So I show up at a South Side Chicago club called the Burning Spear at around 9:00 on a Saturday morning.
I met the club owner, who was pissed because he had to get up early to meet me at the club. I start unloading the gear with the help of my Studio B Engineer, Ray Glower, and he says that the band will be here at 5:00 for a sound check.
I allowed myself a full 8 hours to set up. I not only was going to record this show live, but had the additional problem of having to do the live FOH mix as well.
I have everything rolled out and plugged in by 2:00. True to their word, the musicians show up at five, and by 5:45 I'm placing mics. I did a modest 8 mic setup on the drums, ran the two guitars direct and live, as well as the bass. I used ribbon mics on the horn section and an SM-57 (per Bobby) for the vocal.
I get everybody leveled out and EQed for tape (running a full 24 track MCI 2" deck from my Neotek Console) along with a Tascam 8 track backup. It's now 7:00 p.m. I get a quick level on the background vocals and have the guitar player sing one of the tunes into Bobby's mic because he has not shown up yet.
Alright, everything's cool, I'm all set and ready, the doors open. I'm the ONLY white guy in the entire house.
Purvis Spann gets up on stage and does his promo for his radio show and then introduces the band. The band lights up with an asskicker and I'm just smilin' cause everythings perfect. They finish the tune and:
Ladies and Gentleman, Mr. Bobby "Blue" Bland"
Bobby steps out on stage and the crowd goes crazy. The band plays the intro for Stormy Monday Blues and the crowd roars to a fever pitch. Bobby steps up to the mic and starts....."They call it Stormy Monday" and ....nothing!!!!!! I know he's singing cause I can see his lips move. I never realized until that moment that when he sings, it's almost a whisper. Now he looks down at me as I'm struggling to bring him up and everybody else down cause the mic is maxed for the monitor mix. "But Tuesday's just as bad" The only thing I could do was look up at him and chuckle and yell "I'll have it fixed by the time the "Eagle Flies." He gave me a quick wink and grinned. Everytime we've bumped into each other since then, we just look at each other, chuckle and say "by the time the Eagle Flies."
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