Yesterday we played our first live show. The plan was to have a "secret" show for family and friends and our early fans, The "Panic Agents". As the date approached, we got excited to leak out some clues as to where and when the show would be. Dave posted the first one "SPANISH CASTLE MAGIC". This is a Jimi Hendrix song which has these lyrics:

“It’s very far away
It takes about a half and a day to get there
If we travel by my uh, "dragon-fly"
No it’s not in spain
But all the same you know, it’s a groovy name
And the wind’s just right.
Hey !”

This has the name of the venue we were to play, Hollywood's Dragonfly club.

The second clue was "hidden" in the source code of The Panic Channel site, (you could see it by choosing “view source” or “page source” with whatever browser you use):

!-- the second clue, to the date of our first show is this: a Tuesday in September.-->

Initially when I put this clue in the code, I screwed up and used the wrong code for the "hidden" comment, so some people with some browsers (including Sidekicks) ONLY saw the clue when they went to the site, alone on a blank page... oops. I fixed it, but already a bunch of quick surfers had seen it (and originally it said "the 21st" as well, so the secret was out). The next clue was from Dave on his "Camp Freddy Radio" show, he said "A FAVORITE CASINO GAME". While readers of my site know what MY favorite casino game is, he was referring to Blackjack, which gives you an answer of "21", the date of the show. The people who wrote in with correct answers to the clues were put on the guest list.

The final give-away was the artwork on 6767.com, then the flyer we posted on the Panic Channel website, and sent out to our Panic Channel Mailing list, it was for "The Drapes" playing Tuesday, September 21st, Dragonfly at 10pm. This was the name we were supposed to be playing under, but the 'Fly didn't update their calendar, so that bit probably didn't make much sense. "The Drapes" was one of the first band names were toying with, but found out that it already was the name of a couple bands already.

As the date approached, we were hoping that word didn't get out too much, and that the show wouldn't be full of industry-types, or too crowded for anybody to have any fun. I have seen many, many shows at the Dragonfly, and when it's hyper-packed, it can be a drag.

The day before the show, we had one last rehearsal, and it was my first day with the new amp. I went in early to set up the pedal board and to practice channel switching (clean & dirty) and set the knobs and volume. Man, that fucker is loud. I was kinda nervous that the guys would show up and hate it, and I'd have to take it back. As much as I might like it, the true test is how it sounds in context with the other tones. If it doesn't sound good with Dave's tone, it just won't work. And changing sounds the day before our first show is risky anyway.

Dave and Stephen showed up first and we went through some of the songs and tested it out. It seemed really ... LOUD. My doubts about a 37 watt amp being able to hold it's ground against Dave's 100 watt amp were forgotten. The problem seemed to be - how to turn it down? On this amp, with no master volume, to lose volume, is to lose tone. After Chris got there and we played the set, and Phil Hutson the guitar tech gave us some input, I ran the amp at 1/2 power and it seemed to fit in fine.

The good news is that it seemed to pass the rehearsal test with flying colors. Sonically, it is doing what I had hoped, it's fitting in a space of the sonic frequency (low and low mids) between Dave's sound and Chris' bass, giving us a more warm, full bodied sound, instead of my sound covering the same ground that Dave's does. All of a sudden, I can hear my guitar parts more, the tone is more focused, and isolated. The feedback was that we had more of a "wall of sound". What a relief. My little Purple amp looked like it was going to get to play a show.

Monday night I was up until 2am getting the mailing list all sorted and sent out. Thanks to everybody who has joined up so far (you know who you are).