We used to set up shop on Selma between Cahuenga and Cosmo, next to one of those witchy chicks that sells beeswax and a couple of prospecting granola types that peddled raw milk. On fortuitous Sundays, someone would share a tent.
You pick up a lot of bad habits when you play on the street in a market setting. Mostly due to overplaying to compensate for no amplification. And since acoustic instruments suffer from sonic decay, we played really loud and beat up our hands and instruments. Not to mention our voices.
At times, all I could hear was the crank and grind of the washboard that Clem played with two soup spoons. The hi frequency metal jangle would make that little ear crunch after a while. Whenever we were dragging the tempo, he would bang on the wood block extra loud and give all of us the collective stink eye. We were all racing something as any bluegrass band should, but we never quite got there.
If you haven’t seen us on VH1 Behind the Music, The Middle Class had a rotating membership due to a combination of influences: 1. the crack cocaine habit of some of its multi-instrumentalists, 2. who was married or engaged, and 3. who had to get a real job and go to school for teaching credentials. We were not full on Jefferson Starship / Airplane rebranding, but we did cycle through a lot of players.
During our zenith, we would be raking in a few hundred busking at the Sunday Farmers Market in Hollywood. The best part about playing the Sunday market was — exposure. We were able to secure private gigs from meeting people picking out heirloom tomatoes. For example, we got to play a private party for the creators of American Idol, but our bread-and butter was playing kid’s parties, complete with miniature horses and scary clowns. One time we headlined a balloon festival in teh desert where it was so hot our shoes glued to the floor. Nothing says rock n roll like clowns and balloon animals and ruined footware.
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