A full quarter of 2007 has already slipped by. "What the heck," you might ask, "have you Wilders been DOING?" Well, I aim to answer that question right now...
We busted right out of the gate on January 10th for a 3-week run from Nashville, through the Carolinas, up to Washington D.C. & New York City, and into Pennsylvania accompanied by our Lafayette, Louisiana pals, The Red Stick Ramblers. Then we hauled our butts from Pittsburgh all the way to Madison & Milwaukee to play two shows with our old buds, The Foghorn Stringband. We headed home for just a few days before we did another quick run down to Springfield, MO to play a couple of shows with our new friends, The Arkamo Rangers. Finally, we rounded out the first weekend of February by returning to the Free State Music Festival in Lawrence, KS.
When the dust settled, there were four very-exhausted Wilders standing there scratching their heads- and we had only finished the first MONTH. February passed quickly and we all took a little time to rejuvenate, before heading back up to Wisconsin (dodging snowstorm after snowstorm) to host a three-day stand at the Oneida Nation Casino in Green Bay. After that, we came home and took a long-overdue break.
So, until recently, I haven't seen my band mates much. We all sort of splintered into our own pursuits and distractions. Everybody did their own thing and took care of long-overdue personal business. I, for one, luckily had the opportunity to play rock and roll guitar with my old band, The Pedaljets for the first time in over 10 years. It was a blast. The Wilders took almost 2 months off for the first time in over 3 years. Even before we went full time, we almost always had a festival or show at least once a month. This was a full on, no holds barred, vacation and I think everybody really used it to it's full advantage. We broke our gigfast by becoming the backing band for one of our favorite singers, Martha Scanlan, for four great dates in Colorado. I'll detail that experience in the next blog entry. Take care everybody.
