Geezer Rock

Brotherhood Of the Rope

I was reading the Wall Street Journal's "Five Best" features in the books section, which today listed the five best Man Vs. Nature books. I am always interested in team work among guys and how it applies to the Geezer Rock band adventure.
In K2: The Savage Mountain, the Charles S. Houston and Robert H. Bates describe the brotherhood of the rope as "men banded together in a common effort of will and strength - not against this or that imagined foeman of the instant, but against their only true enemies: inertia, cowardice, greed, igorance and all weaknesses of the spirit."
I think that pretty much sums up the KDOG band experience, too. The common theme of all the books reviewed isn't really man vs. nature; it's men vs. themselves. That's the KDOG story, summed up in one neat slogan.
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Band of Apes

When you form a rock band, regardless of your age, you get an interesting lesson in group dynamics. Group dynamics is a favorite of academic, management and psychological researchers, but I think the most useful work is being done by primate researchers, particuarly as it applies to the male dominance hierarchy. KDOG is an all-male rock band, which is typical. A lot of what happens is colored, not by muscial factors, but by primitive struggles for power: who dominates? Guys are used to sorting out the male dominance hierarchy. It's so much a part of life for us, we hardly notice it. It's like the end of your nose. It starts on the play ground. Games of of king of the hill are the most obvious example. Boys spend most of their time in the company of other boys through junior high school. In any gathering of friends, there's always a leader and a rank of lesser males around him. I remember those days well. Who's the leader? Who controls the most desireable toys? Who goads the other boys into risky activities such a BB gun fights, throwing snowballs at cars or shoplifting dirty magazines? After your grow up, these issues get transferred into the office, church and society at large. Who gets to tell the other apes what to do? Who gets the good toys? Of course, there's the added complication of sexual access to the most desireable females, too.
Once you get this idea, it changes your thinking. I no longer see KDOG as a musical entertainment entity, but as group of chimps with $20,000 worth of sound equipment.
I have been larboriously piecing together an oral history of The Bittermen Blues Band - the band whose leftover fragments birthed KDOG. What killed the Bittermen? Power struggles. Who calls the shots? It's interesting. A lot of the same conflicts are now being played out in KDOG. Two apes are fighting over power. Those apes are myself and Kenton.
It's Kenton's band now, of course. KDOG is his nickname and the name of the band. He gets the gigs, organizes the set lists, fights with club owners over money and so on. He runs the show. Except when it comes to the music. Then he runs into me. Kenton is a skilled drummer, but I think he's got a lot of issues when it comes to deploying those chops in a musical way. I bristle when he starts telling other people what and how to play. I reserve that privlidge for myself. The hierachy clarifies at these moments: I yell at Kenton, Kenton yells at Nick. Then Nick has chest pains, followed by open heart surgery.
At Monday's rehearsal, we had another one of our "head monkey" fights over the deployment of the tambourine. Kenton is always after Nick to play more percussion: shakers, bongoes etc. Kenton even bought Nick an expensive, pro-level tambourine. Then, whenever Nick picks up the tambourine, Kenton screams at Nick. Nick's not doing it right. It messing with the beat. The part doesn't work. Whatever. But Kenton never actually works with Nick to fix the problem. So I started screaming at Kenton whenever this came up. It happened again on Monday. As I stood, screaming at Kenton about "fucking show him the fucking right fucking part or keep your mouth shut," I couldnt help but picture an angry chimp jumping up and down, sheiking, baring his fangs and gums, pounding his chest and perhaps even hurling handfuls of feces, all in an attempt to establish dominance.
In his book, Our Inner Ape, the distinguished primatologist Frans De Waal, provides some interesting insights:
..."men check each other out by picking something - anything - to fight over, often getting worked up about a topic they normally don't care about. They adopt threatening body postures - legs apart and chests pushed out - make expansive gestures, speak with booming voices, utter veiled insults, make risque jokes and so on. They desperately want to find out where they stand relative to one another. They hope to impress the others sufficiently that the outcome will be in our favor."
I was startled at how accurately this describes the scene at the Mojo Dojo Rehearsal Studio and Hair Care Products Storage Facility on a typical "band night."
Waals' research and observations on primate political manuvering even explain Kenton's devotion to 15 minute drum solos and the increasingly large, complex and magificently gleaming drum kits he hauls around. To wit:
..."What chimpanzees do with charging displays - with their hair on end, drumming on anything that amplifies sound, uprooting little trees as they go...this diplay both draws attention to the male and impresses his audience. One alpha male in the Mahale Mountains National Park in Tanzania developed the habit of dislodging enormous boulders so he could roll them down a dry river bed, producing a thunderous noise. One can imagine the awe with which others watched a spectacle that they couldn't match. The performer would then sit down, waiting for his audience to approach."
Then there's this, which could be a descirption of KDOG sitting at his drum set: "I once visited the Forbidden City in Bejing - four times the size of Versailles, then times that of Buckingham Palance - with its beautifully decorated buildings surrounded by gardens and vast squares. It wasn't hard to imagine Chinese emperors ruling from elaborate thrones designed to overlook enormous squatting masses, intimidating them with their splendor."
Once you start seeing yourself as a primate, life makes a lot more sense. My "stage act," which includes big amps, loud soloing, jumping around and the singing of dirty lyrics ("I just wanna play with your poodle."), is obviously a berserk mating and dominance display. I sometimes feel sad when I contemplate this image of myself. On the other hand, it's a great way to totally embaress your teenaged children!
Waal notes that chimp politics and power struggles are often violent. He describes two chimps turning on a former comrade, beating and biting him to death. The coupe de grace: they squeezed the poor devil's scrotal sac so hard, the testicles popped out like grapes and landed in the straw on the floor. Anyone who has had a meeting with Dick Cheney or Karl Rove knows the feeling.
The point of being the dominant male is to control the food supply and access to desireable females. ("You want a banana, baby? Just come see me sometime.") Alpha males in primate societies sometimes mount the lesser males, just to let them know who's "on top." Human males don't do this. They say "fuck you." The message is the same: "I can mount you if I feel like it and you can't do anything about it."
The band needs a clear hierarchy. Everyone knows their place and their role, without righting about it, just like in rigid social caste systems. The band can function comfortably. Many bands suffer death by democracy. The constant fighting and voting tears them apart. Like any smart chimp, Kenton and I know that you can't rule alone. You need alliances. Between us, Kenton and I control all apects of band life, from money to music. I think we understand that there will be no single alpha male in KDOG, since the others would soon topple him. So we have an alliance. An uneasy one, at times.
If it came down to a fight, Kenton could tear me apart. He's short, but solid and strong as, yes, an ape. I sometimes think those robust, rib crushing hugs he dispenses whenever we meet or part company are a way of reminding me who is physically stronger. I realize they're also a display of Kentons personal warmth and affection, which are in great supply. But I never forget that we're just a couple of primates.
It's been a productive struggle. The band is growing musically. I've learned a lot about the concept of "letting it rip" from Kenton. Kenton knows what it means to be a friend, too - something one or two people in my life have forgotten.
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Nick Is Back!

The miracle has happened. Prayers were answered. The heart surgery was successful. Nick returned to the World Famous Mojo Dojo and Hair Care products storage facility last night. A little skinnier, maybe. Just a hint of his zipper scar peeping out from his open collar. It's hard to believe that just a month ago, he had coronary arteries that were up to 97 percent blocked. He played harp and sang his signature tunes "Bug Eyed Willie" and "Urban Spawning" with verve. We intend to write a new blues about his heart sugery experience. Possible title: Zipper Man. I like that title. It's not too on the nose. It's not sentimental in any way. It should include references to having his Love Delivery System shaved by a Filipino nurse. For the record: Nick is not cleared for sexual activity of any kind, including the famous "Rattlesnake Shake." He has to be able to climb two flights of stairs first. (Another great lyrical image: "I climbed two flights of stairs/just to see you baby/It took me three months/You'd better be ready." Writing songs is easy! I feel just like Hal David at moments like this.) Dru, the new bass man, was also on hand, as was our leader, founder, drummer and primary inspiration, Kenton "KDOG" Lee. It was a short rehearsal - 6 to 7:30 p.m. The taiko drumming group had a class next door. We didn't want to cheese them off too badly. KDOG is in good shape. We've got three guys singing. Dru can actually "Tush," "All Right Now," and "Come Together" in their original keys - he can go high, much higher than Nick or myself. We're baritones. Dru is also on pitch, usually. A real musical breakthrough for this band. We're back at the mojo dojo Monday night. We're a band again. It's a relief. The last two months of civilian life reminded me why I started all this nonsense in the first place. Taxes, work, grocery shopping, bill paying, helping the church raise money and being a pillar of the community hardly provide the thrills of playing "La Grange" at maximum volume in a unheated storage space that smells like hair conditioner.
©2007 Edward D. Chance ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Nick's Dream

This is the third and final part in the story of Nick's triple-bypass, a reminder of just how imperfect "Intelligent Design" really is.
Nick may be returning to the harmonca and vocal chair as early as this week. Check Geezer Rock for updates as we continue our bullshit journey of love and healing with Nick.
When we last left our hero, he was hallucinating in his intensive care bed. In his heavily medicated mind, he had taken on the diseases and infirmities of all the patients in the ward after dreamily listening to the nursing staff discuss patient charts during shift changes.
Nick: So the doctor came in. And of course, I’ve been listening now to a couple of days of these nurses reviewing my chart, which was in actuality, everybody’s chart. And so my brother came to visit. I said, “Phil, when the doctor comes in, I don’t want you to say a word. “ The doctor comes in. And I start asking him, “are the chambers of my heart functioning right? Is there any sort of this kind of damage or that kind of damage?” And he’s kind of looking at me like “This is awfully technical medical stuff that you’re asking me about.” But he just said, “We got good results. You are going to live another 30 years, if not forever. You can either worry about it or not worry about it. And I would suggest don’t worry about it.” And I go, “Okay, thank you doctor.” And my brother Phil says, “Where in the hell did you get all of that shit?” Then I realized, “Ah, I’ve been laying here for three days, on medication, listening to all this stuff. My mind is just going through some sort of wild drug trip.” So I calmed down after that. So the next day the moved me (out of intensive care) and who should be my roommate but Mr. Peabody. The next two nights were a real trip with him. In the day, he’s absolutely the sweetest guy. No maintenance. But in the night, the dementia’s kicking in. So the first night, he peed the bed. So he’s getting up, trying to clean up. And believe me, I could’ve easily peed the bed myself, too. You’re pretty much incapacitated. He’s on a heart monitor. So they can tell that there’s activity. So the nurses come in and say “What’s going on, Mr. Peabody?” And he says, “I don’t know.” And they said, “Did you pee the bed?” And says, “I think so.” And they said, “Okay, we’ll, that’s all right. You just sit there and we’ll clean it up.” So they clean it up. And Mr. Peabody is asking, “What’s this an indication of?” The nurse tells him, “It means you’re tired.” And he goes, “Oh, okay.” So they got him back to bed. That was night one. Of course, on night two, he poops the bed. Same type of thing. As they’re cleaning him up, he says something to the female nurse that neither she nor I could hear. So she whispers, “What?” And he says, “I love you.” So she said, “I love you, too.” It was really quite beautiful. It was pretty rough, physically. But I’m doing more things. I’m shaving and I’m walking. Kind of getting back to normal. I didn’t really want to eat very much. I became nauseous.
Q: I talked to you on the phone on Saturday. Much to my great relief.
Nick: Yeah. I made it a point to answer the phone when anybody called. Now it’s a week after that call and I feel great. I just feel great. I thought the gig was last night. I thought, “I should go down and sing one song: Crossroads.” And I kinda practiced it. But then the gig was canceled.
Q: I told the Long Suffering Mrs. Chance that. She was appalled that you’d even consider such a thing.
Nick: I definitely could’ve done it tonight. But last night, I was feeling pretty good and stuff. I thought you guys would trip out to see me come through the door. Even if it was at sound check.
Q: So you’re ready to rock and work on some new tunes?
Nick: For sure.
Q: I think that Super Ego on Vacation becomes more meaningful now.
Nick: Oh yeah.
Q: You even have a poem called “A Surgeons Hands” in your book, “Nick was Right and Other Absurdities.” What in the hell was that about?
Nick: That was kind of about how I wanted to donate my body to science and kind of let kids practice cutting me up into pieces.
Q: Okay. Um, were you ever at any point during your heart treatment concerned that the evil medical machine was planning to place you in suspended animation and harvest your organ to sell to Chinese millionaires?
Nick: No. But Dave asked me if I had any sort of epiphany. You know, I had a very, well, it kinda was an unnerving dream. But, as it turned out, it was a very settling and peaceful dream. I dreamt that I was visited by my mother and father. They were dressed in the “Full Cleveland” styles. My dad was in a blue polyester shirt. Black belt. Blue, baby blue, polyester pants. Black shoes. He looked just like he looked in the 60s. And my mother was dressed in a shift. And they came into this room and there were no features in the room. Nothing. Just whiteness. But it is like a room. So they came in. They had concerned looks on their faces. Then they both turned and left. I thought, “Wow, this is odd.” And then, all of a sudden, this room filled with people. People that I didn’t really know. Just lots of different people. I woke up. I felt a little unnerved. And then I understood that it meant that “we’re concerned about you, but it’s not your time yet. It’s our time to go. We’ll be back. But your life is going to be filled with other people.” So my brother, the night before I went in, said “Do you want me to get you a priest?” I said, “No.” I didn’t have any concern that I might perish on the table. All because of that dream.
Next: Nick and the other founding members of the Bittermen Blues Band tell, in their own words, the incredible saga of the ultimate Geezer Rock Band! Bad gigs! Great gigs! Intra-band Rivalries! Don’t miss it!
©2007 Edward Dean Chance ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Geezers Who Give It Up!

Last night, Tommy Dunbar played a special gig with the Dick Bright Orchesta -a 50th birthday bash that our friend Jack Gallagher threw for his wife Jean.
Jack is a nationally known comedian (Tonight Show, Conan, etc.) who does a lot of work with Tommy and I with our radio production company, Basemental.
It was the best party I've been to in years. Dick and Tommy gave a masterclass on their "entertain or else" approach to playing a party.
Tommy is married to my wife's sister, as readers of the Geezer Rock Blog will recall. He was the kind of kid who got sent to the hall for "acting up" and "being silly." ("There's a difference between acting up and being silly, mister Dunbar!")
The sight of a camera often brings out this tendencyin "Uncle Tom." This first photo was taken during the tuning up and sound check portion of the evening. The band wasn't even playing yet.
Tommy's rules for giving a good performance are simple:
• Remember, it's called "show" business.
• Don't fake it. Be yourself. But exaggerate yourself. If you're the sensitive singer songer writer type, really go for it. Weep constantly and finish your show by overdosing right there on stage, then invite the audience to the emergency room while you have your stomach pumped. Tommy exaggerates himself by giving full reign to his "acting up" tendencies.

The next photo shows Tommy "giving it up" during an extended solo on the Electric Prunes' "I Had Too Much to Dream Last Night," a song requested by the birthday girl.
When the guest of honor requests a song, you can't phone it in or act bored, even if you've played it a million times and the sound the the melody is like a dental drill boring into your eardrums.
I got there with the camera a few seconds too late. Tommy had been laying on his back and kicking his legs in the air while riffing wildly.
Which brings up another rule:
• Be willing to lose control. Tommy called this the "giving it up" priniciple. When your band plays are you giving it up?
Remember, Tommy is a 50 year old man who now qualifies for the senior discount at all-you-can eat casino buffets nationwide.
Dick Bright, the bandleader, has a few years on Tommy. Between sets, he grumps about being old and needing to sit down. But when it's time to "surf dance," he ignores any phsycial limitations and show the audience how to "shoot the tube" right there on the dance floor.

Of course, being a solid gold ham, I had to get in on the act. I am not worthy to play guitar with the Dick Bright Orchestra, but when the cry went up for "more cowbell," I was up to the job.
This was my second gig as what Dick Bright calls "The Cowbell Svengali." The first took place at the San Francisco Bark and Whine ball, a annual SPCA fund raiser where rich people dance with their dogs. This mind-bendingly fun event rates a Geezer Rock Blog post of its own.

Later, during a percussion breakdown, I was doing a showy bit where I play the cowbell between my own legs. I manage to smash my index finger and nail myself in the testicles. Fortunately, the wild cheers of the audience numbed the shooting pains.
All these antics are not an example of covering up for lame musicianship. (Except in my case.) The guys in Dick's band are outstanding, in-demand players. It's a matter of realizing that it's a party. It's supposed to be fun. The band has to lead the charge.
If you're too cool to put on a show, you're wrong for the gig.
Watching Dick and the band, I recalled an interview with Louie Prima's trombone player. Prima invented the Vegal Lounge Act and his hyper-charged showmanship made him a favorite of both tourists and big-shot entertainers like Sinatra. (Brian Setzer had a hit covering Prima's "Jump, Jive and Wail." David Lee Roth did Prima's "Just A Gigilo." Prima rocked!)
"Quality music - he (Prima) demanded that," trombonist Lou Sima said. "But as far as trying to prove you're an artist - forget it."
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Nick vs. The Impacted Turd

This is part two of Nick's open heart surgery adventures. Look at that manly scar! Now you know why they call guys who have undergone the bypass as belonging to "the zipper club." All I know is that Nick's personal account of heart surgery presents a different picture of the hospital experience than is presented on the Sutter Memorial website.
Nick: That just blew me away. And I immediately started mourning. I think what I was morning was loss of control of my body. The fact that I couldn’t eat any better or walk any more or take a Rolaid or some sort of mind-altering drug. This was something that was now out of my control. I started to cry. Quite softly. But not out of pity or anger or anything like that. It was more, like I said, mourning. I’ve done all the right things. I shouldn’t be hearing this. So, after a little while, I composed myself. This all took place within an hour. The surgeon came in. He’s probably 45 years old. He said, “I’m going to do your bypass. I’m going to take good care of you. So don’t worry. He said, “Look. This is all about genetics. I can see that you’ve taken good care of yourself. It’s about your family history.” And I continued to hear that throughout my whole say in the hospital, from the nurses and from other doctor who came in. And the surgeon told my brother – he said, “Look. You need to get checked.” So he said he’s going to do the procedure and that we’d do it the next day. And then they rolled me to a room. Then people started coming in to visit, once more and more people heard. Dave came. One thing I did learn from this whole thing is, you know what? Visiting people in the hospital is a great thing to do. I will definitely make more time to do that. Because it just made the time pass. So they left. At 10 p.m., they started the prep. I took a shower. They shaved more – basically everything.
Q: For you, that must have been an intensive procedure. Did the fly in a specialist from the Gillette Corporation?
Nick: I think she was from Fiji.
Q: Oooooooh. That’s erotic.
Nick: Anyway, all this is happening. I got there at 5:30. I didn’t get to sleep until about 11.
Q: Did you sleep?
Nick: Yeah, I did. I slept pretty well. Except that my roommate needed to have an impacted turd physically removed from his colon. He’s about 75. He got constipated. I thought to myself, “Oh, great. Look what I have to look forward to..”
Q: All the more reason to rock now.
Nick: Rock now. Because you may suffer from impacted turds later. When they actually did it, he kind did that Little Richard “Whoooooooooo!” He was brave about it. But he let out a couple of “Oooooooohs.”
Q: That’s a juicy detail. And this is what the Geezer Rock blog is all about.
Nick: I finally got to sleep. The next morning, my family started coming in. I didn’t want it to be a big, dramatic thing, but they came. They wheeled me in to pre-op. The anesthesiologist comes in and says, “This is what’s going to happen. My family in there, sitting off to the side. And I’m thinking, it’s almost like I’m in a coffin and they’re mourners. So finally, my family goes off into the waiting room and they roll me in. The only thing that I can really remember from here until I woke up was this light that almost look like the bottom of a spaceship. You know how in the movies where you see the spaceship coming down? It was like one of those. I don’t remember anything after that. I was out. The next thing I remember was the nurse saying “Oh, yeah, go in there, he’s sleeping. Wake up, Mr. Ciani. Your family’s here.” I’m groggy. I want to wake up. I open my eyes kind of to say, “I got through that. I’m here.”
Q: Then you go to intensive care for a couple of days.
Nick: They have you medicated on a lot of things. I’m in and out the whole time. Friends are coming in the whole time. The television is playing with no sound. I’m just seeing these loops of…storyboards. One after another. The nurses are monitoring all your vital functions all the time. Especially the first day. They’re checking your catheter. They’re checking this and they’re checking that. It seemed like constantly. People are there. Lots of people. But at night, intensive care gets very strange. Eight-thirty, nine o’clock and night, all the patients are there, quiet. But the people at intensive care, the people who work there are…partying. It didn’t bother me. A lot of banter. “Who wants dinner?” They’re playing cards out there. My door was open. It was really healing. There’s life going on. So you’re not focused on what’s going on with you. So all that’s going on. Then, this guy, who ultimately becomes my roommate later on, Mr. Peabody (not his real name), who is 83 years old and has dementia. I hear them telling him, “Mr. Peabody, where are you going?” And Mr. Peabody says, “I don’t know.” And they tell him, “Go back to bed.” Now, I can’t even lift my head up off the pillow. And Mr. Peabody, who’s had the same procedure that I had, is getting ready to go somewhere. So, you know, I’m making mental notes of this. And with every shift change, nurses are briefing each other about their patients. All this is going on outside my door. So every chart they’re reading, I know start to think they’re talking about me. And so, it’s been a day or so now. I can’t even stand up and walk to the bathroom. You don’t know how many days have gone by. The next night, the same thing. Mr. Peabody is getting up and he’s ready to go somewhere. He doesn’t know where he’s going. But he’s got to get up and go somewhere. The next day, they sent him on. I got pretty upset. I didn’t know how many days I had been there. And it seemed like people were getting out of the intensive care and I wasn’t. I wasn’t getting out of bed. And here’s Mr. Peabody, he’s about ready to go tap dancing.
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Nick Under the Knife 1

Here's Nick, looking skinnier but good, about a week after his semi-emergency triple bypass surgery. When I arrived at his house, he was walking along McKinley Boulevard more briskly than the typical 50-year-old American, decked out in his signiture down vest. This garment, like most of Nick's wardrobe, hasn't been in style for years. He looks a lot of Marty McFly in Back to the Future.
Nick immediately agreed to violate all aspects of doctor-patient confidentiality, on tape, for total exposure in the Geezer Rock blog. "I'm public property now," Nick said, taking a seat on his couch.
If you plan on persuing Geezer Rock stardom, this is an important lesson: admit everything publicly, like Nick. This way, the scandal sheets can't blackmail you later. From my perspective, a cooperative subject like Nick saved me the time and trouble involved with bribing his caregivers for juicy tidbits and hiding in his bushes, waiting to leap out paparazzi style for exclusive photos as Nick returns from his therapeutic walks.
Here is the first half of our interview.
Q: So I want to get your reaction on tape to this news: I get an e-mail from Player X last night that says “in view of al the delays, I think it’s best that I leave the band KDOG at this time.
Nick: You know what? Here’s my reaction. I kind of knew that he was shaky. I kind of felt like that. As far as the gig that we were supposed to have at the Hilltop – that had to happen. Or we’d lose Player X. As it turns out, that’s what happened. You know, Dave (Mering) came to me and said the band should not play out of respect for my situation, but you guys have a lot of time and money invested in the band and it had to go on. (Director’s commentary: Dave Mering is Nick’s childhood pal – and a long time friend of mine, too.)
Q: I talked to Dave. He told me the same thing. I said, “Dave, we’ve got to keep going or there won’t be a band for Nick to come back to.” He just reacted that way because Kenton drives him crazy sometimes. He said, “Dean, if you were hit by a bus tomorrow, Kenton would go on as a solo act.”
Nick: He’s roll us in there as cadavers. I think when you go out on Craig’s List to find these guys (like Player X), there’s mercenary guys who want to get plugged into a band and start working.
Q: I’m through with Craig’s List. I’m going to try networking. Everybody knows somebody who knows somebody who wants to be in a band.
Nick: Who wants to Geezer Rock?
Q: Right. You look great. You lost some weight.
Nick: I probably lost about 10 pounds. But I feel good. I really do feel good. I went to a strange health farm where they reconfigured my pipes and I lost 10 pounds.
Q: Any good-looking nurses?
Nick: You know what? They were all good looking. The weird thing about it is I was going through all kinds of almost like psychotic episodes. The nurses would come in and they’d be in color. Then after awhile they’d be gray. This applied to everybody. But the nurses were great. They were absolutely fantastic. The care that I got was just extraordinary.
Q: Let’s go back to Monday night – the Monday you came in and said “No, I don’t want a 99-cent Double Cheeseburger.”
Nick: I was pretty much going to keep this all to myself. I had just done the stress test. The doctor said, “You have a problem.” With some gravity in his voice. He said “We’re going to have you do a heart cath on Friday. You may need a medication. Or you may need a stent. It’s something we can treat.
Q: Whey did they suddenly change their minds about acid reflux?
Nick: Well, I scheduled a colonoscopy with the primary care guy since I’m 50. When you’re fifty you need to have these tests. I did through him an upper gastro. You know, when you drink the barium. That showed mild reflux. So there was some reason to believe that this pressure feeling could be caused by that. Some months went on. Finally, I got tired of it. So I called him and I said “Schedule me for a colonoscopy.” Then when I went in for my workup on that, I asked the gastro guy “Look, when I’m walking I get these gas pains. They go away, sometimes with burping, sometimes without burping.” I had been trying to figure this out for myself. I had been surfing Web MD almost every day. I probably have 100,000 hits on there. I got to the point where I thought I had some sort of peanut allergy. That’s how crazy I was getting. So this proctologist said, “you know, I don’t think this sounds like acid reflux. I want you to go back to your internist and I want him to do an EKG on you. I want to rule out the possibility that this is a heart situation. So he ran an EKG on me. And there was just a little abnormality. A little blip where it should’ve stayed straight. He said “Well, I’m going to send you to a cardiologist.” So I went in a talked to him. The first thing he did was a family history. He didn’t talk symptoms. (Nick’s dad died from a massive heart attack at 55.) He wanted the whole heart profile. Fortunately, I knew it pretty well. He said “okay, let’s schedule you for an echo stress.” I had an echo stress five years ago. It turned out absolutely normal. So fast forward. Monday, I go in and that gal’s prepping. She says, “Don’t be worried. He really pushes his patients so you may be on this thing (the treadmill) 15 minutes. So she got me all hooked up. The got me on the treadmill. The EKG is printing out as I’m going. He said, “If you feel any symptoms, let me know immediately.” So we went through stage one. No problems at all. So we go to stage two. It’s a little faster, with a slight incline. Then I started feeling the pressure. Just a little. It’s really vague. After I told him that, he said, “Okay, I’m going to have you stop. So we stopped. I sat down. He’s shuffling papers and moving his eyeglass around. I could see there was something of interest there. Finally he said, “You have a problem.” At that point, I was kind of mildly shocked. Then he went over to check the screen with his assistant. And I said, “Wow, there’s something compelling enough there.” He said, “I think you have a problem. I don’t think it’s too much. We’d like for you to have a heart cath.” He looked at my schedule and said “Let’s do it on Friday.” This was Monday. I came to practice. It was a couple of hours after all of this. I noticed the bag of 99-cent burgers. That was really conflicting for me. I wanted to dive right in. But I didn’t think that was advisable. I didn’t want to tell anybody. But I thought I should at least tell you guys.
Q: If it had been me or Kenton, it would have been the first thing discussed: “I’m dying! I’m dying! Can you make it to my funeral if we schedule it for Saturday?”
Nick: But the number of people I was going to tell was pretty small. Obviously, I didn’t know what was going to happen.
Q: Of course, I immediately put it up on the Geezer Rock Blog, which sort of killed your plan to keep it quiet. I think that’s how Dave found out.
Nick: I saw the gleam in your eye as you thought, “Oh, this would be perfect for the Geezer Rock Blog. This could be a gem.” I public property now. I thought that was funny. By Tuesday, I thought “You know, man, I don’t want to be sweating this thing until Friday.” So I called and they could fit me on Wednesday. Anyway, Dave called me on Tuesday night after reading the blog and said, “What the hell is going on?” I said, “Oh, nothing. I’m just sitting around here watching TV.” And he says, “No, I’m talking about the blog. You’re having a test on Friday?” I said, “No, I moved it to tomorrow.” We joked quite a bit about it. As a hypochondriac, I’ve been through lots of exams and you can tell that these exams now that I’m getting, there’s a lot more interest and there’s a lot more energy that’s going on in the rooms. You know, as a hypochondriac, you go in and say, “Well, my foot kinda hurts and my finger kinda hurts and I’m kinda limping and I’m burping occasionally. And they go, “Oh, really.” “So doctor – what is that? “Uh, I don’t know but here’s a prescription for whatever.” It wasn’t like that here. People were actually interested. Anyway, so I moved my cath procedure up to Wednesday. The time line’s getting kind of fuzzy here. So it’s Wednesday, 5:30 in the morning and I’m standing in line with three 80 year old men, filling out my paperwork. The real geezers.
Q: Did you ask them if any of them played bass or wanted to be in a band?
Nick: I’m going to talk about this guy Mr. Peabody later. (This is not the man’s real name.) He may make a great lead singer. Anyway, I’m standing in line with these three 80 year old men and everybody’s looking at me like “Well, this guy’s pretty young.” So they take me in and they get me all shaved down. The gal who shaved me had a bit of a sense of humor because she left a patch like this. (Editor’s Note: Nick has what now might be called a “Brazilian Wax” with a little moustache like patch of hair floating over his “love delivery system.”)
Q: I think she’s going to be calling you up later.
Nick: Yeah. So, they roll me in and my doctor comes in and they do the heart cath. And there’s probably about five technicians in there now. And they’re moving stuff around. They start shooting the dye. And now again, the same type of energy. People were moving around, things were shifting. People are interested in what they’re seeing. This is not just ‘Oh, he’s got one little vein that’s jumping around.” I’m thinking, “oh, they’re going to give me some Xanax or some medication for my heart or they might do a stent. That’s basically what they had proposed. So they roll me out of there. They roll me past the receptionist. And she goes “hey, I know you, don’t I? Where would I know you from?” I said, “Probably from walking out in front of the hospital every morning. Which I do. That was my normal route. I walk there, between 3 and 5 miles every morning. So she probably saw me walking. I said, “I shouldn’t be here.” So they roll me (into recovery). And after 15 minutes or so, my doctor came in and said, “Uh, you have to have a bypass.”

Next: Nick goes under the knife and bunks with a confused elderly patient in intensive care! Plus: shocking photos of Nick's scar!
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Nick Returns. Sort Of.

Nick came to rehearsal last night to check out Dru. He looked good. We've been trying to get together to write songs, but mild medical complications keep interfering.
First, he had low blood pressure. I guess the medications were out of whack. I suggested immediate exposure to Kenton. A good band fight will should cause an immediate spike. I wonder what Kenton charges as a co-pay? Would Blue Shield cover this "treatment?"
Then he had an infection. "An infection around my heart area," is how he put it. Nick told me that it only sounds like a death sentence. It's a pretty typical complication. His temperature hit 101 and he felt a distinct lack of pep.
Nick started cardiac therapy. I asked him if how long it would be before he'd receive medical clearance for me to send him two hookers and a trampoline. He said he'd let me know.
But last night, Nick came to rehearsal for 30 minutes. He didnt' play or sing. He just sat on the couch while we did "Red House," and "Come Together." He seemed to like what he heard.
I know I loved seeing him back at the Mojo Dojo.
Dru sounded great, as usual. He picks up new tunes quickly. He can sing harmony too. One of the most enjoyable part of the evening was working out the new arrangement of "Brown Eyed Zombie," a combination of "Browned Eyed Girl" and "I Walked with a Zombie." Dru and I sang a little harmony on Brown-Eyed Girl." I picked up the melody and he sang a high part.
We must have 60 songs to work on. I don't know how we can do this with only 2 1/2 hours a week. Well, we can. But it's going to take a lot of weeks. And what's going to happen if Dru's other band comes back on-line?
©2007 Edward Dean Chance. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.