Dr. G
It’s all right if bands like AC/DC and Kiss use a simplistic approach to writing and recording songs, as long as the songs are fun and infectious. It’s all right for bands like The Grateful Dead and Phish to play in a mellow groove as long as those grooves are complex and serve as a useful platform for high level instrumental interactions between musicians who understand complex phrasing. It’s all right for bands like The Doors to segue into poetic portions instead of just singing to the music as long as it’s clear what the song is about and the singer can connect his poetry to the song and make it meaningful to the audience.
That is why the band I just an hour earlier sucked beyond redemption and hopefully will be able to find more appropriate day jobs. Lee and Dr. G performed not too long ago at Pembroke City Limits in Pembroke, New Hampshire. While Pembroke City Limits is interestingly quirky and a comfortable hang, their unfortunate choice for a Friday night band left me scratching my head. I was wondering if the owner or booker is a very compassionate person who just feels sorry for them.
I noticed that several middle aged patrons sitting at the bar were watching them with a particular fondness. I couldn’t help wonder which were the young band leader’s parents, which were his aunts and uncles, and which were his grandparents. I cannot image how listeners who have been in the world as long as they have cannot easily detect such a lack of talent. I also don’t know how the numerous young people in the audience could pay attention to such a weak band for such a long time.
It takes a certain kind of patience for an audience to follow a band as close to nothingness as Lee and Dr. G. Many times the Lee and Dr. G combo pressed out music that was as slow and uneventful as to remind of cows sitting in the pasture eating grass. Dr. G’s vocals are, at best, mediocre. At worst, he is unclear as to what the heck he is singing about. He often seemed to be moaning into the microphone in an attempt to sound bluesy or soulful. Yet, he only ended up sounding like someone attempting to. The result was muddy, unclear lyrics that didn’t seem distinguishable from any of his previous songs.
Let’s talk about Dr. G’s stage presence. Well, er, um, he just doesn’t have a stage presence. He seems to just wander around the stage as if he doesn’t know where he is trying to get to. Try to picture a small child getting lost in a large department store and not knowing how to find his way back to where he last saw his parents. A couple of times Dr. G. sat on the steps leading from the band’s area to the rest of the bar. It was unclear what purpose that served, and Dr. G is clueless that only famous celebrity level bands can assume such a personal approach to the crowed.
A couple of times Dr. G almost tripped over his overly long guitar chord. That chord had an incongruity, white among all of the darker colored instruments and gear on the stage. It was nerve racking watching the over six foot tall Dr. G getting that guitar chord wrapped around his ankle, as a fall from his height could be a disaster requiring immediate medical attention.
Lee & G; Girl For Me album cover
By now my reader is probably wondering, well, what about the music Lee & Dr. G were playing? Well, what about it? I could not distinguish between the band’s original music from their album Girl For Me and a tiresome attempt at playing Pink Floyd’s “Breathe.” Dr. G seemed to think that just sustaining a simple note for too long meant he was playing something deep. Yet, his phrase, if you even want to call it a phrase, just hung in the air motionless. Everything he played had the same lifelessness to it, phrasing that went nowhere. Dr. G seemed to think that just playing the same simple chords faster and faster while jumping up and down on stage meant he was onto something exciting. He first needs to learn more chords and how to play them with finesse before he can simply go hog wild accenting them to act as a soundtrack to his tendency to jump up and down.
I didn’t catch any of Dr. G’s song titles as he prattled them off. Dr. G puts his mouth too close to his microphone and he talks too quickly for the audience to understand what he’s saying. Perhaps he’s new at this and just nervous. I’m not sure if Dr. G will ever know enough about music to know how weak he is at this point in his career. It is possible he might at some point in time have a moment of clarity to realize he’s pretty much just using the same chords over and over again and he either is playing them too fast or too slow for his music to have much of an impact.
Dr. G’s three band mates are middle aged Disco Santas that have absolutely no stage charisma. Maybe they are all related to him and just like to have an excuse to get out of the house for the evening. The rhythm guitarist sings weakly, barely above a whisper, and he can barely carry a tune. His rhythm guitar work as well as the bass guitar efforts and the drummer’s input do nothing to elevate Dr. G’s meandering guitar parts. Instead of offering driving beats and ferocious grooves, the rhythm section only provides a faint pulse, the kind that would have a nurse concerned. Even weaker than Dr. G, the rhythm boys play like unskilled laborers.
I do not know how this outfit can be getting any bookings at all, never mind at some places that have been garnering respect in the last few years. I’m not even going to go into the part where Dr. G said something about Louisiana and then tried to sound like Jim Morrison reciting some haunting poetic lines. It was unclear what Dr. G was trying to achieve.
Other than a chance to check out Pembroke City Limits, the evening was a waste of time musically because the band was constantly performing as less than a band.
