Crystal Gardens (09.08.11)

For being such a positive person, I tend to go negative about certain shows. I mentioned to Kat earlier this week that because I was scheduled for two shows on two consecutive days, it was likely that both would end up being poorly attended.

Well, my show on Wednesday turned out great, leaving me with all the more reason to believe that Thursday night's show at Crystal Gardens would be an empty wasteland. However, due in part to a good crowd that was left over from Anek Fuchs' show previous to mine, we started strong and pretty much stayed that way. I was very pleasantly surprised, and if I were a smarter guy, it should teach me a lesson to not presume how things are going to go at any given show.

Wearing my "I Already Beat This Game" t-shirt and rocking out at Crystal Gardens. Photo by Triana.

Anyway, speaking of the show, this one seemed to go very well. My only complaint is that we'd been having a mini heat wave here in SoCal, and things were a little on the toasty side in my little upstairs office/studio where I do my shows (we don't have air conditioning here by the beach where I live). But despite generating a bunch of perspiration, I had a good time while I played, and it seemed that my audience did as well.

Is this a nice place to play some rock music, or what? Photo by Kat.

The set came out pretty good as well. Just the night before, I'd done a themed show of all-90s cover tunes, so for this show I went back to my usual eclectic mix of originals and covers that spanned decades. I also did another new cover for the first time, and pulled out a number of tunes that are rare for me.

Crystal Gardens Set List...
Bertha (Grateful Dead)
This Afternoon (Zak Claxton)
†Won't Get Fooled Again (The Who)
Thanks Anyway (Zak Claxton)
Wish You Were Here (Pink Floyd)
††Black Crow (joni MItchell)
Falling Down (Zak Claxton)
*Thick as a Brick (Jethro Tull)
†††My Heart (Neil Young)
††††She's Leaving Home (Beatles)
Redemption Song (Bob Marley)

*Indicates the first time I have performed this song in SL.
†My last performance of "Won't Get Fooled Again": October 14, 2008.
††My last performance of "Black Crow" (only played once before): August 23, 2010.
†††My last performance of "My Heart": April 4, 2010.
††††My last performance of "She's Leaving Home": September 9, 2009.

Thanks very much to everyone who made the show fantastic, including those below who helped support my show! GMetal Svartur, Triana Caldera, TheaDee, Sher Salmson, Alexis Fairlady, Diana Renoir, Kat Claxton, my manager Maali Beck, and Crystal Gardens owners Mikal Beaumont and Sandi Benelli!