my night opening for Dizzy

teamaxl

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my night opening for Dizzy

« on: January 16, 2008, 10:21:29 PM »

Hey all! First thing's first, I just wanted to say I've spent a shitload of time on this site the last few days and enjoyed every minute of it. I've been checkin' out all the current GNR boards as of late and decided to go with this one as I know it's been around a long time now and seemed to fit me best. Now that I've joined I've got a little story from the other night I figured some of you hardcore gunners would enjoy. A little background about myself just to put it in proper context. I'm a 26 year old singer/songwriter/guitarist type based in Chicago and life long Guns fan. In fact, it was Guns that largely inspired me to pick up a guitar in the first place when GNR and "Appetite" were just beginning to take over the world. I got my first electric a few years later right around the time UYI came out and the rest as they say is history.

So to get back to the story itself... Just the other night (January 7th to be exact) I played on a bill with Dizzy who was appearing with Happenin' Harry and The Haptones at Chicago's famed Double Door. Now, I know to some people he's "just" the keyboard player or whatever (and a damn fine one at that) but I must admit, I was pretty stoked about meeting him, as I would be with any Gunner. Sure enough Diz was one of the first people I met upon my arrival and promptly introduced himself. I've met a few big name musicians recently who were big influences on me but having never met anybody in the Guns' sphere before I admit I felt a little nervous. Of course, Diz was pretty cool about it. Very gracious, maybe even a little shy actually. It was an all acoustic show so it was actually held in DD's basement lounge giving the whole thing a pretty casual vibe. I was the first act of the evening and starting at 8 on the dot there was nary a person in sight during the first part of my set but people started filtering in as it went on. At one point I did a quick scan of the bar and noticed Diz sitting there watching me. He ended up watching most of the set and was pretty complimentary. He may have just been being nice, ya never know, but that was kinda cool. After I played a few other Chicago based acts played (including my friend Phil Angotti who I had got on the bill) and by the time Harry/Dizzy and co. were set to take the stage the place had filled up pretty well. I think Harry and maybe some of the other guys were a bit annoyed more people didn't show but that was about all I was expecting for Monday night, and really, most of the people that I knew there were having a good time.

By this point I had a few drinks and was feeling more confident to engage Diz a bit. I had promised myself I wouldn't bring up anything about Axl or "Chinese Democracy" to him, as I know that can get to be a pain in the arse but I was getting pretty buzzed and I guess I couldn't resist. All's I really said was how much I was diggin' the new tunes and how successful I thought the album was going to be and Dizzy replied "the album's done dude" and that yes, there's now something going on with the label (didn't quite catch what he said there and didn't want to press him on it). Now, I know this is apparently old news to you guys, but it was news to me a week and a half ago. I wasn't planning on really mentioning that at all until I did some googling the next day and learned that info was already going around. Of course it's continued to spread like wildfire since then, so I guess now it doesn't really matter. I also asked him about the piano solo in "Estranged" whether it was Axl or he himself who played it on the record (having forgotten all about the individual track credits in the CD's liner notes 'til just the other day) and he said that it was Axl, but of course he always planned to have him do it live. Now here's the cool part about that. At that point he starts going into the solo, and though he said it had been so long he wasn't sure if he remembered all of it, he ends up playing through the rest of the song just instrumentally as a soundcheck of sorts. That was without a doubt the highlight of my night. It was very cool actually. Once the other guys started joining him they also did "Patience" as part of this extended "soundcheck". Once Harry got up there they did "Used To Love Her" (featuring some great piano from Diz) and "Knockin' On Heaven's Door" with everybody singing along and what not. Like I said, it was all very casual and it was getting kinda late by then so it was almost more of a party atmosphere which was fun. I ended up getting completely smashed and insisted on helping Diz carry his keyboard after the show. I'm sure he didn't really want my drunk ass carrying his shit which would have been completely understandable but he was cool about it. I was pretty out there by then. Kinda funny, but also a little embarassing in retrospect. Just glad I didn't drop it!

All in all, my impression of Diz was that of a pretty cool dude. Low key in his way, but definitely no dummy. Scotty Griffin from L.A. Guns was also in the band and he seemed pretty cool to. Not sure who the other two cats were, they were a little younger. It was an absolute pleasure meeting Diz and even cooler getting to play a show with him, even if it was just some low key acoustic thang. I had a blast. I just wish I hadn't gotten quite so drunk at the end of the night. We bought Diz a couple shots of jager, but I don't think any of those guys were as out there as I got. So yeah, that was a lil' embarassing but what are you going to do? I'm sure they've all been there! So that's the story in a nutshell or most of the parts worth sharing anyway. After doing all that lurking I didn't really see any other posts about something quite like this so I figured you guys would appreciate it. Hopefully you did as I'm definitely planning on sticking around and contributing here, or of course I would have never bothered posting it in the first place. Anyhow, here's a few pics from the night....

me and my dirty ass guitar

Happenin' Harry and The Haptones

Dizzy "fukin" Reed

a candid shot of me and Scotty Griffin after the show....

from R to L: me, Dizzy, the drummer from The Haptones and my buddy Scott Jackson

Incidentally, my buddy Scott (the guy with the blonde streak) did a lot of the old Rock N' Roll Comics covers, including some of the GNR issues. You can still find them floating around on ebay and what not.

Cheers!


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