A Barking Dog

While not near as good (IMNSHO) as El Mariachi or Desparado, it still is in the style of those films. It shows that Rodriguez took the time between the second and third to do the Spy Kids flicks and a great deal of the big time Hollywood machine seems to have rubbed off on this, the final installment of the trio.

This isn’t a review of the film, but an account of my most recent tour of Mexico. Twelve concerts and a TV show in twenty four days, uncommon for a American based rock/pop artist. Usually, the larger acts do only Mexico City and perhaps Monterey. I thought it appropriate to see the latest installment of the Banderas lead flick the night before my departure, if only to set the tone for the month.

It all started so innocently, with a last minute one off in Seattle in August. I got a last minute call that a six piece all in ear band needed a Monitor Mel for a rehearsal and one off date in Seattle. The gig went well with an audio crew consisting of a third of the persons that were on the tour I did earlier this year. It wrapped and I went back to my new routine of being unemployed, looking for my next gig and racing my go kart. For me, it’s all about kart racing at this point, though I do enjoy gigging, just like in the old days. At the end of the gig, all the usual plesantries were exchanged and I thought nothing of it.

About a month later, I’m hanging in the shop, something I’ve been doing with more frequency though my gigs with the company, with the exception of tour dates and my accounts, are far and few between. I’m basically too expensive for most of the local and regional dates and I suppose I still have a propensity to be somewhat vocal at a gig if all is not going according to plan. At this point I could be called perhaps a whinner, if nothing else a grumpy middle aged man. My former partners are kind enough to store my kart and race trailer and allow me use of the shop to prep the kart and work on it. During a race week, I’m there more than I was when I was a full time employee. I digress… Anyway, I’m in the shop and the Production Manager of the act calls. Seems they’ve done a couple of dates in the month since I did the gig and haven’t clicked with a Monitor Mel yet. It’s been a different bloke every time and the leader asks that the “guy that did Seattle” be called to see if he is available for the work in the Fall. At the time it consisted of a three show run in So Cal and Vegas, three weeks in Mexico in Oct, a few Mid West casino dates and ten days in India in Novemeber. The India dates were cancelled due to terrorism in the country a few weeks later. I gladly agreed to do any dates this artist has. I really enjoy the gig.

So here I sit about two weeks into the Mexican tour in a hotel in Mexico City, with a few scattered notes, pictures and memories of what we’ve done so far. I had planned to write the accounts as the gig happened, but several factors contributed to not being able to access the Web, or even know where I was going to be from one day to the next. The way this leg started for me was a forboding of how things on the tour might turn out, and indeed, have transpired thus far. A week prior to leaving, I still had no concrete info. No flight info, itenerary or other details. Neither did management or production. It was a source of concern for all, though I didn’t think much of it at the time as I was busy with the IKF Grand Nationals, a week long kart event that culminates the season with what is meant to be the Crown Jewel of that series. I returned from the So Cal run on Sunday, loaded the kart and left on Monday for the five day event and would return to Seattle two days prior to my departure for the tour. Except that, no one in the party had any travel info from the Mexican promoter. After several mechanical problems, I left the event a day early and returned to Seattle frustrated that I had a chance to grab a podium spot in the Formula 125 Limited Heavy class, but mechanical problems kept me from even making the first grid.

Three days before my departure, I got word that we were to get info via Fed Ex in the form of hard tickets. That’s strange because most tours haven’t used hard tickets for flights in years, going the all electronic route. Apparently this promoter, FR Productiones in Mexico City only wanted to use hard tickets. I got a confirmation number via email, that was incomplete and the United Premier Executive desk couldn’t find a reservation for me. That was Monday, we were to leave on Wednesday. My Fed Ex was due on Tuesday. When I got the Fed Ex I didn’t look too hard at the dates and called the Premier desk back with my proper confirmation number. Part of the perks is that I get a seat with a few more inches of leg room and flying in coach that makes all the difference. I chatted with the agent, saying my flight was the next day and I was glad to get the proper info. She countered that this reservation was for a week later. I read my docs more carefully, thanked here and called the Tour Manager. It seems that my situation wasn’t the only wrench in the travel works. It seems the promoter had waited until the last minute, sent the info to the agent who then sent it to each person. Tour production never had a chance to review the accuracy and several things did not match the summary they were given a couple days prior. I started to think “What the fuck is going on here?”. In a couple of hours it was sorted and the next morning I was to be on a flight to Mexico City.

In the meantime, I called the Production Manager to let him know the situation and find out what he knew about the gig. We were to be in venues of 3000 to 9000, most around 4000 in capacity. It was to be a mix of theaters, small arenas, a few bullfighting rings, a cockfighting ring and a convention center ballroom. There were also the possiblity of a TV show or two. We were to carry the same production for all dates with the exception two dates in Northern Mexico that we were co headlining with another popular act. In fact, I did a short stint with that act in ‘99. It was to be an identical production for all 12 dates, backline, lighting and sound. We also had a generator that was to travel with us. The promoter hired a production manager, let’s call him Jorge, that acted as a middleman hiring the production and arranging all the advance. The problem was, that he had only been confirmed a few days prior to the gig and did not want to part with any info until we got to the first city. Our production manager did manage to get an equipment list, though we still had little confirmed info about the rest of the gig other than the band and band crew would travel by day via passenger bus, with the production crew traveling after the gig in what turned out to be a hammered old Eagle that looked like it belonged to one of those low budget Tejano bands in the Southwest US. The gear was to travel in a single trailer, including the generator.

Our production requirements aren’t that difficult to meet. We carry all the mics, ear mons and a few other backline nuggets. We were to have a 24 box KF850/SB 1000 rig with a pair of PM4000s and the associated processing and hardware. It all seemed like a slam dunk. Little did we know what we were getting into.

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 25th, 2003 at 1:05 pm and is filed under Mexico Tour. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.