How to Become An Overnight Rock Star

Not to be confused with "How to Become A Rock Star Overnight," my handy guide will simply teach you valuable techniques for overnight forays into rockstardom. That is, when your whirlwind musical life leads you to an out-of-town gig for one evening only, and not a full-length tour. I'll cover things like:

• Packing all of your gear into one vehicle
• Making friends with your fellow musicians
• Navigating icy roads
• Great East African eateries of the Midwest

Follow along now, and you too will be well on your way to mastering the art of the overnight.

Last Friday, I took the day off from work and headed north to Minneapolis for a show with the Buffali (otherwise known as Clare and Andrew, who I've been playing drums for lately). Sound check was to start at 5:00pm, so we Tetris'd all of our gear into my trusty minivan and headed out from Madison just before noon. You may scoff at me and think "Emily, what kind of self-respecting rock star drives an effing minivan?" But my response, as always, will be that, as a drummer and frequent traveler, there is little better than a minivan. For instance, on this trip it fit my drum set, two guitars, a keyboard, luggage and three people comfortably. Try that in your shitty little sedan.

The drive there went much more smoothly and quickly than we'd anticipated, and we arrived on the U of M campus shortly after 4:00pm. Luckily, there were a few union staff already at the venue who let us in and helped us unload all of our gear. That's Midwestern hospitality for you. Our venue for the evening, the Whole Music Club, was actually pretty impressive. Especially when compared to the live music spaces at the UW's two student unions, the Whole distinguished itself by having a spacious stage, good sound system, very decent lighting and a lot of dancing and sitting room for spectators. All of the walls in the place were also covered in chalkboard paint, allowing for all sorts of works of chalk art and obscure phrases to be scrawled. My favorite art, however, were the various graffiti style portraits of various musicians, including Sleater Kinney, Liz Phair, Atmosphere and Henry Rollins. I snapped a photo of the Henry Rollins picture, because it was too amazing not to document.The likeness is uncanny.

Ahem.

Anyway, as we'd obviously arrived quite early and as sound checks never start on time anyway, we opted to head back outside in search of dinner. A friend of Clare's had recommended we try an Ethiopian place in the city, and as luck would have it, we'd passed by the very restaurant on our way in. I wish I could remember its name, but I do remember that it started with a "u" and was on Cedar Ave. It was, in a word, authentic. The place was no more than a room with tables, chairs, and a big screen television broadcasting Al Jazeera. When we walked in, everyone stopped what they were doing for a moment and stared at us. Yep, definitely the only pale skinned folks in the house.

Despite that initial awkwardness, we were treated very well, and the food was absolutely delicious. I ordered what ended up being a huge crepe with spiced and cooked veggies on it, and in the tradition of the place's home country, ate with my hands. We were each also given a banana for desert (no extra charge) and a bottle of water, and all told, for the three of us and our huge, tasty meals, it only cost $14. Well worth it.

Afterwards, we headed back to the club and met the other two bands we'd be sharing the bill with that night: Le Concorde, a synth-pop band from Chicago, and This World Fair, a rock band from Minneapolis. They were both very friendly and helpful, which was downright refreshing. You never know what you're going to get when working with unfamiliar bands, and musicians can be notoriously off-putting. That wasn't the case at all, though, as everyone was sure to introduce themselves and offer help to one another. We then went through the sound checks, got ready in the band green room (seen above), and waited.

We were on first, and there was a good sized and responsive crowd during our 45 minute set. The Buffali's very lyrical, storytelling style seemed to go over well, and afterwards I was happy as a clam when the other bands had really complimentary things to say about us. Afterwards, we went out into the audience to enjoy the next acts, both of which were quite good. Le Concorde had excellent song craft, with heavy influences from 80's new wave/synth-pop but without being what you'd call "retro." This Word Fair was the most polished of all three groups, probably bound for more mainstream popularity, and their lead singer's voice was stellar.

The next morning, we hit the road back to Madison, only to end up in the middle of yet another foul weather day. The interstate was deceptively icy, and as I did 30 mph, we saw car after car in the ditch, some flipped over, some just stuck in the snow. It was a little nerve wracking, to say the least, and I've resolved not to take another long car trip until spring rolls around. I'm done with that crap for the year and can't imagine it'd be a good idea to push my luck and further.

Still, we arrived safe and sound around 5:30pm, and aside from the trip home, had a great time. I hadn't been to Minneapolis since I was a little girl, and I think now, having seen it even so briefly, I should go back and explore the place a little more thoroughly. In the summer.

1 year and 200 posts

On a self-congratulatory note: hooray for me! One year ago today, I entered the first, totally content-free post into this blog. For the first few months, I made maybe four posts a month. And then the ACT Ride came, and writing my memories of that event must have kick started something in my brain, because come September, I became a blogging fiend. I'll admit, it has been fun. I've met a whole bunch of good people through the blogosphere and gotten to know a few people from "the real world" even better. I've learned a lot. I've felt stupid more than a few times. I've also felt supported and understood more than a few times, which is pretty great. So, to the handful of people who come here and read my ramblings--thanks. I mean that.

Today I'm packing my bags and my drums into the ol' minivan for a journey west and north to the snowy metropolis of Minneapolis for a Buffali show. God willing, the weather will be relatively cooperative and my fellow drivers will be relatively coherent so that the drive to and from is uneventful. The show, I'm sure, will be great fun. We're sharing a bill with This World Fair and Le Concorde--I haven't heard either of them, so it'll be good getting to know new bands.

I feel like this, being my 200th post, should include something memorable to mark the occasion. So...uhh...how about a mildly embarrassing picture of me from college, during rehearsals for "A Midsummer Nights Dream"? Yeah, that about sums it up.

Have a great weekend, and stay warm!

Loving our lakes a lot more

Madison is known for its lakes. We're the only state capitol situated on an isthmus. We host the Wisconsin Ironman competition, 1/3 of which relies on one of our lakes. There's a long tradition of recreation and use of the lakes here.

And yet, algae blooms and beach closures become more frequent, surface visibility is decreasing dramatically, and the overall health of the lakes is growing worse and worse. The main culprit is run-off from area farms, coupled with a whole slew of smaller issues. The city (with the help of the Dane County Office of Lakes and Watersheds) took a step in the right direction when it banned the use of phosphorous lawn fertilizer and coal tar sealants, and I certainly applaud their efforts.

But there's a lot still to be done if we want our lakes to be usable not only by future generations, but by our generation, too.

Rob Zaleski wrote a great article in the Capital Times about this issue (and a hat tip to Paul Soglin's blog for bringing it to my attention) and how we can look to Minneapolis' recent efforts to clean up their lakes as an example of how to get it right. Many of the techniques and suggestions offered by the Minneapolis story sound great to me, and I'm hoping that Madison gets on the ball and begins to more exactly pinpoint our own unique problem areas and then to act accordingly to fix them. Public involvement is key. Hiring the best scholars and scientists in related fields is key.

But there's one thing, and it seems like it was a major part of the Minneapolis clean-up effort, that doesn't quite sit right with me: the use of aluminum sulfate in the lakes.

In theory, it sounds good: bind up all that phosphorous and other solids and get 'em out of the way. But what are the long-term environmental effects of pouring all that aluminum into the water?

So far, I've found this:

"However, the use of aluminum sulfate as an additive has inherent problems when employed in lake water having low alkalinity and low pH, as aluminum sulfate tends to further depress the pH of the entire lake. For example, one mg/liter of aluminum sulfate consumes about 0.5 mg/liter of alkalinity from lake water, thereby depressing the pH of the lake. Lake pH is of particular importance because at a pH of 6.0 or less, free aluminum becomes soluble and enters the lake water. Toxicity tests have indicated that aluminum concentrations in water which are greater than about 50 µg/liter are detrimental to aquatic life." (http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/5039427-description.html)

And then: "However, in eutrophic lakes algal blooms often raise the pH to 9 or above, and a significant fraction of the ammonia is thus present as volatile NH3. The pH of the Lake Mendota surface water is generally 8.9 to 9.0 during the summer. However, ammonia is depleted to trace concentrations (0.01 to 0.05 mg. of N per liter) by algal assimilation in early spring and remains low in concentration until late fall. During periods when the surface water ammonia content is high (0.3 to 0.4 mg. of N per liter) the pH is near 8.0, and during much of the period of high ammonia values, the lake is ice covered." (http://www.members.aol.com/annejlee/DenitrifMendotaBrezonik.pdf)

Which would indicate that at this time, with the lake pH level being as high as it is, likely due to all that algae, adding the aluminum sulphate would be relatively safe. But what about if/when we reach the goal of cleaner lakes, resulting in fewer algae blooms and, presumably, lower pH levels? Would the aluminum then be released into the water?

I would hope that any task force created to study and make recommendations for the cleaning up of the lakes would seriously address this issue before using the technique. Who knows, maybe I'm completely off-base with this (I kind of hope so, because frankly I suspect that it'd be easier to use this process than not). I wonder what the Minnesota planner's knew about the process?

I realize this makes me geeky and picky, but it seems important to know.

One thing's for sure, though: we need to take drastic and sustained action to clean up our watershed. In addition to its recreational uses, the viability of the watershed is crucial in maintaining a healthy ecosystem--something that benefits each and every one of us, from the water we drink to the air we breathe. So what's next? What petitions do we have to start, which politicians need to be hassled, committees formed, etc? We can't leave everything to the officials. We have to let them know that we care, and that we care right now.