MikeSpace

Thanks to the miracle of modern technology, with the aid of magical elves and giant robotic monsters, here are some videos from a show we played at Double D’s Queen City Grille on Friday January 29th 2010.

I like to play all the videos at once – you can hear the whole show in less than 7 minutes!

(If you are only checking out one song, might I recommend #16 – It’s our newest, we are excited about it, and it smokes!)

I’m not sure why, but the gain seems pretty loud on these files – so be ready to adjust your volume. Just sayin’ . . .

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01: Rain On The Sky (cover – some 80′s band)

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02: Done It All (by Nick Pietrzykowski)

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If you are interested, there is 14 more songs on the next page – thanks for listening!
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I guess you end up taking it for granted after a while . . . encouraging, friendly, helpful, kind, and talented fellow musicians. And a vibrant active healthy choice of places to play, where original music is de rigeur – encouraged and preferred. Cool people, cool clubs, and cool bands. In any genre.
I only bring this up because I’ve been reading the musician section of craigslist in Rochester, and I must say it’s a huge contrast. I feel sorry for those folks, as apparently it has been a difficult place for so long that they have resorted to sniping and bitching and whining as a means of expressing their frustration, to the point that the whole section is a little like watching a train wreck – it’s horrible, but I can’t look away! If you need a reminder how good we have it in Buffalo, or you just need a morbid giggle, check it out. I think you’ll see what I mean. They are all welcome to come to Buffalo to play any time!

(art by Sean Madden)

Folks who know me well know that I listen to a lot of public radio. It has been perhaps 30 years since I last listened to a commercial radio station, or watched a television for that matter.

Here in Buffalo we have some pretty fine public radio stations – WNED fm does NPR (National Public Radio) and classical music, WBFO fm does NPR and jazz, and the one I use most often is WNED am, which is a 24 hour news station with NPR, PRI (Public Radio International), and (yay!) BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation).

Imagine my delight and surprise when I heard our own Gypsy Jazz(ish) virtuosos Babik being profiled on “The World”, a PRI show out of Boston that is on every weekday at 3PM on WNED AM! This show culminates each day with a musical segment that profiles musicians from the farthest reaches of the globe – quite a diverse selection – and has introduced me to more than one of my favorites! And somehow they found Babik! Awesome. A little national exposure for the guys who, as we’ve all known since that lovely summer when Hardware cafe opened their patio and diluted their yuppie regulars with freaky music affectionadoes, simply tear it up every time! I will risk copyright infringment by letting you all listen to the cool interview here, but I admonish you all to check out The World, as its a terrific show!

Click Here to listen to Babik on Public Radio International’s “The World”.

Here’s a little synopsis I wrote for the band press pack:

Introducing NICK VEGA! A man whose swank song styling has moved and grooved the hearts and stirred the loins of, well, scores of dozens of people. Nick’s powerful voice and highly charged emotional lyrics have broken up many a formerly happy marriage, and have been known to make members of the Meat Packers Union cry! Daughters, mothers, aunts, sisters, nieces, grandmothers, and even some dudes, all experience accelerated heart rates and sweaty palms in the vicinity of Nick’s mesmerizing stage presence and startlingly direct and perceptive lyrical swordplay.

You may have guessed that Nick Vega is not his given name. That name was bestowed upon him by the US government, as Nick is part of the Federal Witness Protection Program. Years ago Nick owned and operated a Bar, Brothel, and Gambling Casino in Utah, and as a result of much misunderstanding he was driven from the state by both the Mafia and the Mormons. Bruised, penniless, and desperate, he made sandwich money by playing trucker songs in dusty roadhouses, eventually stopping in Tijuana Mexico where he felt that they would understand his brand of soulful folk rock. But since he sang in English they did not, and he was run out of town in a hail of bullets. Determined to get as far from Mexico as he could, he eventually settled in Batavia New York – home to the largest Meat Packers Union in America!

As mesmerizing and hypnotic as a solo Nick Vega show can be, he realized that it was not good for the health of the audience for his strongly evocative presence to be undiluted. He decided that it might be wise to incorporate some other musicians, so as not to overwhelm the palpitating hearts of his panting fan base.

First up he needed some fancy guitar – some wheedely wheedely stuff. He recalled an amazing player that he had known years earlier, and had met while hunting for white tigers in the mountains of Ceylon. This was Mike Golner, and as luck would have it Mike had just been released from the substance abuse wing of Buffalo Psychiatric Center, and he really needed sandwich money. After several baths, and an emergency GED, Nick and Mike were ready to hit the stage!

And hit it they did, honing and crafting an unmistakable sound, a sound that made their swooning fans weak in the knees, as the tears flowed in rivers and grown men and women alike were made to weep and cheer. Spontaneous mosh pits would turn suddenly into orgies of sweaty moaning flesh, arms and legs askew, and from the stage Nick and Mike could not tell where one human began and the next ended. Birthrates skyrocketed 9 months after every Nick Vega show.

Yet something still was missing. As good as the duo shows were, there was still a desire to take it up a notch and really kick out the jams! As Nick and Mike pondered their dilemma, a van pulled up and amid much cursing and shouting out tumbled two leather clad wild eyed maniacs, followed by several road cases and quite a few beer bottles. Much shouting ensued before the van roared off with one last hurled bottle and many more expletives. With a shock, Nick realized that he had seen these two before – they were the drummer and bassist for BAT-EATER, the extreme death grunge black goth speed horror metal band that was a household name in Utah!

They introduced themselves as Jay McGurrin, and Danger Dave, and explained that they had been kicked out of their band because of artistic differences, and for both sleeping with the singer’s Mom. When Nick asked what kind of artistic differences, they told him that they really actually wanted to play some more chill type music, something like a sensitive singer songwriter with intensely emotional lyrics and a soulful sweet voice who had a wheedely wheedely guitar player. And Nick knew it was fate – NICK’S VEGA was born!

So now the band is a juggernaut, carefully and skillfully playing the emotional skinflute which is each undulating and rapturous audience! Nick knows that someday he’ll return triumphant to Tijuana, but in the meantime he sure loves gigging in Western New York, artistic cradle of the explored Universe!