I got a kick out of the Johnny Echols posts! Johnny is an amazing guitar player and his solo on YOUR MIND is really cool, especially the tone. (i recall him telling me is was a VOX AC30 cranked all the way up…) Funny, i was thinkng, after the one fan who wrote about our drummer’s playing in S.F., about doing a diary on fan complaints. see, you have no idea what kind of mail i get. how come we don’t play hawii? why we never do “Revelations”? when are we gonna do “Stand Out!” (that one comes courtesy of jazmaan and Martyn ON A REGULAR BASIS..and then there’s the ones about why this and why that and gee, we are trying to do the best we can. and also, it doesn’t do any good, sometimes, to play a part like the record if the rest of the music sounds more modern.

See, the Singer wants the tunes to sound live like they could be written today. and that’s what we try to bring to the table. also, this helps us look more viable and less like an oldies act. so, we apologize if we don’t sound JUST like the record but, to quote Mr. Lee himself (after i had played a solo that underwhelmed him in rehearsal) “Mike, either play it LIKE the record or BETTER than the record. personally, i prefer BETTER.” So there you have it. And for those of you who have been asking, my solo record won’t be completed before us leaving on this tour so it will have to be finished in April. While i was recording non-stop, my wife, artist **** *****, had been finishing the artwork but neither of us could get it before the first deadline. and the nice folks at Ochre extending that deadline. howeverm the FEB 29 show at the Garage (upstairs) is still on!

So expect the record sometime in May. And i must say, this tour is going to be a long one and, although i am looking forward to playing, i think it’s important for me these days to reflect on all the good fortune i’ve had. despite many ups and downs, i feel very blessed. it’s worth mentioning that i owe much of that to Rita. Now, it’s thursday and we leave in 48 hours. i am dead tired from being in the studio the last 2 days with LOVE, finishing some more songs. ok, i was tired from sitting around doing crossowrd puzzles with Don Conca! Actually, we did quite a bit and i got to cut loose on some guitar stuff. Oh, by the way Torben/Martyn, The Singer played me a CD of FEATEHRED FISH that Baby lemonade did about 10 years ago and the solos are all me. I was wrong in assuming melvin Whittington came in and did some of the solo. (when we recorded it, the night i solo’d, i had been in the studio from noon till 3am and i went home, went to sleep, unplugged the phone and didn’t show up for the next session. The Singer threatened to bring in Melvin but i guessed they used my tracks exclusively. so, now you know…

So this will indeed be an interesting year. i co-wrote a WB cartoon theme song that should come on tv in march (will tell you the title once i know it) and also contributed music and songs (all told, about 11 tunes) to a low budget comedy called FALLING DOWN STAIRS, which was produced by none other than Traci “Mrs. Daddyo” Green. Look for that one this summer. And with a new LOVE record sometime this year and a solo record in the late spring and most likely something from baby Lemonade in the late fall, this is gonna be a truly busy year. thanks to you.

Mike Randle