Joel's Jam Cruise 9 Wrap Up (+free music)
For those of you who have enjoyed life on Jam Cruise, you know how perfect of a way it is to start off the year. Umphrey's McGee played two shows on Jam Cruise for the first four years of it's existence, starting in January of 2004 on an 800 person hulking, gray dinosaur of a boat -- she was barely seaworthy. The event has grown equally in stature and expanded to a sold out 2500 person ship for the past three years, typically welcoming aboard a new orleans-tinged rotating cast of musicians and bands. Renowned musicians from Maceo Parker to Les Claypool to Dweezil Zappa have now all graced the stages of Jam Cruise. It's the best floating 5 day party in January in the world, that's for sure.
This year I was invited to be a special guest, and my main solo piano set in the atrium featured the music of Umphrey's McGee for solo piano. Being there without another bandmate was an interesting experience, but it seems like I know most of the musicians on the boat now, which makes the hang aspect of it that much more fun. While last year's embarkation weather was nasty cold, we arrived to Port Everglades this year to abundant sunshine with temps in the mid 70's. It takes all day to board the ship, so it doesn't pull out of port until around 5:30 or 6 pm. But the party starts right away with lots of action on the pool deck. I take the first day to hang out, talk to friends and make plans for some sit ins. I find myself spending most of my time on the pool deck as we head south into the warm, breezy air of the Caribbean. Many of the outside rooms on the MSC Poesia have balconies as well, and this is another great place to hang and watch the ocean, or sometimes Cuba go by.
When in nice weather, I like to move to "island time," meaning trying to get as much of daylight in as possible, especially in the winter months when the sun goes down around 4 pm for those in the Midwest U.S. When I talked to the Cornmeal cats the night before they were thoroughly surprised that anyone would want to sit in for their 11:30 am set, but I knew it would be a perfect time to be up and out. Indeed it was a glorious day, not a cloud in the sky. Cornmeal played to a great crowd on the deck, and I joined in the fray for the last 30 minutes of their set, alternatingly playing organ and piano. We played two of their originals and worked in Benny & the Jets, the Elton John classic, which I had also played with them at a UstorM benefit at Martyrs a few years ago. It was a blast and the energy those guys bring to the table slams.
One of the fans' favorite parts of Jam Cruise is the autograph signing, where the artists all gather in the swanky R32 Disco on the top deck (15) of the ship. I find myself entertained and often humbled by a lot of the interactions with the people that keep coming back to Jam Cruise or Umphrey's McGee year after year. This year I sat between my buddies the New Mastersounds, and a new friend, David Gans, who many of you might know as the voice of the Grateful Dead hour, but he is also a singer, songwriter and performer. David and I had a blast hangin and later got together for lunch in Honduras, There was more than once when we were hanging out and someone came over asking if he was who he was, then telling him that they thought they'd recognized his voice as they were walking by. I've never seen that happen before, but it was clear that David's audience truly gets and loves him.
Another of my favorite sit ins this year happened on the Solar Stage, a stage on the pool deck powered by solar energy & wind, later that day. I had hooked up with the Moog foundation people on board, and they kindly lent me their Little Phatty Minimoog, a smaller and slightly more user friendly version of my MiniMoog Voyager. Zach Deputy had a sunset performance lined up, and he welcomed me up there for two of his original songs, "Cellphone" and "She Says." The Little Phatty proved to be the perfect instrument for that sit in as I was able to create some cellphone like noises on cue, along with a ton of other melodic ideas over Zach's tasty loops. I could have stayed out there playin with him all day, he's an incredibly talented guy. He'll be playing some shows with us next month, so hopefully I'll get a chance to play with him again.
One of the highlights of the entire trip for me was having the Moog foundation aboard. They brought keyboards for the musicians to use, presented a fantastic workshop and for two nights, set up Moog Lab, an interactive area for fans and musicians to play the various Moog instruments together. Bob Moog's voice even made multiple appearances in the form of audio recordings from his archive, often explaining elements of the instrument and its composition in layman's terms, and calling his first design of the Moog an "abominatron." The workshop featured segments of explanation by Michelle Moog-Koussa, Fred, Wesley, Rich Vogel, Nigel Hall, Chris Tanfield (amazing Theremin player) and myself. At the end of it, we performed Billy Cobham's "Red Baron" with everyone, including Adam Deitch on drums. Finally, the Moog Lab was an amazing interactive experience where passengers on the cruise got to try their hand on Moog instruments. I joined in the fray both nights, playing with friends and fans as we created various soundscapes and moods with our instruments. I felt like a kid in a candy store, so much fun to be had.
There were many, many other highlights on the cruise, far too many to write about here, but when all was said and done, I had performed 10 times on this year's cruise. What a blast. If you haven't done a Jam Cruise yet, there's no better time to hop on board as nearly all of the trickier elements of the production of it have been hammered out--riding the ship is a smooth experience from start to finish. Maybe see you next year on Jam Cruise 10?
Here's a review of my "big adventure" from our friends at Hidden Track. And here's a link to the audio of my solo piano set that you can grab for free.
Joel