This weeks Greg Adams short story

Origianlly published last week on East Bay Soul's Facebook page.

Greg writes:

"Marin County-Bay Area if you're not familiar... 1979. The Tower horn section got the call to do Tommy Johnston's first solo album. Of course you must know that Tom was and, after a bit of a hiatus, still is the lead singer with The Doobie Brothers. They opened for Tower in 1973 I think, at a little... club on San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley called The Longbranch Saloon. Both bands were on WB and it was the last time they would open for us. Hint: "Listen To The Music" was released a couple of weeks later.


We eventually toured Europe together on the WB Music Tour. Remember that Short Story? And opened for them for several shows after. We were all pals and always looked forward to playing on the same bill. One of my favorites was when we played in Honolulu. And, by the way, I'm off to Honolulu on Tues...day to do a show with Mindi Abair and Michael Paulo on Friday. Can't wait! Anyway, back to the story...

All the Doobs were and are great guys. Real humble. When the call came in for me to get together with him to do the arrangements, I talked to Tom and got his address in Larkspur, Corte Madera, I really can't remember at this point, but in that area. Tom's home was nothing fancy, but it was nice. A ...condo on the side of a hill overlooking the bay. We spent some time catching up and then started in on the tracks. No home studio, just the cassette player in the stereo in his living room. He cleared a space for me on his coffee table so I could put my manuscript pad down to sketch out some ideas...

That's when I saw it. As I set my tablet down I noticed something that resembled a check. It had a coffee mug on it and he seemed to be using the check as a coaster. He quickly picked up the mug to get it out of my way. The check, and another right next to it were made out to the amounts of, drum roll.... $275,000.00 and $234,000.00 Dollars. Coffee mug ring stain on the one for 275K. I didn't say anything. Neither did he. I wanted to ask him, "So how's that Listen To The Music treatin' ya?" I hope he went for the Direct Deposit option in the future. We went on to do the sessions and the album was entitled Everything You've Heard Is True. Did one more with him and also a couple with his bandmate Patrick Simmons. Always a pleasure working with all of them!"

See you next week.
 
For more on Greg Adams go to http://www.gregadamsmusic.com/ or http://www.eastbaysoul.com/