The Road (pt3)
Left-Brain
Okay, That Was Fun
After living like a gypsy, working 80 hours a week, through every weekend and holiday, hopping from motel to motel, packing, unpacking and repacking -- for a year and a half .
Well, let's just say that I was primed and ready for a change.
I'd been making pretty good money. Mostly from the sheer number of hours worked per week. I made $6 an hour, so 40 hours a week were overtime pay at time and a half. And most holidays paid double-time.
Combined with a prudent approach to the daily per diem--we weren't millionaires or anything--but we were able to put away a couple grand for a rainy day.
(Or the inevitable lifestyle change looming on the horizon.)
Right-Brain
Getting Back on Track
As the infatuation with the nomadic lifestyle was fading, I started to rekindle the idea of being a recording engineer.
During one of our trips back home to Minnesota, I finagled some time in the studio (once again with Tom in the engineer's chair) to make some copies of my engineer "reel" (demo tape) so I could start sending out copies along with a hokey resume I'd hobbled together.
Engineer Demo Reel
One of the first questions we pondered as a family, was where was this push for a recording engineer job going to take place?
Basically, in my mind, the 3 largest meccas of recording in the country were: LA, New York, and Nashville.
And of those, Nashville (by far) felt like the least intimidating, disruptive and easy to step into.
So again, before the internet, I found myself back in the library looking for a copy of a Nashville phonebook to which I photo copied every page under the Recording Studio section.
Flood The Zone
I think I sent out something like 50 of these demo tape / resume packages to studios in Nashville.
And, after it was all said and done, I actually got a couple of--not horrible--responses back. Which was enough to solidify the idea that we should just up and move there and see what happens next.
I turned in my notice with the seismograph company then off to Nashville we went. (And of course, as usual, with absolutely no plan whatsoever!)