St. Patrick's night gig at The Palms

I needed that.

And, in all honesty, I had been conflicted about even goin' to the gig tonight (even after missing last week). Still reeling from the enervating after-effects of being sick. Cheryl remains under the weather and had to opt to stay home. I was still feeling so tired, and the prospect of trying to get back into it and get shots of the show and man the CD sales table was giving me major mixed emotions.

I'm glad I made the effort, though, and I gotta give a huge shout-out of props to our friend and Santa Fe regular Howard Adler for covering the CD table most of the night so I could roam and shoot.

I see The Palms in fact fixed the neon logo sign. Unbelievable.

But, the night would not be complete without the recurrent heartburn over the rest of the stage lights. We didn't get lights up till about 10 pm, after I had to ask the bar to call engineering to jerk the vendor's chain to bring the laptop in and fire up the grid.

We were SRO by kick-off, and the crowd just kept growing thereafter into a wall-to-wall, elbow-to-elbow mass of peeps flippin' out over every song. The guys opened with the Earth, Wind, & Fire medley, which never fails to stomp an audience into exultant submission.

Wes Marshall subbed again ably for Gil Kaupp on trumpet. Thanks, bro'.

After the EW&F open, they dove right into Dave's awesome "What'cha gonna Do Wit' Dat Greazy Thing?" That tune has the absolute coolest funk-swing groove, man. Off the heels of that came Jerry's "Ev'rybody Wants to Love You." Wes's mute trumpet solo in that was right on the money. Below, Jamie and JJ diggin' Wes's ride.

Below, Jerry brought our bro' Bad Boy guitarist Dave Hart up to play chromatic harp in "Take My Heart Away." It was so fine. Dave took Jamie's ride section, and seriously threw it down.

I love that tune. Jerry also sang Dave's new original "Si Te Vas" tonight. A bunch of the "Mamma Mia" cast were sittin' front row center tonight. They looked shell-shocked at that tune, which got a roaring standing-O at the end.

Nice. Below, I shot this standing atop the CD sales booth in the back. Not kidding, the place was a crush tonight.

Rochon took an extended bass ride during "Ain't That Peculiar?" tonight. That was a first. And, totally over the top.

Below: I squeezed off this round from all the way in the back -- again, standing on the back of the CD sales booth.

Couple more pics.

Finally, our brother Sean from MOSAIC was in the house, and got drafted for duty in "Living For The City" at the end of the show. Way cool.

THIS JUST IN

Rob just sent me this pic.

Our guys have the pinnacle gig in Vegas at the moment. We could not be more proud and grateful.

THIS WEEK

Tommy Alvarado's Slick Willie Orchestra hits the stage tonight at Just Jazz, 10 pm. Also, Wed - Sat, the incredible "Side Guys" (basically the Dave Sanborn band) will be at the Salute Lounge in the Palazzo, 9 pm till ... No cover, no minimum.