Oh! It’s all new and exciting!

Welcome, my good friends, to the new resting place of bloggage. D’you like the address? D’you get it? It’s how I get people to remember my name – “Hi, I’m Charlotte – like the spider”. And if you don’t know what I’m talking about, then you had no childhood, you poor dear.

Anyway, new trip, new blog address, I think. After all, this trip, I’m not exclusively going to China. That’s for the second leg of the journey. This time, it’s the big rock tour with a band which I’m becoming more and more excited about, then a year in the UK or Ireland (I’ve not yet decided, as many of you know) followed by a short amount of down time in Australia, then another year in China.

In the last blog entry, I believe I promised more information about the band that I’m touring with. Question is, where to start? OK, firstly, the band is called The Mark Saul Band, or some variation thereof. I think it’s billed at many of the festivals we’re playing at as just “Mark Saul” – Mark being the front man of the band. Lovely bloke. Easy to work with, but more about personalities later.

The band style itself would best be described as … ummm … Techno-celtic-electronica-folk-dancey-fusiony-something. It’s this cool mix of bagpipes, guitar, fiddle and drums, interspersed with all sorts of whacko samples – from some old dude talking about how bagpipe players should treat their pipes as a musical instrument, to old school steam engine noises which become the basis for a drum beat. Too cool.

You might ask why I’m joining the band at this late stage – I was brought on board just nine weeks before the tour was set to leave. They already had a fiddle player – Hamish – who I’d regard as being one of the best bluegrass musicians around. Top player, and top bloke. Unfortunately, (but lucky for me!) his university seemed to think that taking time off to tour with a band might not exactly provide him with the extra credit that he’d need to pass his degree. Educational establishments these days. So demanding. They expect you to actually SHOW UP to CLASSS?!

So, long story short, I’m going to Scotland, wearing Hamish’s very big, very shiny boots. Boots that are hard to fill…

The music itself has forced me into an altered approach – usually, rock and folk music has been a matter of me learning a set of folk tunes (no difficulty whatsoever), or just noodling along, improvising with the main music. But this music is a bit more thought out than most bands I’ve played with, a bit less free-form. I’ve had to learn music from charts, from sheet music, something that I’ve not done since playing with the Melbourne Youth Orchestra years ago. Most of the music is not technically very difficult, but some parts are not obvious in the beginning. One night weeks ago, as I was first learning the music, I made a frustrated phone call to Hamish, attempting to get some sort of guidance as to how to approach the music. He laughed at me, and told me that I’d eventually learn how Mark’s twisted mind works when it comes to writing and arranging music, and not to sweat it – “you’ll be fine,” he said.

I think I’m getting the hang of it, Hamish.

As for personalities – I’ve not yet met the entire band, only Mark and the drummer, Shannon. I’ve been rehearsing with Mark now for weeks, and I’ve gotta say, he’s just ridiculously easy to rehearse with. He has a good idea of where the music is going, and so it’s a bit less of “music by committee” and a bit more “music by benevolent dictator”, or at least that’s my initial impression (bearing in mind that I’ve not yet had a rehearsal with the full band). Past bands that I’ve been in (though I love ‘em dearly – you guys know who you are!) have often been bogged down by the age old problem of too-many-cooks.

On the subject of not yet having had a full rehearsal – well, I only have myself to blame for that. Something happened last week that I’m still frightfully embarrassed about: I actually FORGOT about a rehearsal. We were set to have one last Monday, but in my usual vague way, I toddle off to my usual Monday night gym session, and forget that I’m supposed to be at my first full practice with the boys. I got home from the gym to have my current housemate tell me that I’m in BIG trouble, cause Mark had called a while back, asking where I was. How terribly embarrassing. I have NEVER forgotten a rehearsal before. I may have forgotten to tell someone that I could GET to a rehearsal, but I’ve never planned on going and then just forgot!!

Yep, greeeaaaat start.

Mmmhmmm. Good one Charlotte.

More following the next full rehearsal on Thursday night. If I remember, that is…