I had no idea when we pulled into Columbus, Ohio that the gig would mark my solo debut on stage but it had been a long, strange tour and tonight was no different. Columbus always held a special place in our hearts ever since we had to cancel our first show there in 1987 when our van dropped its transmission on the Jersey Turnpike. I still remember the phone call that I had to make to the promoter at Staches and promising to make it up at some point. I think we made good finally, in February of ’89 on a bill with 11th Dream Day when both bands combined to rip the roof off the place.
This Wednesday night, however, we just wanted to put on a good show for the nice people of Ohio and get on the road for our Friday night showcase in NYC. I don’t recall anything unusual about the set but, when we finished our set and left the stage to raucous applause, I grabbed a beer from backstage and headed back out on stage for our encore. Now, I’ll freely admit that the Big Dipper was generally ‘encore whores’, and it didn’t take much more than someone coughing loudly to get us to do a curtain-call, but for some reason, I found myself alone on stage with the rest of the band nowhere to be seen. I stalled for a minute before realizing that they had no intention of joining me. I decided that, rather than disappoint the Columbians once again, I’d have some fun and so I grabbed Gary’s guitar and launched into a solo version of Neil’s ‘Rockin’ in the Free World’. a song that we’d been encoring with all tour. I managed to remember all the words and when it came time for the big solo, I stomped on all of the effects pedals and made a caterwauling racket instead, bringing it down for the last verse before finishing big and leaving the stage to even more applause.
I’m still not sure why the band decided not to play the encore that night but it felt to me like a turning point. The next day was a driving day, 500 miles to our hotel in New Jersey, just across the river from Manhattan. It would give me a lot of time to think.
Tomorrow: Pearls of wisdom from Brad Delp and Tom Scholz.
Calculating Route... 