Just wanted to update things a little. We had our first gig last week playing instrumental jazz (just the guys, no female singer this time). Our drummer is also an excellent trombonist, the bass player brought his standup and I brought out my Heritage hollowbody. We played dinner music for a banquet, basically an hour of Misty and Moonglow for $100 each and a fancy dinner. Not bad for a first gig.
Our bass player is trying to book us a showcase at the school where he teaches. That would be the full band doing rock and modern country tunes (White Rabbit, Here for the Party, etc.) for maybe a half hour for a small stipend (maybe $50 each?) Great opportunity to get our feet wet anyway.
One snag we've hit is that I've done kind of a lousy job picking tunes for us to learn. I wasn't really paying attention and I've got us learning a lot of modern stuff with tricky stops in the music. It makes the rehearsals really long and intense which hurts the band's enthusiasm a bit. I need to throw in some more Honky Tonk Women-type songs so we can just have some fun playing rock 'n' roll. Still, in the long run, I think audiences will really appreciate our variety and the fact that we can play some radio-friendly hits along with the moldy oldies.
Guess that's it for now. It's kind of fun "blogging" my progress here, I hope that's okay. I thought it might be entertaining and informative for you folks if I shared my experiences starting up a new cover band after not having played in one for a few years. And I certainly appreciate your ideas and responses.
Take care everybody.
Tony