Tricks News
February, 2008
Tricks Newsletter 08.01
Tricks Report from the Basement '08.
Although the Tricks family of fans and friends is very sad that Tim Clifford will no longer be playing and singing with Tricks, we are happy that we didn't take very long to find a new bass player.
We were very worried that we might not find a suitable bass player in time to fulfill our 2008 commitments. We were afraid that we wouldn't find someone until late January or February, with auditions and painful choices, and no time to learn very many songs, much less anything new for our Tricks repertoire. We talked about cancelling our spring dates. But, we didn't see that a convergence of places, people, and events was going to make Tricks a happy and whole band once again . . . without missing a beat, as they say.
In November, we sent out an e-mail to about 80 of our closest musical friends, asking "Know any good bass players"? We are grateful to Rod Lane that he forwarded this e-mail to his large e-mail address book from his contacts in the local Rock 'n' Roll scene. One of the recipients of Rod's forwarded Tricks e-mail was Dave Trierweiler, bassist/vocalist of the band Meanstreak.
There were interesting coincidences where Dave and Tricks had crossed paths several times in the past. First of all, on the weekend of May 29th in 1977 Dave's band played with Tricks at a 3-day rock and roll party up in Irons. This party was one of our "best ever" fun times with Tricks during "the Michael years". Dave says that they were just teenagers who aspired "to be like Tricks". See our Tricks 1977 History page for the low-down on this historic Tricks gig.
Again, in 1978, when Michael left the Tricks band, Dave spent lots of time hanging around with the same crowd that Michael was hanging out with. Dave says he recalls many times thinking that he would like to get ahold of Rick and Steve and help them form a new band. Ironically, it was during this period of the late 70's and early 80's that Rick and Steve wasted lots of time with abortive attempts at forming a "new Tricks", and our the main problem was that we couldn't find an acceptable bass player.
Many years later, for a short time Dave dated Ann Erwood, who later would play keyboards with Tricks from 1992 thru 1994.
Last year, when Tricks lost 2 venues, and we were scouting new venues to play at, Rick, Krys, and a bunch of our Hudsonville fans went over to the Log Cabin on a Saturday night in early February, 2007. We were only there to check out the bar and what type of crowd and bands they had.
The band that night at the Log Cabin was Meanstreak, and the remarkable thing was that the drummer was a guy named Skip who, when he was 13 years old, used to live near Hopkins, just a quarter mile from the house that Rick and Steve lived in. This is right around the time when we were looking for a good bass player. Skip's older sisters used to come and hang out in the yard while Tricks was practicing, and we used to invite them inside once in a while. (Incidentally, Rick went over to their place to tune their mom's piano one time, and Skip's mom did the flowers for Krys and Rick's wedding.)
We only stayed for the first 2 Meanstreak sets that night at the Log Cabin, but we remember the Meanstreak band quite well. Meanstreak was a bit more heavy metal than Tricks, but we especially liked the singing. Meanstreak was professional and had a good song selection and a tight sound. That made a good first-impression on Rick and Krys. (This was one of the last nights Meanstreak played before their guitarist dropped out and Meanstreak began a fruitless search for a new guitarist.)
Frustrated by the long search for a new guitarist, Dave called Rick after getting the forwarded e-mail from Rod Lane. We talked about all of these coincidences and synchronicities. Then, out of the blue, Dave says "you're my customer". I said, "huh, what"? "Yeah, you're one of my customers". Again, I said, "What? . . . You mean Trendway"? It turns out that Dave is the Quality Manager of Sountech in G.R., and they sell acoustical insulation for making office panels at Trendway, where I work (Rick, that is).
So, to make a long story longer,...
On the strength of all this history, the fact that we have very similar likes and early influences, and after lots of e-mails and phone calls, and after a couple short evenings auditioning each other, we selected Dave to be our new Tricks bass player. And Dave selected Tricks to be his new band.
Bad Newz - 1975 -1976 High School Fun!!! Aerosmith, Frampton, Animals, BTO, Ted Nugent etc. Vocals only.
Axe - 1976 - 1979 Post High School - The Hard-Partyin' Years. Mostly the same music as Bad Newz except we became better players. I learned Bass, switched to Rythym Guitar with some leads mixed in (Thin Lizzy, Aerosmith etc.) and handled most of the lead vocals. An extreme rock boot camp for me during this period.
Shock - 1979 - 1980 The Hard-Partyin' Years - Continued. Went back to playing Bass because most of the Bass players we dealt with were really just frustrated guitar players. Meanwhile, I was a frustrated Bass player playing guitar. I just didn't know it.
Boss - 1980 - 1982 Heavy Metal . . . Worked 12 hour days and played bars at night. Back to singing lead and doing utility duty on Bass and Guitar.
Siezhur - 1982 - 1984 Pop-Rock with a mix of progressive. Playing for a living now - pretty scary. A lot of travel. Music ranged from Loverboy and Styx to Alan Parsons, Pink Floyd, Rush, Uriah Heep, Billy Idol and Tom Petty. Mainly a supporting player in a cast of really good musicians playing Bass full time and singing harmony with the occasional lead to give the others a rest.
Street Legal - 1984 - 1987 Even more travel throughout the Midwest and the South. The usual ZZ Top, Bryan Adams, REO, Molly Hatchet etc., etc., etc.. Played Bass and sang minimally. Things got really crazy during this period. I met a lot of good people, bad people, and dangerous people. I'm glad for the experience, but I probably stayed in longer than I should have.
Thunderchild - 1993 - 1993 An attempt at re-living past glory that just didn't pan out. We had a great set list to work from but just couldn't seem to decide who we wanted to be. Back to playing Bass and handled about half the lead vocal load.
Meanstreak - 1995 - 2007 Much time and energy spent over a 12 year period with some personnel changes and hiatus' mixed in for good measure. We never played anything we hated. Enjoyed most of the folks I worked with and made a lot of new friends. Had a blast with all versions of this band. Nice balance with two main lead singers and one or two others contributing to the lead duties.
Foolish Plezyer - 1996 - 2001 My guilty "Plezyer" Heavy Metal fix. Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Dio, Black Sabbath, - you get the picture. Running concurrently with Meanstreak for a while, I was allowed the opportunity by all of my band mates and my Wife to spread myself as thin as possible without having a nervous breakdown. Lots of high points in both bands. Pounded out some fairly challenging Bass parts and probably lost at least 10% of my hearing. WE WERE LOUD!
Tricks - 2008 - ??? - Dave is teaching Tricks how to be a bit heavier, and Tricks is teaching Dave how to be a bit more diverse. We all have the goal of being the hardest working weekend rock band in West Michigan. We're working on lots of difficult harmonies, and an eclectic mix of new rock, new country, classic rock, classic metal, and we're not settling for "good enough".
Auditioning in Steve's Basement in November
"Love at First Bite!"
Adam's Apple, Fire Woman, Ride On, Hey Baby
Wishing Well, Strange Face of Love, Talk To Ya Later
Lick It Up, Nobody Said It Was Easy, Whole Lotta Rosie
Domino, Rock Candy, Seasons Of Wither
Armageddon It, Hard to Handle, Black Velvet
Kryptonite, When The Smoke is Going Down
Once Bitten Twice Shy, Free For All, (We have 60 songs learned with Dave so far!)
The Unplugged Trial
Like the Tricks crowd in general, Dave is a nice friendly guy who loves his wife and family, and he works hard all week, but he needs to (you know I gotta say it) PLAY HARD on the weekends. Good thing his wife Debbie likes to play hard as well. Debbie had a birthday party a couple weeks ago, and we did a Tricks Lite set for Dave and Debbie's family and friends. I think they like us.
March 8 - Private Party at Roger's
March 14 & 15 - Wayland Hotel
March 21 & 22 - Wayland Hotel
March 28 & 29 - Wayland Hotel
April 18 & 19 - Sidetrack in Fennville
April 25 & 26 - Sidetrack in Fennville
May 30 & 31 - Log Cabin in Wyoming
Why such a slim schedule for Spring?
Well, mainly because Steve is building a brand new million dollar store that opens the first week of August 2008. That's going to be taking his attention away for a few months.
So we're taking it a bit easy for now.
See you at the bars!
Steve, Krys, Rick, Bassbeast, Dave
www.tricksband.com