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Bev RBR question (or anyone else who knows)
Well, I just took a double look when I read in the Skeemers newsletters I was catching up on, and I couldve sworn that I saw that the Rock Bottom Remainders will be doing a show in Detroit? Is this true? Does anyone know where I can find out info on this? I live like 5 minutes from Detroit, and if this is the case, Im so there!! Thanks to anyone who has some info:)
Berry
Berry
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http://www.rockbottomremainders.com/
The tour stops Oct. 28 at the House of Blues in Chicago.
Proceeds from the tour support the nationwide after-school program, America SCORES.
"We are going to rock the nation's Heartland so hard there could be bruising as far away as the nation's Spleenland, and possibly even the nation's Kidneyland!" said Dave Barry, the group's Pulitzer Prize-winning guitarist.
The literary world's answer to the Rolling Stones switches word processors for guitars annually as a fund-raiser for the national after-school program that uses soccer and poetry to inspire literacy, civic responsibility and healthy living among urban, public-school kids.
During the past five years, the Remainders have raised more than $500,000 for the charity.
The Remainders line up draws from a pool of best-selling writers including Barry, Amy Tan, Scott Turow, Mitch Albom, Roy Blount Jr., Ridley Pearson, Greg Iles, Kathi Goldmark, and guest author Frank McCourt. In previous years, such stars as Steve Martin and Robin Williams have appeared with the group.
Musically, the band is held together by Roger McGuinn, co-founder of The Byrds.
Because of scheduling conflicts, Stephen King, Matt Groening and James McBride are not on this tour.
St. Louis -- Chicago -- Cleveland -- Detroit
www.rockbottomremainders.com
Please pass on to friends in above cities.
A note from Dave Barry and the Rock Bottom Remainders
"The World Famous (in certain places) Rock Bottom Remainders are getting ready to rock the Midwest this October. We're going on a four-city tour that will take us to St. Louis, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, the House of Blues in Chicago, and Detroit. We'll be traveling by bus, just like real rock stars, except of course that many real rock stars have actual talent. We may not have that, but we DO have a bunch of famous authors, including Amy Tan, Mitch Albom, Ridley Pearson, Scott Turow, Greg Iles, Roy Blount, Jr., and Kathi Kamen Goldmark, who founded the band. And -- for the first time -- Frank "The Harmonica King" McCourt.
Also performing with us once again will be Roger McGuinn, legendary co-founder of the Byrds, who really DOES have talent, and who has been giving the band valuable musical tips to improve our sound, such as "Don't play so loud."
We are going to rock the nation's Heartland so hard that there could be bruising as far away as the nation's Spleenland, and possibly even the nation's Kidneyland.
It's all for a great cause. So get your tickets now, and tell your friends. If you have no friends, make some, because they will not want to miss this event." --Dave Barry, Lead Guitar, Vocals
And Roger McGuinn says....
"Touring with the Rock Bottom Remainders has been a blast! This will be my 4th tour with them. Dave Barry has always said that touring with them would surely ruin my career, but so far it's hard to tell if that's true. Maybe it takes a while."
Tour Details -- Special ticket deal below.
OCTOBER 26 -- ST. LOUIS -- CONCERT AT THE PAGEANT
http://www.thepageant.com
6161 Delmar Blvd.
St. Louis, MO
Concert starts at 8:30 pm, doors open at 7:30 pm
Tickets: $26 for concert, $150 for concert plus VIP reception, 7:00-8:00pm
for Tickets (314) 421-4400
OCTOBER 28 -- CHICAGO -- CONCERT AT HOUSE OF BLUES
http://www.hob.com
329 N. Dearborn
Chicago, IL
Concert starts at 8:30 pm, doors open at 7:45 pm
Tickets: $35 for concert, $150 for concert plus VIP reception, , 6:30-7:30pm
for tickets (312) 923-2000
OCTOBER 29 -- CLEVELAND -- CONCERT AT ROCK HALL OF FAME
http://www.rockhall.com/
One Key Plaza
751 Erieside Ave
Cleveland, Ohio
Concert starts at 8:30 pm, doors open at 7:30pm
Tickets: $35 for concert, $150 for concert plus VIP reception, 6:30-8:00pm
for tickets 1-800-493-7655
OCTOBER 30 -- DETROIT -- CONCERT AT CLUTCH CARGOS
http://www.clutchcargos.com/
65 E. Huron St.
Pontiac, MI
Concert starts at 7:30 pm, doors open at 7:00pm
Tickets: $35 for concert, $150 for concert plus VIP reception, 6:00-7:00pm
for tickets (248) 645-6666
All proceeds benefit the national afterschool program, America SCORES, which combines creative writing and poetry as well as soccer for 8-12 year old inner city kids. For more information visit www.americascores.org
A guitar signed by everyone in the band will be auctioned off at each concert.
TICKET SPECIAL--SOCCER MOM or BOOK CLUB PACKAGE
Support a great cause, save on ticket handling fees and get a T-shirt.
St. Louis -- Get 10 tickets, 10 T-shirts, no handling charges -- $300
Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit -- same deal -- $400
for inquiries on these deals, e-mail: info@rockbottomremainders.com
The concert is a benefit for 826NYC, the New York affiliate of the organization Dave Eggers founded to get kids writing; the AAP's Get Caught Reading program; and the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression. On May 31, some of the RBR band members will be appearing on Good Morning America to talk up the charities the band is supporting. Over the years, the Remainders have hired a manager and raised more than $1.6 million for charities.
The band was the brainchild of Kathi Kamen Goldmark, then a San Francisco literary escort and musician, who brought together authors she had driven around who expressed a wish to play in a rock band. "None of them knew each other before," said Goldmark. Now some of the band members are best friends.
The Rock Bottom Remainders have shared the stage with numerous rock legends, including Warren Zevon and Bruce Springsteen, and have played for a variety of audiences including at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but the band particularly enjoys playing for a bunch of rowdy book trade show attendees. "When we play for booksellers, we do a lot more songs by Joyce Carol Oates," said Barry.
The Rock Bottom Remainders formed about 15 years ago, the brainchild of Kathi Kamen Goldmark, a semi-pro musician whose day job was book publicity.
The group burst onto the scene at the 1992 American Booksellers Association convention -- and in spite of their dubious talent, their yearly gigs have raised over a $1.6 million for literacy programs with this year's gig taking place in New York during the annual Book Expo America convention.
"We are just awful -- but we are awful for a good cause," said crime writer Ridley Pearson, who has played the bass with the band since the outset.
The band's line-up is like a who's who of modern U.S. literature, including Stephen King, Dave Barry, Mitch Albom, Scott Turow, Amy Tan, and "Simpsons" creator Matt Groening.
Also part of the group this year are Frank McCourt and Andy Borowitz while Roger McGuinn, co-founder of folk-rock group the Byrds, is their "musical minder."
King, 59, author of over 50 best-selling horror novels, is rejoining this year after dropping out following an accident in 1999 when he was hit by a car, shattering his leg. His injuries made sitting uncomfortable and reduced his stamina.
"We have had the most bizarre Stephen King experiences," said Pearson. "He is a totally normal person but some of his fans are lunatics. In front of him at a concert in Nashville one time was a woman waving back and forward with all 10 finger nails on fire."
Over the years one or two have left, such as Barbara Kingsolver, but they were replaced, with the requirement being the newcomers were not talented and had a good sense of humor.
Turow, 58, whose book "Presumed Innocent" was made into a movie starring Harrison Ford, said he was asked to join after approaching Goldmark and telling her he had no talent.
"Every writer of our generation who was not invited to join the Rock Bottom Remainders bears a psychic wound," Turow joked in an e-mail to Reuters.
"I 'sing.' Mitch Albom has said that my musical ability is confined to wearing a wig."
Amy Tan, 55, widely known for "The Joy Luck Club," is another of the original members and plays the tambourine. She often takes to the stage in leather and smoking fake cigarettes. She looks forward to the yearly event.
"Music is not solitary. I write in a solitary way," she told Reuters.
Is there anything they don't discuss? Yes, writing.
"The whole reason we are together is for fun," said Tan.
"But all the things that have transpired in the last 15 years together -- different personal ups and downs such as broken marriages, kids growing up, parents dying -- has built strong friendships among us all."
What kind of rock band gets up before noon? For that matter, what kind of band reads and writes? The Rock Bottom Remainders do both, and have also been known, while on tour, to tune in to “The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer.” At a little after 6 on Thursday morning they turned up at the studio of “Good Morning America” to do a promotional spot for a Friday-night benefit coinciding with BookExpo America, the big publishing fair that took place in New York over the weekend. The green-room spread included, instead of greenies and quarts of Jack, platters of fresh fruit and, at the request of Roy Blount Jr., one of the band’s founding members, a big pan of grits.
Remainders is a booksellers’ term, used for books that languish on the shelves so long they have to be dumped at a discount. Most of the members of the band inhabit a different part of the literary universe, the loftier reaches of the best-seller list. Besides Mr. Blount, members include Amy Tan, Dave Barry, Ridley Pearson, Stephen King, Scott Turow and Mitch Albom. At least notionally Maya Angelou is also a member, but she has yet to show up for a gig — a word that members of the Rock Bottom Remainders delight in using whenever possible.
The band was created in 1992 by Kathi Kamen Goldmark, a singer and musician who was working part time as a media escort in Los Angeles, driving authors around on their book tours. “When they heard I sang in a band, that’s all many of them wanted to talk about,” she recalled on Thursday. “They’d say: ‘You’re kidding. You’re so lucky!’ ” She came up with the idea of putting together a literary band to give a benefit concert at a Los Angeles book fair that year and sent out a dozen or so faxes. Those who responded became the Rock Bottom Remainders, and with a few additions the band has been together ever since.
They are what every garage band dreams of becoming: a bunch of middle-aged people with word-processing day jobs who every now and then get to go on tour, not in a rented van but in Aretha Franklin’s old bus. They have played benefit concerts all over the country, before live, paying audiences, and even have groupies. A few years ago the bus broke down late at night in Alabama, Mr. Barry recalled, and out of the darkness a fan suddenly materialized with a copy of “The Stand” that he wanted Mr. King to autograph. In Nashville once another King fan was so carried away that she lit all 10 of her fingernails on fire.
“What we all gain from this is just the friendships, the hanging out,” Mr. Barry explained. “There’s no other group of people I spend this much time with. Writing is a pretty solitary activity to begin with, and, you know, once you get to be a certain age, once the kids are grown up, you just don’t make that many new friends. But it’s really intense here. It’s like camp for grown-ups.” Ms. Tan said, “I’d kill the whales to do this.”
In the beginning, by all accounts, the band was pretty awful, and over the years the members have memorized a great deal of self-deprecating patter. “We play music about as well as Metallica writes novels,” Mr. Barry likes to say. Mr. Turow says, “We’re a band that specializes in meeting low expectations.” And Mr. Blount characterizes the Remainders’ particular brand of music as “hard listening.” He should know. Easily the most sonically challenged member of the band, he has a voice so bad and pitch so uncertain that he is usually discouraged from singing at all, except during the chorus of “Wild Thing,” when he is allowed to solo on the “You move me” part.
In truth the Rock Bottom Remainders are not terrible, and harbor a certain amount of genuine talent. Mr. Pearson was a professional musician before turning to writing; Mr. Barry played in a college rock band, Federal Duck. Stars like Bruce Springsteen and Warren Zevon have occasionally made guest appearances, and over time the band has carefully added some ringers: the nonfiction author James McBride, for example, who still works as a professional saxophonist, and the novelist Greg Isles, who for years played in the band Frankly Scarlet. A key acquisition was Mr. Albom, the sports columnist, who in 1994 replaced Barbara Kingsolver (who had left to have children) at the keyboard and as a bonus brought along his wife, Janine Sabino, a professional singer. Before becoming a writer, Mr. Albom recalled at the “Good Morning America” studio, he played the piano for a living. “I used to play in an Irish bar about 30 blocks from here,” he said. “It was called McSomething’s, and it used to be just me and the drunks. I’d get about $10 a night. Now look at me. I’m in a band where they have people to carry our stuff for you.”
[continued below]
The evening featured guest appearances by Frank McCourt, Andy Borowitz and Leslie Gore, who belted out her ’60s anthem “It’s My Party” and was so pumped she stayed onstage for the rest of the evening, dancing and vamping. Halfway through, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Roger McGuinn came out, transcendently cool in black pants, black shirt and black fedora, and over the course of a couple of Byrds songs lifted the band way off rock bottom. For a while it wasn’t just not bad — it was pretty good. For the rest of the time it rocked at least, and even wailed during a couple of harmonica solos by Mr. Barry’s younger brother Sam, who is not an author, strictly speaking, but close enough. (He works for a division of HarperCollins.)
There was no fingernail ignition, but the audience swayed, danced and took countless cellphone pictures. Near the end Mr. Albom did an Elvis impersonation, appearing first in a wig, sunglasses and gold lamé jacket and then, for “Jailhouse Rock,” stripping down to a sleeveless undershirt and striped prison pants. Then Larry Portzline, of Harrisburg, Pa., who had paid $2,800 at a charity auction for the privilege, joined the band to sing “Wild Thing.” Afterward he was still wired. “I can’t believe it,” he said. “I even got to rehearse with them. But I wasn’t worried. I’ve known ‘Wild Thing’ all my life.”
Packing up, Mr. King said, “You never know for certain, but I’m pretty sure we never sounded better.”