Saturday October 29 2022

 

Waking up before my alarm goes but can’t go back to sleep cause my mind is racing about today.

 

Oatmeal with Cinnamon, Blueberries, Flax Seed, and Almond Milk. English Breakfast Tea.

 

Loading up the truck with gear and heading out to Toast in Norfolk for the much anticipated Lava Halloween Extravaganza. There’s much to do to prepare for the night – helping set up the video camera – setting up a dressing room area in the garage – getting all my music gear (synths/pianos) prepped on the side of the stage. People, bands, and friends all start to pile in and thus begins the magical night. Every year this event grows and grows. The stage is bigger – the sound is better – the costumes more extravagant.

 

 

I’m so proud to be a part of this music community that can pull together to make this thing happen. I doubled up this year performing with ABBA and New Division. Other friends of mine are in other acts like No Doubt, Britney Spears, The Cure, Talking Heads, and Blink 182. We pulled off the ABBA set near perfectly – so much fun.

 

 

Later on, my other band starts trying to set up during the costume contest and it’s absolute chaos. It’s so stressful cause we’re scrambling to plug in cables while groups of people in costumes parade on the stage. I’m about to lose my mind after running to the dressing room cause I still need to change. Shannon helps assist me in my transformation into Ian Curtis of Joy Division. I take a breath...then make my way onto the stage to sing “No Love Lost”. The words that I worked so hard memorizing just flow out of my mouth without thought or reaction. I go hard into character and croon in that infamous baritone voice of Ian’s letting every lyric cut right through. The New Order songs we save for the second half and they’re a big hit too. I’m so proud of Chris, Jessica, Jacob, and Daniel for taking all this music to the next level. It really showed to the crowd – most people didn’t even notice who I was until afterwards.

 

 

After The Talking Heads do their finale set it’s all over, just like that. Hanging by the stage and packing everything up. We all try to take a big group picture.

 

 

Dave, Megan’s dad, helped me film and load gear back to the studio. Grateful to have his help.

 

Finally back home and able to decompress.