1/8/2010 - Unlabeled Usage plays Zydeco!

Tonight is Sunday, January 10, 2010. I had an especially good night Friday night, playing with my band at the best sounding venue we have played a little over a year since I have been with them. The rest of the weekend was even better, being completely lazy recuperating from that event and a full workweek with my wonderful girlfriend Caroline. A pharmacy fraternity hired my band, Unlabeled Usage, to play a party combining maybe 5-7 different colleges, which translated to a crowd of over 300 for us and a chance to play at Birmingham's famous Zydeco venue. I can recall going to see two bands at Zydeco, both that sounded very loud and powerful, and both that were already major acts when I went to see them - In This Moment and Five Finger Death Punch.

Zydeco had the best sounding PA I've ever played through. Standing out on the floor listening to our drummer Jonathan do his sound check, it became obvious quick exactly how loud we would be playing. With every quarter note bass drum hit, the sound guy was pushing the sliders increasingly forward, until I could feel the bass in my chest! It sounded as if we were going to sound like a real band tonight. I couldn't tell from when I did my soundcheck though, I offered up some generic guitar riffs and played through Ted Nugent's Stranglehold, but I did not have my 5150 amp pushing hard enough I guess, as was evidenced during the first set, when I struggled to hear myself onstage.

We had a blast playing the venue, and even had a rat's nest of a VIP room where we scarfed down some Taj Indian takeout that Caroline and I picked up an hour before we went on. No heat and the endless supply of dudes that hit on my girlfriend were the only complaints, but I guess that is to be expected. At least the 2 for 1 kamikaze shots and Red Stripe tallboys were flowing like a river, the music was louder than ever, and several drunken guys expressed how I could shred or whatever. Overall, it was a fun night despite the temperature in the teens.