Birthday Party

Hey Everyone! First off thanx to all my friends that came last night and braved the rain, that STOPPED at about 830...to those people who punked out because of the rain....watch the weather channel! LOSERS! Well, I started off my birthday party night by having dinner with my dad, my uncle Phil and Jo Anne at Francisco's Centro Vasco. My dad and I have been going there for years and they specialize in BIG lobsters. I got a 5 pounder! Dinner was great and I could have finished it along with my fried shrimp and chorizo appetizers and my lobster bisque soup but I wanted to save a claw for later! YUM! Well after dinner Jo Anne and I went over to Snitch to just wait for everyone. I know I will have a few stalwarts that will come even if we are going against a sold out Killswitch Engage show at the Starland & a sold out Lenny Kravitz show at the Hammerstein Ballroom and also the Supersuckers! What was I thinking?....I should have had my party next week after Queensryche! I could have probably got them to come and hang after they played since they are playing in Atlantic City the next night. Oh well... First person to show up was my bud Nick from Sony. Then Eddie from ILG showed up with Kenny and Swirley and his brother. Then Mike showed up and so on and so on... I did have a few surprises. My friend Frank from Sony showed up with the rest of his Sony crew...first Bagel Bash for Frank since he got married and had a baby. My buddy Mark showed up with his brother Jeff that I haven't seen in years. Rachel, Stacy, Suzanne, Dayna, Sara, Rebecca and alot more the list would go on forever (don't be mad if I didnt mention your name)... THANX, IT MEANT ALOT! So today was also a kinda Spinal Tap-ish day. 3 more singers gone! 1 had family things to do, 1 just didn't show up and 1 was told by his band not to sing until he sings with them for the first time live... Thanx to my friends with that cow disease (hint!) Also one of my other surprise guest got called away cause he's going out on tour in Japan (My friend Budgie who played with Ace Frehley was gonna play drums on R&R All Nite!) So the night started off with White Trash doing there set... a lil late of a start cause Aaron showed up late but whatever... The set was cool... Full band with horn section but Ethan couldn't play so Craig filled in which was fine cause Craig kicks ass!!! Dave from the club was really cool we got come drink tickets and a few tubs of beer and he also told me to take my time whenever we wanted to go on to do so. Thanx Dave! Oh I almost forgot! Some asshole tried to steal my video camera but the security caught him and kicked him out! Lucky for him cause if I would have caught him there would have been a bloodbath!! So, Thanx to the whole staff at Snitch! Ok so we start getting our gear set up and I give my friend Bill my video camera to record the show and I have my friends Damien and Tracy taking pictures for me...most of, if not all the pictures here in this blog are theirs...I will give you the links to there sites at the end of my blog...Then as we were setting up my friend Dante shows up and brings his friend Scott from Reverand Horton Heat with him...Thanx Dante! I say hello and tell them thanx for coming... everyone else from Dante's band NEVER comes to my parties! So the waitress brings up our beer... now we are ready. The first song of the set was to be sung by my friend Dan but...I tell everyone we had only one practice and there's no singer for the first song so we are going do it instrumental.... So What...with me playing guitar, Mike playing drums, Eric playing bass and John playing guitar...I thought it was actually our best song of the night ....Then I invite Dave from White Trash up to sing Train Kept A Rollin' with Tommy and I on guitar.... Then John comes back up and plays guitar with Tommy for a few songs as I sing You Really Got Me, American Band and Some Kinda Wonderful. Then I inform the crowd that it's Tommy's birthday too. He then plays Pride & Joy with the rest of the band as I sit this one out. Next up I rejoin the band and we do a Lenny Kravitz style version of Superstition with Tommy and I sharing vocals which turned into me singing all the vocals UGH!! I DON'T WANNA SING! Ok so we are told we have one more song and I invite up Scott from Reverend Horton Heat to play drums on Rock & Roll All Nite. He comes up and because of the other people canceling on me I am again stuck singing....Didn't I say that I didn't want to sing.... Ok so now we are done and I can relax... alot of people left and said goodbye while we were onstage and some just left without saying goodbye ..Thanx...real friends...I know who you are and don't ask me for any favors! As we are winding down a few more people showed up after they got back from the other shows. My friend Paul showed up with Dawn and her friend Rosela and out of no where came my buddy Rick Rispoli...GREAT surprises in all! The night over all was alot of fun I just wish we could have practiced more and I wish I would have done it on another night...Well next year will be on a Saturday and I will make sure no shows on that night! Again THANX to all my friends that showed up and the staff of Snitch! To those of you who didn't show up and have no excuses and the ones that left early without saying goodbye..... FUCK YOU!! Don't ask me for a favor cause you wont get it and as my boys LIFE OF AGONY say.... I will "LOVE TO LET YOU DOWN"!!!!! Peace Out, Bagel! I will be getting some more pictures from my friend Tracy in the next few days to post here so stay tuned!
More stories and pictures up soon including my night with HellYeah! and 4 days with my boys in Queensryche!!!
All pictures on this Blog courtesy of Damien Mauer. Visit him at myspace.com/damiensixsixsix
Also for more pictures of the show visit http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrestrada/sets/72157603836977674/