Astral Dreams (04.16.10)

Photos courtesy of Diana Renoir.

So there I was, in Second Life, sitting on a comfortable love seat in my virtual office (while my real ass was perched on my desk seat in my real office, natch). I'd gone in to contact some people to set up some shows. I'd been negligent in reaching to people since my last flurry of gigs, and realized my schedule was looking pretty sad and empty.

Just then my IM notice chimed. It was Sandy Demina, who I've known for quite awhile, and have played for her at Italian Mood awhile back. She asked if I'd be interested in doing a show, and I said I would, and asked her when the show would be. "Tomorrow," she answered.

Well, I usually want a little more than 24 hours notice of shows, but it worked out that my schedule was flexible enough to take this one. Besides, it seemed interesting: she let me know that Moolto, a social network for avatars, was planning a virtual flash mob for the event. Well that seemed pretty cool. And, as you loyal readers have seen me write many times before, I really like the opportunities to play at new places and expose new people to my music.

So I agreed, and today I went over to Astral Dreams, a large Italian fashion mall with an ancient Greek motif. Pretty nice-looking place, all made of marble textures with columns and so on. I set up my stuff and at 12:30, kicked off the set. Sure enough, a few minutes later, about 25 people appeared out of nowhere (well, that's just the way you appear in Second Life, heh heh), and according to my audio stream statistics we had something like 55 listeners. That's not bad at all for a show in the middle of a weekday.

Of course, the downside of getting rushed by a virtual flash mob is that at some point, they have to flash on out of there to go to their next event. But even so, we kept a fairly good-sized crowd there for the duration of the show; it's not like the rea emptied. And more importantly, everyone seemed to be having a good time. Since I don't read or speak Italian, I'm just going to assume what people were saying was complimentary. I'm an optimist.

Set List at Astral Dreams...
You're Like a Cloud (Zak Claxton)
Time Never Waits for You (Zak Claxton)
This Afternoon (Zak Claxton)
Rikki Don't Lose That Number (Steely Dan)
Thanks Anyway (Zak Claxton)
Falling Down (Zak Claxton)
Wonderwall (Oasis)
Fade Away (Zak Claxton)
Heart of Gold (Neil Young)
Shine (Zak Claxton)
Always Tomorrow (Zak Claxton)
Tangled Up In Blue (Bob Dylan)

Grazie tanto to all the people who supported my show today at Astral Dreams!
Diana Renoir (who also took photos), Kat Claxton, Jura Shepherd, Aurelie Chenaux, Lacy Muircastle, Astral Dreams owner Jack Davies, and Sandy Demina!