Ya’ll, I’m excervous about this. Nervited? 2 years ago I saw a post from Keith at The Boat looking for “tribute acts, especially Yacht Rock.” I had been really enjoying a lot of Yacht Rock Radio on SiriusXM and found that the music was deep in my bones. Stuff I remembered hearing on the radio as a child, or in my mom’s car. I contacted some of my favorite friends and bandmates to make this band. A LOT happened in the last two years including several personnel changes (for various person reasons, nothing dramatic), a pandemic that kept us just doing light practices in a back yard for a while, medical procedures that made the future of one voice uncertain, and a lot of learning some of the most complex and difficult music that any of us had ever tackled despite us all being long time professionals.
Appropriately, since it’s where this all started, we booked our debut gig at The Boat and it happens this Friday, 10/21. We held our last practice before the gig today. None of us are as ready as we want to be, but I’m not sure if we ever could be, being that we hold ourselves to a very high bar. The whole reason I booked the gig was that I knew we needed a target. A “Ready or not, that’s our debut” date. We will never be “done” learning, polishing and tightening these tunes and adding new ones. Every listen we discover new things or things to improve.
Well, it’s here. It’s time. in 5 days, 2 years of work comes to fruition. Our most recent member only joined 2 months ago and worked hard at getting up to speed. Will we be perfect? Absolutely not. Will there be mistakes? 100% probability. Will it be amazing, silly, fun, smooth and filled with some amazingly great music? Also 100% probability.
I plan to livestream it from the Yacht Z Facebook page, but it would definitely mean the world to us to have any of you there who can make it. Your energy, friendly faces, and love will feed us, and maybe if we’re lucky, the mistakes, or “clams” as we call them in the music world, won’t be too noticeable. The ship might have a few small leaks, but it’s going to be a smooth, grooving, fun ride. Please forgive my nervous, self-deprecating disclaimers. ‘Tis my nature. I live with excruciating transparency! She’s a good ship, the Yacht Z.
So yes, very excited. And very nervous. Excervous. Nervited.
-Heath