July 8, 2004 - Madrid, Spain

Here's some exciting news that I've been holding out on. Today we're opening for the original Chick Corea Electric Band. This band features John Pattitucci on bass, Frank Gambale on guitar, Eric Marienthal on sax and Dave Weckl on drums. I was extremely excited about seeing all those guys. I originally met them around1986, but more on this later.

When I woke up this morning I felt no different than waking up in the States. No,...that's not true. None of the hotel rooms seem to have alarm clocks and all of the bathrooms have bidets. Bidets are very amusing to me and I have to admit that I'm still not quite sure what you're supposed to do with them. Although the hotel looked very plain from the outside, the rooms were very modern. I turned on the TV and I was quickly reminded that I was not in America. There was more bull fighting on TV. Bull fighters seem to be the sex symbols here and they seem to be totally revered. There are signed pictures of bull fighters throughout the hotel. One channel was showing uncut footage of 'Running with the Bulls' in Pamplano. In America we always see the watered down footage. In Spain they show footage that you definitely wouldn't get to see in America. They show the bull goring a man's 'private parts'! Then the bull tossed the man about 15 feet in the air...by those same parts (I pretty much know what every man's reaction who is reading this is)!

Divinity and I decided that we were going to go for a walk through the neighborhood. We wanted to get some breakfast, find some phone cards to call back to the US and find a post office to mail out some postcards. When we set out on our journey we knew we were going to have a lot of fun. We were going to use the little Spanish that we both knew to try and communicate to people what we were trying to find. It was cool being away from the tourist spots. We found an internet café and we both checked out mail. After exploring the area for a couple more hours we walked back to the hotel. I took a quick nap then I went downstairs to meet Kurt and Joe for a 4:45 lobby call. The rest of the band wasn't coming to the venue till 5:30. Victor came down to the lobby and decided that he would head over with us. This was the first I had seen him and it was great seeing him as usual. I thanked him for bringing me along on the trip. I told him this was the whole reason why I started playing music. He told me that we would probably do a lot more international traveling next summer.

The venue was an outdoor soccer field. A massive stage and PA system was set up. The Chick Corea band was soundchecking. When they were done we got to hang around with them for a while and we talked. We all took tons of pictures. Listening to Chick Corea warm and and doodle around is amazing. I realized that so much of the fusion sound has been influenced by Chick Corea. I asked him if it was true that his name was really Anthony and he said that his middle name was Anthony. That must explain why he plays so well (hee hee!). I think everybody in the Victor Wooten band was excited to be around Chick Corea. Chick had actually invited Victor to do this tour because John Pattitucci could only do the first 2 weeks. Chick had even joked with Victor about being able to listen to the songs that he got out of playing.

Our sound check went relatively smoothely. My friend Eduardo came and he gave Victor and I jerseys from the Real Madrid Futbol (soccer) team. He give Victor jersey number 9 worn by Rinaldo and he gave me number 23 worn by Beckham. Eduardo told Victor that if he wore that jersey tonight that the crowd would go crazy when they saw him with it on. Victor was kind enough to change strings on 2 of the basses for me since I was busy trying to set up the rig that was provided for us. We had decided to bring our 16 input digital mixer, the jam man, the bass synths, and the wireless. So we were trying to figure out how to integrate that with the rig that was provided for us. We also had to contend with setting up in front of the Chirck Corea band's gear. By the time that we got everything hooked up there was only 10 minutes left before show time. It was just enough time for me to change clothes and go back out and tune the basses one last time.

Victor started the show by himself playing Flaminco on the bass. The crowd went crazy. Then the rest of us joined him on stage and played a tune from a yet to be released Victor Wooten CD. I miss playing my 5 string but it's always fun to play Victor's basses. The band played incredibly. I don't think that anyone knew what to expect from the Victor Wooten band. Spain had always see Victor with the Flecktones. I think they were shocked to see Victor singing and dancing. I think they were also shocked to see a girl playing the bass and rapping. And they were definitely shocked to see Victor's tech to be playing on a lot of the songs. I could see the Chick Corea Band watching us from the side of the stage. That made our performance even more special. We only had 90 minutes and as most of you know, that's short for a Victor Wooten show. I didn't get to solo that night, but that's cool - I was just happy to be playing musin in Spain.

After we finished we had to hurry up and break down our gear to make way for the Chick Corea Electric Band. John Pattitucci came out on stage to talk to me while I was breaking down gear. He told me he really enjoyed my playing. He liked the grooves that I laid down for Victor and he told me that he genuinely knows how difficult my job is. He may be the first person who's ever said that to me. I don't think people realize how difficult it is to play bass behind another bass. I also don't think most people understand the discipline it takes to constantly moniter the bass playing of another person just so you can be sure to stay out of his way and his frequency range. John and I also talked about him taking Ron Carter's place at City College in Harlem.

We stuck around for most of Chick Corea's set. It was fantastic. Then we actually had to leave early because the vans that were taking us to our hotel were the same vans that were taking the Chick Corea band back after they were done playing.

When I got back to the room I turned on CNN since it was the only thing in English and I waited for my wife to call. I think the older gentleman working the front desk didn't appreciate my wife and I talking on the phone late at night.

We had a 7:30 AM lobby call because we had a 9:00 flight to Tenerife, one of the largest of the Canary Islands.

peace & blessings

Anthony