a free form jazz odyssey in front of a festival crowd

ok, G’s, lots has happened since I soaked myself in Snapple, lets get right into it in typical Steve Weiss fashion; 100 miles per hour, bobbing my head to a song only I can hear, leaving everyone in the dust except those adventerous enough to try a taste of my fast paced live hard die young rock and roll fest of a lifestyle. By live hard die young, I pretty much mean hang out and be healthy, save for a few late night Falafels which we will get to later.

Keiko Jones called me back last monday. I had worked the longest on air shift ever- 6hrs the night before from midnight to 6am, so I was out of it. She called me around noon, and invited me over Wednesday at 1:00, needless to say I didnt get back to sleep. Elvin Jones is pretty much god on the drums. Listen to Coltrane: Live At Birdland, and you will very soon realize that. His playing is simply and explosion, just a machine gun of percussive noise pummeling you in the face, unrelenting, until you finally admit to defeat and burn and dream you ever had of becomming that good. That being said, I set out on my quest to purchase a relic of this man, hoping the vibe would some how still be alive within the drum, transforming me into a player beyond my wildest dreams, and soon after I was going to buy the Empire State Building.

I cashed my paycheck Wednesday morning, designating it as “Elvin Money”. I treked up to the Jones Pad on 101 and Central Park West. I arrived a bit early, hung out in the park, which is beautiful up there, and reflected on the genius that is Elvin. Mid reflection, I recieved a call from WFUV telling me I had been awarded a pair of tickets to see Particle at Irving Plaza. My pledge of 120 is getting close to being paid off….Web Master T Bone is getting the other ticket, sorry Moochers.

At around 12:56, I headed to La Casa De Jones, awaiting some astounding mysteries of the percussive universe. And by that, I mean really old drums. Wellll, I go up to the doorman, there is a small line, the man in front of me is Gregg Kaplinger, a friend of Elvin’s- the doorman tells him to go to floor 7, and me to floor 5. What I soon learned, Is that the rumors were true, Elvin kept 2 apartments in the same building, one to live in and one JUST for drums. And when i say that, I dont mean like a kit in the center and a few furnishings, i mean SOLELY FUCKING DRUMS and cymbals. The amount was mindblowing. Easily over 1000 cymbals. Keiko was extremely nice to me, we talked for a bit, and she told me to look for anything I wanted, with the help of Gregg. We began rummaging through cymbals, but Elvin’s Coltrane era Zildjians were going for 5K a piece, Ouch. His Coltrane kick drum…3 grand…again, ouch. What I did end up getting was a 1968 Round Badge Gretsch kick drum, played on his first solo album, a beautiful thing. I plan to keep it as long as I live, making sure everyone I know is aware of it, and how freaking cool it makes me for owning it. Don’t believe what your parents tell you, its totally possible to buy “Cool” , you just have to know what to buy. Jigga What?? yeah, thats right.

Let us conitnue with the events Post Kick Drum. The rest of the week was pretty much a blur. I worked several overnights, did the rest of the week’s shifts on WBGO, playing as much Elvin related records as I could, slept 12 hrs from 7am to 7pm on thursday, and thats about all I remember until yesterday.

Last night, was the Triumphant Return of The Food ODyssey. I arrived late since I had to work, but joined in for rounds 2-4 of cuisine. We determined a few new rules. The most important of which;

Rule 6-a, section 2: Throwing up is cheating, and will get you ejected from the odyssey, in traditional fashion, where we rip the badges off your uniform, if there were badges or a uniform, which we will soon determine if uniforms will be created once the 2005-6 budget is created.

we followed with some Belgian fries with Garlic Mayo, ooh yeah. Some Falafel, then the night ended with Gyoza, not bad.

This afternoon I took a trip up to CT. I have not driven much lately, so this was like a big road trip for me. As I was leaving the casa, I searched for the appropriate music, no cd’s were immediately available containing badass driving music, so I grabbed some David Byrne, and hit the road. At about the 2nd song, it wasnt working. I scoured the radio, not happening. Perhaps I needed some personal motivation? I reached for my Elvis sunglasses, I was clearly ready to rock and be rocked. I popped in a CD from the cd case left in the car by my dad, it was Jackson Browne.

No disrespect to JB (not james brown) but he doesn’t exactly “rock”. Speeding down 95, wearing Elvis Presely sunglasses, pumping “Running On Empty” is cool for about 2:30 sec, but after that…not so much. With hits like “The Pretender” and “Somebody’s Baby” soon to follow, the mission was aborted. I prayed for some old school rock and roll tunes on the radio, but my trusty FM failed. FUV had the Irish Hour, JackFM (Formerly CBS) was just not doing it, and KROCK was just sucking it up. So, I swallowed my pride and continued with the introspective mid 70’s songwriting styles of Jackson Browne. I exited the Merrit Parkway, and approached my destination, and flipped it to Krock, just to see if the signal came in. What was on….?

RUN TO THE HILLS…IRON MAIDEN. Man, i totally cranked that shit like it was 1984, speeding around corners, feelin it…for like 3 blocks. I was going to visit the girl, who recently had the wisdom teeth out. She lives with family, and I am still in the early impression stage, so I considered it too big of a risk to pull up, do a donut in the couldesac and stand on top of the car, giving it all I;ve got screaming “Run Toooooo the Hilllllllls, Run For Your Liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiife”, so I reluctantly turned of the radio, and resumed my unassuming demeanor. Little did they know, the rock and roll demon that is Steven Austin Weiss Esquire lurked just beneath the surface, ready to pounce without warning. Well, maybe some warning, but not much, because i’m a badass like that. You Know It Chico.