First of all… to all the readers out there that are worried that we are constantly fighting and on the verge of breaking up… I would like to announce my NEW band… Gary and the New Blue Sky Riders!!! (Featuring Gary).

Seriously, everyone can calm down. I know that the concern over this does not rank up there with Iran acquiring nuclear weapons but people do seem to think we are one slice away from being toast. We’re not. We are a band and bands argue. I have been arguing with band mates since I was 17 and convinced that the bass player was setting his amp six inches closer to the front of the stage than my guitar amp so he would be louder and get more girls. It’s normal. We are creative people and that makes us severely unbalanced and hard to reason with without a whip and a chair.

Secondly, I would like to talk about last week. We went to LA to play the Grammy After party. It was a wonderful experience, a thrill of a lifetime. I cannot help wondering why this thrill of a lifetime had to come in the cocktail hours of my life/career? The whole thing would have been soooo much easier when I was twenty five years old. You want examples? I got examples:

  • At 25 I didn’t have to stand on stage and wonder if the cameraman shooting the stage for the jumbotron was behind me making my bald spot look like it’s a lake in Wisconsin.
  • At 25 I could go to the dining room between soundcheck and show and fall face first into the plates of cookies and cakes and not stop till I hit porcelain. Today I have to sift thru the salad to make sure I don’t accidentally eat any bell peppers (which can kill me like a gastric ninja assassin. That’s the working title of my book, by the way: Gary Burr, Gastric Ninja Assassin!)
  • At 25 I didn’t have to worry about buttoning my vest. The airplane ride? The last tour where I ate everything in sight and parts of Orange County are still missing? When did THIS happen? At my age all I have to do is SAY the word “Pastry” and one more button doesn’t fasten. I have till the wedding to lose 115 pounds. Doable.
  • At 25 I could look out at the pretty girls in front of me watching the show and not feel, well… creepy. These days if I have our guitar tech approach one and ask her to come backstage it’s because she looks like a registered nurse and might know how to work a defibrillator. (Georgia has read and approved this message)
  • At 25 at the end of the night I could carry my guitar case out to a taxi without saying “Oh, I’m gonna feel this in the morning.” Granted I have a guitar case that weighs 500 lbs and could withstand the Dresden bombing but there WAS a time I could schlep it thru a lobby and not actually HEAR ligaments tearing.

It’s very exciting and rewarding to have a chance like this at ANY age so I am only complaining because I am so damn GOOD at it.

That’s all for now. I am going to pick up the phone and call Kenny and yell at him for something.

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