One Way to Bring a Session to a Grinding Halt
10/25/2024
I wrote this up three years ago during the lockdown but didn’t get around to posting it, so here it goes...
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01/08/2021
I got a call from a producer last night to play guitar parts for a pair of his songs today. He sent me wav files of the songs last night, so I at least knew what I was in for and what to pack for the session. There's an interesting twist to this one: For one of the songs the producer asked me to prepare to help recreate the spirit of a Billy Joel performance on a British show called The Old Grey Whistle Test from 1978. I looked up the video and, lo' and behold, Joel's guitarist was playing a '70s Les Paul. I've got just the thing! So, this morning I packed up my '74 Les Paul Standard, an American Standard Tele, and the Helix Floor modeler, and transported them over to the studio for the afternoon's gig. I backed up to the loading dock and took them in.
As I was leaving the studio and coming down the stairs by the loading dock to park the car, I caught my toe on the steel ice cleat of one of the steps and launched forward into this really interesting forward loop onto the asphalt below. My forehead made a convenient skid plate and shock absorber to arrest my forward, downward, and circular momentum, followed by a hard touchdown onto my knees and finally, a flop onto my belly. As my head made contact, I felt my baseball cap pop off and I both heard and felt my glasses grinding across the concrete as they, too, popped off. It was one of those shattering stops where the pain starts immediately, despite the effects of shock. There's an interesting vibrating sensation as the waves of pain and adrenaline pour over you that is eventually communicated to your muscles as trembling. I'm feeling all this with my eye an inch off the asphalt. As soon as I could compose myself, I rolled over on my back and just laid there, trying to resolve the blue sky above and waiting for the trembling to stop.
What was the first thing I did when I regained control? Ralphie? Old habits die hard. Having worn glasses since I was a kid, my automatic memory from fifty years ago is that damaged glasses are not tolerated by the high command! I fished around above my head and found them by touch. I discovered that I had, indeed, ground up and disfigured the titanium frame and produced nice scrapes across the focal area of my progressive lenses. Have you priced those lately?
Next, I patted around and found myself leaking from my head, hands, and knees. I call it "leaking" because I take a blood thinner and no longer simply bleed like a normal person - I leak. A tiny pinprick can take a half-hour to staunch. If I cut a corner too close and brush a door frame it means an hour applying pressure to the scrape to stop the bleeding. Thankfully, it was lockdown time at the studio complex so no-one discovered me lying shivering and bleeding below the stairs. Quick check - Nothing was broken, I was able to focus my eyes, and though I was a little groggy, things made sense. As much as usual.
So, I packed myself back into the car and limped home to mama. My wife spent three years in nursing school so she knows how to handle this crap. She hovered, tut-tutted, and shook her finger at me. No, what she really did was get me into a recliner, ran a concussion protocol on me, cleaned and treated the wounds, applied pressure to stop the bleeding, and then applied ice packs on my head and knee to reduce the subcutaneous bleeding. During the concussion test I was crossing my eyes, one at a time, and imitating Cousin Eddie from National Lampoon's Christimas Vacation ("That lump is right under my part. My hair just ain't going to look right.") for comedic effect. Well, at least I still had my singular sense of humor.
So, now I am sore and stiff all over. I've got swelling in my knee and a scraped-up lump on my head, but all my brains are still in there and not out here. My hands are okay, but my wrists are sore from the impact, especially the left one, and especially if I attempt to turn it up into guitar playing position. I had to contact my client and my scheduler to postpone the session, but the producer was extremely kind and we've already moved it to next week.
I can't really draw a conclusion or extract a lesson from this one for you. I'm just glad to be relatively in one piece and functional!
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Post script: A week later the session went on, successfully, and the Les Paul tones were period perfect.
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