Our new guitarist/singer is named Pat, and he used to be in a band called Soda. The Soda demo video (which is five years old) has him in it, and since the whole point is to showcase the band's various strengths, part it has Pat singing "Come Sail Away" by Styx. He sounds great. In fact, when he auditioned for us, John asked me to work up the intro and first verse just so we could hear if Pat still has the pipes. He does. (Also, I've known the song since junior high, but whatever). Jerry and JT (bassist, drummer) also knew the song, so we fumbled through the whole song, including the A-flat bridge, despite never having played it before, at Pat's audition. That was cool.
Anyway, a few weeks ago, JT was on his way home, an hour west of here, and stopped at this dive called Jerry's Bar & Grill to get something to eat. The lady behind the counter, Diane, says "You're new around here. What's your name?" and he says "James". She says "James? That's a nice name. James what?" "James Taylor". (That's his real name, so he always just goes by JT.) "James Taylor? Like the musician? Are you a musician?" And JT says "Yes, but I'm not a singer. I play the drums."
There's a big board that says "Live Music Saturday Nights" with pictures and the names of various bands that have played there. JT continues "In fact, I was looking at the board there, and I've played with a lot of those guys." He names one of the bands, names some of the guys in it, says he used to play with them in some other band, etc. So now they're talking about bands and stuff, and she says "You know, there was a band we used to get a lot, but we never get them anymore, there were called Soda. Those guys were great." JT tells her that our new singer used to be with Soda. "Pat?" she asks. "Sailing Pat?"
Sailing Pat? "You mean, like Come Sail Away?" he asks. "Yes! Come Sail Away! What a great song, and the way he sang that song..." So JT tells her, yes, "Sailing Pat" is now in our band, and (he bends the truth just a bit) we do "Come Sail Away".
Just then Mike (the other owner, Diane's husband) comes out of the kitchen, and Diane says "Hey Mike, this guy James is in a band with Pat from Soda! You know, Sailing Pat?" And Mike says "I love Styx. Come Sail Away is one of my favorite songs by them. Pat is in your band?" And JT nods. Diane goes on "Plus, he's played with (so-and-so from this band, so-and-so from this other band)..." And Mike says "You're hired. I'm sure you guys are great if you have Pat, and you've played with those other guys, too. When do you want to play here?"
JT says "This is the part where I give you our manager's name and phone number."
And that's how we got the gig. They never listened to us, didn't go to our website or Facebook page, and JT could have been completely bullshitting them, but we got the gig based on "Sailing Pat" being our new singer, and they love that one song he sings.
Topic: All musicians unite! - The Musicians Chat Thread (Read 302768 times)
