kinds of sounds happening. For the rest of the evening, we all traded off on solos, duos, and another trio piece or two. I loved it all, especially the opportunity to rediscover a musical relationship with Jonathan. He expressed surprised at what I was doing - after all, the last time he heard me playing, I was in a loud prog-rock band while studying straight-ahead jazz - and I returned to him many compliments about all that he's accomplished.

People seemed to really enjoy the music that was happening, and I experienced some of the most positive reactions yet for my contribution. Afterward, Jonathan and I tracked down some late-night falafel, then retreated to his place by the shore to spin vinyl and sip tequila until five in the morning.

This was the last solo guitar show of the tour, and I'd been looking forward to it. When I emailed Banjo Jim's - a very nice little spot in the Village - to advance the show, they told me that since I was starting at 8 and the next artist wouldn't be going on until 10, I could play as long as I wanted. That was great to hear, as I figured people would probably start to show up closer to the later sets, especially as Adam Levy (guitarist with Norah Jones, and a fine solo artist in his own right) was playing at 11.

It was pretty dead at 8, and I started with a batch of the lesser-exciting tunes in my repertoire, but then a few friends showed up and I started digging in a bit more. I was having a great time in the comfortable space - very much set up for music listening - but it still was nearly empty. The people who were there seemed to be enjoying themselves, but as the hour grew later I allowed myself to get just a bit frustrated. Still, I've been mindful on this tour to always keep focused on the guitar more than the environment, so I managed to mellow out and played better for it (and seemed to be rewarded with more appreciation). I finished up a few minutes before 10 o'clock, and not fifteen minutes later, people began streaming in. By 10:15, the place was completely packed, with every stool and table taken and folks standing in all the other space. I just don't get it..!

I loved the players that came after me - a local duo called The Hippynuts, then Adam Levy with his trio - and I heard some kind words about my music, which allowed me to forget about the fact that the huge crowd completely missed my contribution. This, I suppose, is just how it goes sometimes.

I've had two acoustic shows already this trip, and was looking forward to this one. It was going to be unusual for sure - Jim and I as Chinapainting are pretty dependent on loops as part of our sound, though we often do feature an effects-less tune in our set - and we've never even seen each other do our solo stuff. The Naked Mud series, which takes place at a cafe called Mud NYC, presents artists unamplified in a small back room off the main cafe, with the intent of creating an environment for close listening.

I do admire that intent, but the execution was lacking. Being summer in New York, the room was rather hot, and though we asked for the fans to be turned off during the music, one was left whirling, creating a loud hum that made normal-voiced conversation difficult, and acoustic music challenging. I made the quick decision to play my loudest solo pieces, which seemed to go well, and Jim's steel-string cut through decently too. During our improvised duo pieces, though, I felt pretty limited and unable to provide much nuance. Some members of the audience crowded closer to be able to hear us better, which was kinda flattering but frustrating, knowing that we weren't being heard.

We finished up our sixth piece, a duet, and I was tuning up (had terrible intonation problems all night, probably due to humidity and the air motion) in preparation for another solo piece when the booker told us we had only time for one more. Huh? She had started us 15 minutes late, and since we had been told we had an hour to play, we'd assumed we'd be going til 9:15. But it was only 8:50, and we were getting cut off. I wanted to do a solo piece to end strongly, but after a brief discussion we decided to finish up with another duo piece. I was pretty pissed off at the early curtain, so it was hard for me to settle into anything, and I think that tune turned out to be the weakest of the night.

There was nice applause and comments following the set, though frustratingly, at that point more people started drifting in. The performer after us was a singer-songwriter with a bongo player, and obviously had a bit of a following as all the tables were soon taken. I couldn't stand him, though, and soon regretted my decision to stick around; I thought his songs were lame and his singing weak. Oh well.

ABC No Rio is a multi-purpose arts facility in Manhattan which has been around for many years. Apparently the building itself is in poor shape, but a retrofit would cost more than what the building is worth, so there is a project underway to raise funds to raze the structure and rebuild. One can certainly tell from the outside that the place has seen some age, it's a rather uninviting entrance. Once inside, though (and once we managed to find someone who could tell us where the music venue was, as the place is full of workshops and darkrooms and galleries), it looks much more of a welcoming place where art is made.

We were there as part of a weekly improvised event called COMA, which always involves two acts, followed by a open session. We met the other artist, John Gilbert, as we were setting up. He'd driven up from Florida just for this show with his one-of-a-kind microtonal guitar. It was fascinating to look at; he has some seriously deep theories which resulted in what he calls an "ocular-tuned" instrument. While every fretted guitar I've ever seen, even the 15 or 20 microtonal axes at the Sonic Arts Gallery in San Diego, uses straight frets, the neck of Mr. Gilbert's guitar was covered with circles and loops (made from picture-hanging wire, he told me). Thus, there is not only a microtonal relationship between notes on an individual string, but also across the strings. Awesome!

A nice little crowd had shown up by the time Jim and I started. At Stain the previous night, the tiny audience and cafe atmosphere made us (unconsciously) gear our material just a bit toward the more pastoral, at least until Will joined us. But at this venue, we knew that the audience was up for anything, and in fact was probably expecting us to stretch things pretty far. I found myself using the dictaphone a lot, then on the third or fourth tune, really let loose with some oscillating no-input mixer feedback that evolved into something almost metal, with some hammering distorted chords screeching out. Definitely the noisiest thing we'd done together so far this tour, and it felt great.

It felt like the crowd was right with us for the whole set, and I think it probably was one of our strongest ever. Then Gilbert went up, and launched into some seriously crazy music. He described himself as "Schoenberg meets Cecil Taylor", which wasn't a bad description, though I'd probably add "meets Kerry King". He had unbelievably fast technique, right out of the speed metal school, but was applying it to his microtonal axe which was further fitted with a synth pickup, giving him access to a limitless palette of tones. He was knocking everyone out with his ferocious attack, wedded to otherworldly harmonies and sounds ranging from pipe organ to bird chirps.

After his set - which included a meandering ten-minute dissertation on his philosophy of tuning, which was equal parts political scree, science lesson, and stoner metaphysics - we took a short break, then began the open session. Jim, John and I began together, then we were joined by a violinist, then four or five horns. It slowly grew to an Ascension-like blastout, where I felt I could contribute very little except deeply detuned bass notes, so I mainly stuck to tape manipulation. Blaise Siwula, the organizer, had joined in powerfully on alto, and at one point he pointed to a seated fellow with a bow and a saw. The rest of us got the hint and began to quiet down, then drop out. The sawist (?) took a brief solo, then other people joined in one by one, and once again we reached a frenetic crescendo before knocking off for the evening. It was exhilarating, kinda terrifying, and not a bit deafening. Jim and I have never played together in an ensemble this size, and it's been many years since I played in Moe Staino's large group improvisations, so it was a wonderful and unusual thing to take a part in.

Best thing about Brooklyn - even in the hot Prospect Park neighborhood, one can often find legitimate parking on any block you need. Unbelievable.

I experienced an afternoon of slowly ascendant culture shock, driving from my brother's place on a gravel road in rural Vermont directly into NYC and its attendant toll bridges, construction detours and jaywalkers. I've always had a love for NYC (I was born in the Bronx, though only lived there for four years before my family moved to small-town Pennsylvania) but have never really spent much time there as an adult. On my tour last year I was recording up in Woodstock so didn't get to hang out much in the city, so am looking forward to doing some of that this time around, in between three CP shows and a solo gig (my last one of the tour).

The Stain is a spacious, comfortable beer n' wine art cafe located in one of the less-hip corners of Williamsburg. It doesn't seem to get a lot of business, which is too bad because it's very charming, with a large garden in back decorated by a massive facsimile of a demented nickel. There were three or four patrons there when we arrived, being entertained by the bartender who'd taken up a place on the stage and was peeling off some chiming, spiky chords in a sort of Jeff Buckley free stream. He stopped when we started setting up, explaining he'd just been filling space as the songwriter scheduled to appear before us hadn't bothered to show up.

Tonight was special for CP not just because we hadn't played together live in nine months, but because we were playing for the first time as a three-piece, joined by Will Romano on percussion. Jim and Will have a lot of history together, and we'd done an exploratory Ninjam online session a few months ago, but Will and I hadn't met in person before and CP has never been more than a duo. The Stain is a low-volume place, so we asked Will to leave his snare and bass drum at home. He brought along a hi-hat, some bamboo sticks and mallets, a slit drum and a bullroarer made from a vacuum cleaner hose. Before starting, he upended an empty beer bottle on top of the hat. Even before we started, I was excited by his creative approach.

Jim and I did a set on our own before inviting Will to the stage. The first set was a little slow to get going, I think just getting used to each other always takes time and there are always technical issues to work out with our various instruments. Halfway through we had a couple of really nice pieces, though, and started settling in.

Between sets, a fellow came up and introduced himself to Jim, saying he'd heard Jim and Will play before and that he'd kept up on Jim's doings since then, though he hadn't made it to another show. (As it turns out, Jim told me later, the show he'd seen had taken place almost five years ago...!). He then explained that he does projections, and had his projector and transparencies along in the car, would we mind if he did some live projections while we played? Naturally we agreed - our kind of music can always benefit from visual interest since we kinda just stand there working our buttons and frets, and many people get bored without a vocalist to focus on.

While our visitor set up his equipment, Jim, Will and I started making some music. We seemed to click instantly, Will fit in effortlessly and I loved the addition of percussion. During our next piece, Will stood up and started whirling his bullroarer, which generated a ghostly whine that somehow was perfectly in key (and looked very cool as well), stepping up the harmonic series depending on how fast he whipped it around. By this point, our projectionist had started flashing images above us, switching out found transparencies by hand. Though I couldn't see much of what was being shown, our crowd was displaying signs of interest, which is all I hoped for. It was a great set, I wish more people could have seen it.