Charles welcomes longtime friend Andy to recap their self-made “24/7 Live Music Challenge,” inspired by New York’s “Concert Joe” Sarkis, aiming to see 24 bands at 24 venues in seven days (June 8–14) around Chicago. They discuss the logistics of averaging 3.5 shows per night, the difficulty of squeezing in three or four stops, buying tickets day-of, and using ChatGPT to build efficient nightly itineraries while navigating trains, parking meters, and tornado-related power outages. The week spans jazz, folk, punk, jam bands, comedy/storytelling, bluegrass, and blues, with highlights including The Green Mill, Jazz Showcase youth jam, Buddy Guy’s Legends (including spotting Buddy Guy), Garcia’s, and Blue Chicago. They finish all 24 shows for $313 in cover charges, reflect on fatigue and value, and share favorite moments and lessons learned.
Charles is joined by longtime friend and concert enthusiast Andy to recap their 24/7 Live Music Challenge — an ambitious attempt to see 24 live music events in just seven days, inspired by "Concert Joe" Sarkis of New York, who famously attended 1,000 shows in a single year back in 1992. Based in the Chicago area, Charles and Andy plotted their week using ChatGPT to build efficient nightly itineraries, hitting 24 shows across 16 different clubs without ever buying tickets in advance. They quickly learned that averaging three and a half shows per night was brutal — three shows in one night put them behind schedule, while four was a struggle to pull off even once, let alone repeatedly.
The conversation walks through each night in detail, from a jazz set at the historic Green Mill and a punk show at Subterranean to blues legends at Buddy Guy's Legends and Blue Chicago, a folk night at The Hideout, and a storytelling-meets-live-band show at Martyrs that reminded them both of NPR. Along the way they battled real tornado warnings that knocked out power at multiple venues, forcing last-minute audibles, and stumbled into unexpected magic — snagging the last two seats at nearly every stop, watching Buddy Guy hang out in his own club ahead of his 90th birthday, and catching an incredible impromptu bass solo from a musician neither of them had heard of before.
By the end of the week, Charles and Andy had hit their goal of 24 shows for a total of just $313 in cover charges (well under the $1,000 budget Andy had braced his wife for), capped off by seeing Santana and the Doobie Brothers at a Tinley Park band shell. Standout moments included the high-energy punk band Squint and Kansas City act Season to Risk at The Liar's Club, while the sheer physical toll — late trains, torrential rain, and blown-out eardrums — made clear why neither of them plans to repeat the full challenge. Still, both agreed it was a rewarding way to break out of their musical comfort zones, discover new venues worth revisiting, and appreciate just how much dedication (and money) serious "concert chasers" like Concert Joe put into their passion.
BANDS: Able Baker, Amyl and the Sniffers, Cherry Decay, Dog Caller, Dot, Grateful Dub, Greasy Gravy, Groove Witness, Jerry's Middle Finger, Public Opinion, Santana, Season to Risk, Squint, Tunnel, liverwhip, the Doobie Brothers, La Croix Mystique, Majesty.
VENUES: Andy's Jazz Club, Beat Kitchen, Blue Chicago, Buddy Guy's Legends, Cobra Lounge, Fitzgeralds, Garcia's, Jazz Showcase, Martyrs, Salt Shed, Shubas, Subterranean, The Empty Bottle, The Green Mill, The Hideout, The Hungry Brain, The Liar's Club, Tinley Park (band shell).
[00:00:25] Andy: it was a really cool, jam session, where they had uh, bunch of older seasoned guys seeming about in their 60s and 70s playing with a bunch of, school age kids, and they were really enjoying and having a good time.
[00:00:38] Charles: Today's guest is my longtime friend and concert-going enthusiast, Andy. Back in November, Andy and I hatched a plan to see 24 live music events in a seven-day period, calling it the 24/7 Live Music Challenge. The concept stems from a well-documented claim made by Concert Joe Sarkis of New York [00:01:00] City.
[00:01:00] Back in 1992, Concert Joe attended 1,000 concerts in a single year, and during that time, he saw 99 shows in a single month. We wanted to see what it would be like to go to that many shows, but of course, over a much shorter period of time, and we picked a one-week time period. So Andy and I began planning this challenge over the next several months and decided to start on June 8th and end on June 14th. With me today is Andy to discuss our week-long live music excursion. Andy, welcome to Seeing Them Live.
[00:01:34] Andy: Oh, thank you, Charles. Nice to be back, and, survive.
[00:01:37] Charles: Yeah, and this is the fourth time you've been on. You were on Season 1, Episode 9, The Ticket Stub Master is the title of the show. Season 3, Episode 17, Andy Gets Washed Out at Bonnaroo, which was a very, interesting story. And, Season 4, Episode 3, we call it the Encore, the 2025 year-end, concert wrap-up.
[00:01:58] So yeah, you're back [00:02:00] for this thing we came up with, the 24/7 Concert Challenge, and I thought we could just start with some general things, Andy, we broke down the thousand shows that that this guy Joe Sarkis did, Concert Joe, and, you arrive at about 21 shows a week, but if you take into account the 99 that he went to during a one-month period during those 12 months, one month he went to 99 shows, you get, like, around 24 and a half or 25, you know, per week.
[00:02:33] So we decided to call it 24/7 'cause it sounds a lot cooler, and that's what we tried to do. Go to 24 different venues, and I'll get to that in a minute, and see, 24 bands in a seven-day period basically. So let's category by the numbers. We went to 16 different clubs, so we never repeated a club in one night.
[00:02:55] So we went to 24 clubs, individually, and [00:03:00] 16 of them were different. For me, it was like six new clubs that I had visited that I'd never been to before during this time period, and you were saying maybe yours was maybe eight or ten.
[00:03:10] Andy: I'm yeah, thinking 10 to 12. Again, there was a lot of, again, yeah, but the, I loved going to the, the Liars Club, the Cobras Lounge, you know. We, we went to places I thought I passed up that I probably wouldn't be visiting. But again, some of those were some hidden gems, that's for sure.
[00:03:26] Charles: Yeah, and the most clubs we went to in one night, was four, and we were able to do that three times.
[00:03:33] Andy: Wow.
[00:03:33] Charles: And, other times we just couldn't do it, and we'll talk about each individual night here in a minute. But what we found overall is going to three shows in one evening is very difficult. And I don't wanna, you know, sound negative here, but in some ways it's not enjoyable, and we'll get to that.
[00:03:51] Andy: Oh, well, again, as we talked, Charles, many times while we were doing it, again, you had to leave to get to the next venue, and that was sometimes you're [00:04:00] enjoying the live music and you go, "No, we gotta stay on schedule or you're gonna be behind." And, you know, with us only doing a week, you had to stay on schedule. Three and a half a day or you're behind.
[00:04:10] Charles: Exactly, you were taking the train into the city. So in order to get back home at a reasonable hour, you were catching like an 11:30 train. So, the clock is ticking, so to speak, when you're doing this. And we found that, we figured two shows per night is doable.
[00:04:26] You know, that's not too hard. But, hitting four shows in one night is extremely difficult, at least for us. And for us to hit the 24 after the seven days, we had to maintain a three and a half shows per night cadence. So what does that mean? If we go to three shows in one night, we're down half a show. If we go to four shows in one night, we're up half a show. So we have to average three and a half.
[00:04:53] Andy: Why that wednesday, Thursday, Friday, those four shows made it. I had some introspective thoughts on the train ride [00:05:00] home at 12:30 in the morning after five days in a row past midnight.
[00:05:04] Charles: Yeah, it's hard to do. And what we did too is we came up with the shows every night that we wanted to go to, what time the bands came on, where they were playing, and then fed that into ChatGPT to come up with the most efficient itinerary for that night. So we were driving, I was driving to each venue, so no Uber or anything like that. And this ChatGPT, planning made sure that we weren't crisscrossing the city and going back to where we just came from. So I thought that worked out pretty well. And, yeah, along the way I learned how to work the Chicago parking meters.
[00:05:38] Andy: Charles, is the first time I ever thought of using AI for anything whatsoever was when I punched this in the first time, you know, probably in December or January, starting to try and look for bands. So I touched AI for the first time just because of the 24/7 challenge, let alone using the parking meters and stuff. I was surprised that.
[00:05:56] Charles: Yeah, the parking wasn't bad. Most people, when they hit this parking [00:06:00] meter, your natural instinct is go for the maximum amount of time, like two hours, it's like 13 and a half bucks. But if you hit rates, there's like a little rate screen, and you only do an hour, which is, you know, what we were doing basically, it's like $5 and 6 cents.
[00:06:15] So five bucks to park in the city of Chicago, that's pretty darn cheap. So that, worked out well, too. So yeah, Andy, I thought we'd just go through each day, or night I should say.
[00:06:25] Andy: Well, how about this? Before we even started, Charlie, anxiety and thought patterns had just been the night before it happened, I don't think I was sleeping too well.
[00:06:33] Charles: Yeah, well, what's also interesting is a lot of these clubs, they don't post who's playing, like, four months in advance, It's like three weeks out, four weeks. I mean, I found some of these the week we were doing it, they popped up. So it's not like, oh, well, you know, you could just plan this out well in advance.
[00:06:52] it doesn't work out that way. And the other thing, too, is we didn't buy really any tickets in advance. One [00:07:00] reason is because you don't know if you're gonna show up to the club and have enough time to be there and see these bands. So we bought everything day of, and I think that worked out very well for us, too. And we could talk about that as we go through each one of our nights. So, did you wanna add anything to that, Andy?
[00:07:17] Andy: No. Again, I had more anxiety than I thought I was gonna have on the night before just going, " Man, this is, uh, actually coming to fruition again, and this is gonna be something."
[00:07:27] Charles: Yeah, I shared the same kind of anxiety as well, and even each night, like especially the first couple nights, we were down, half a show each night, and we'll talk about that. But, on the first night, so Monday night, there's... You know, Monday and Tuesday is tough because there aren't any that I could find early shows on Monday and Tuesday. Wednesday through Sunday we were able to find them, but, those two nights were tough. So we didn't start Monday until 8:00 at night at the Green Mill in Chicago.
[00:07:57] Andy: That's why that makes the Challenge hard. Again, we're lucky we're [00:08:00] in the, you know, in the metropolitan Chicago and we're able to use Chicago because if you didn't have, again, like Concert Joe had New York. Roger had London. If we weren't in a big metropolitan area, the challenge is almost you can't do it.
[00:08:12] Charles: Yeah, and Roger Mairlot, who I interviewed, I think it was in season one, London's Notorious Gig Master. He's gone to, like, 725 gigs consecutively, nights. And he does this. But his philosophy, he doesn't go to a gig just to go to one and, like, to count it, so to speak. If he goes to one and he's having a good time, he stays. If he goes to another one and he's not enjoying it, then he moves on. So he's not going to gigs just to go to them, and I felt like sometimes, that's exactly what we were doing.
[00:08:44] Andy: No, that's exactly what we're doing try and get to the number. it was the Challenge. And again, that's where the whole thing is so encompassing and what these guys have done is almost insane. You know, again, where they're investing so [00:09:00] much of their life and time into seeing live music.
[00:09:02] Charles: Yeah. We'll get to this too, I was so fried by the end of the week, there's no way I could jump back in on Monday and do that all over again and keep that pace. It's just insane. But yeah, so Monday we start off at this place called The Green Mill. It's super famous jazz club. It's been around probably for 100 years. We saw this guy Joel Patterson. He's a jazz guy primarily, but he does play the blues and western swing music and such. And plays guitar, steel guitar, et cetera. And every Monday night he's got this residency at The Green Mill. And, his band play there. And I think we got about the last two bar stools in the place when we walked in. It was really crowded.
[00:09:45] Andy: It seemed like we had that quite often, Charles, where we were snagging seats that were the last ones. And again, we had the 24/7 Challenge Music God looking over us sometimes where, getting lucky seats that are the last two or, you know, nuzzling up at the Blue Chicago or [00:10:00] something. We got lucky and it was nice.
[00:10:01] Charles: Yeah, that happened to us quite often. We literally grabbed the last two available seats, which was nuts. So yeah, that was good. I hadn't been to the Green Mill in a long time. That's a cool place.
[00:10:14] Andy: It really hadn't changed much though.
[00:10:15] Charles: No, it was exactly the same.
[00:10:17] Andy: Beautiful, iconic, old-time place that hasn't changed in a 100 years. It's same stuff that's been going on the, since I was first there 40 years ago. Again, great place. If you ever could be in Chicago, you wanna go there though.
[00:10:30] Charles: You have to go to The Green Mill. It's a must. Anyway, so then we went over to The Empty Bottle. There were what? Three bands playing. Now let me back up a second. To get into The Green Mill was 10 bucks. To get into The Empty Bottle was free because it was a record release party. So there were three bands playing, The Prathloons, which I believe it was their record that was being released, Hannah Frey, and this Chicago band called Able Baker.
[00:10:56] Andy: That's what we saw, right?
[00:10:57] Charles: Yeah. we saw Able Baker. They're [00:11:00] like a rock band, I guess, sort of, originally from Madison, Wisconsin. I mean, they were good. How many songs you think we watched of theirs?
[00:11:08] Andy: I thought saw their whole set, to be honest with you.
[00:11:10] Charles: Yeah, maybe.
[00:11:11] Andy: And that's what we tried to do the whole time is try to catch a whole set if we could. And sometimes it was easier than other times where some bands had short sets and we were lucky enough to catch them. And other times, we had to leave at the end.
[00:11:23] Charles: Yeah, so again, there's three bands playing. This was the first band, and there was no way we could stay on our schedule and wait for the other band to set up and start playing. You know, that That just couldn't happen. So we left, and that was fine. And then we went to The Hideout, this place, in Chicago, small place. I don't know. These two places, Andy, The Empty Bottle and The Hideout, I don't know, what would you say the capacity be?
[00:11:46] Andy: Hundred. Maybe 150 at the most.
[00:11:48] Charles: Very most. Yeah.
[00:11:50] Andy: Yeah, so small clubs. Again, it, going to places I was at neither one before, or I, yeah, I've been to Green Mill, never to Hideout or the Empty Bottle. They were new for me. And again, The Hideout was a nice [00:12:00] little place. That, I thought that was the nicer out of those two.
[00:12:03] Charles: Yeah. And free parking there, plenty of street parking, and this is where not buying tickets in advance, we could have bought tickets to The Hideout. There's, again, three bands playing, La Croix Mystique, Tunnel, and this band called Dot, like literally the period, liverwhip, all lowercase.
[00:12:21] Andy: Now that's who we saw, wasn't it? Or you, we aren't sure?
[00:12:24] Charles: Well, I'm not sure, because Andy and I took pictures at every stop we made of the band and, and so I had pictures of the band we, we were watching at The Hideout, and then so I went to these websites and they just weren't matching up.
[00:12:40] Andy: It didn't look like liverwhip.
[00:12:41] Charles: Honestly, I don't know which band we saw, but, they were good.
[00:12:45] Andy: No, I, I thought they were enjoyable. I liked they had a nice stage. That Hideout has a nice stage where it's higher you know, for a smaller club.
[00:12:52] Charles: And there's like all these lights. Those little tiny white lights in the ceiling over the stage and stuff. It's got a [00:13:00] cool vibe. So, then we were gonna hit this last stop called Andy's Jazz Club, which has these jam sessions that start at 10:00 at night. But on Mondays they only do two sets, and the rest of the week they do three sets. And so when we got there, they had finished up and, they didn't let us in 'cause they were closing.
[00:13:21] Andy: After we were lucky enough to find parking too. Yeah, we, it was the parking gods were looking at us on that day, that night too, and then An- Andy's turned us away.
[00:13:29] Charles: Yeah, so that was it. I took you back to the train station. So night one, we're down half a show, three bands, and the total cover charge was 10 bucks.
[00:13:39] Andy: The cost was way cheaper than we thought and the whole thing, just to bring that up. I don't know when you were wanting to talk about that. But, going to the shows, Charles did a great job on trying to find cheaper places to go. And, again, that's the only places we really could find, that were in the area to hit up and make happen.
[00:13:55] Charles: Exactly, yeah. So that was an inexpensive night. It fluctuated. This next [00:14:00] night, night two, which was Tuesday, uh, we started at The Hideout. So we, we were at The Hideout the night before. We went back to The Hideout and saw this woman who has a residency there as well, Nora O'Connor. And I think it said on the website that the show started at 7:00, or maybe it was 7:30, but she was running late. She's doing, like, these folk songs and stuff. And I, I think this night, Andy, was, like, the most extreme diversity of music.
[00:14:29] Andy: Oh, for sure. By far, Charles, and it started right there too.
[00:14:33] Charles: Yeah. It was like this folky stuff, which it was fine. And she had like literally nine of her folk friends came up on stage and they were playing songs, but because they started kinda late, we couldn't take in very many songs 'cause the clock was ticking. So we left Nora O'Connor and, and the folk thing, and then we went to this club called Subterranean.
[00:14:55] Andy: Luckily, this was just the high point of this night.
[00:14:57] Charles: And Andy, you saw the [00:15:00] occupancy.
[00:15:00] Andy: 99. 99, Charles. I saw an occupancy 99.
[00:15:04] Charles: 99 People, and I'd never been to Subterranean. So this was interesting. Small room. You pretty much walk into it right off the street.
[00:15:13] Andy: All black.
[00:15:14] Charles: Everything's painted black. There's a bar right there to the right. And so there was three bands playing: Public Opinion, this band Squint, and this other band Majesty, and I don't know in which order they were going. But, we happened to walk in right as this band Squint, which is a high energy, I mean high energy, hardcore punk band from St. Louis. I mean, that, lead singer, and I, you know, I should have put down his name.
[00:15:44] Andy: High energy and ready to go. That guy, he gives punk rock hope. These kids were riled up and playing hard, and they had all but 25 people in there and wanted to mosh, and he's looking at you like he wanted to punch You know, it was great.
[00:15:57] Charles: Yeah, but he did seem like a nice guy when he talked to [00:16:00] the crowd.
[00:16:00] Andy: Oh, yeah, yeah.
[00:16:01] Charles: But yeah, when he was going, singing and they were playing, you want to stay out of his way. But he said they'd been playing together since they were 16 years old, and they came together in 2021, I guess, in St. Louis. So this puts them at, like, 21 years old. They looked young, and they were great. But, one of the notes I have here for that too is, like, we watched their entire set, and because each song lasted about two or three minutes maximum, they were done in about 35 minutes.
[00:16:28] Andy: Oh, great set.
[00:16:29] Charles: "Yeah, I'm halfway through my beer. What are you talking about? You're almost done?" But, that's the thing with this kind of challenge. Like, if you were going there to see Squint, you would have to have been there to see the first band and then to see them.
[00:16:43] That's the downside. You can't really plan. It's just a matter of luck to see a particular band. If you were interested in, like, this band Squint, you couldn't have gone to this Nora O'Connor thing. Not that you probably would've.
[00:16:56] Andy: No, those two are the farthest things apart in our whole spectrum of music, I [00:17:00] believe.
[00:17:00] Charles: That was cool too, 'cause it forces you, you can't like, "Oh, well I don't really wanna go to The Hideout and see folk music.
[00:17:06] Andy: Gets me out of your comfort zone.
[00:17:08] Charles: Yeah, exactly, and you're not gonna then see 24 shows in a week either. So it's a cool way to, like you just said, force you out of your comfort zone and go to these clubs and see these bands. So then after that, we headed to Garcia's, which is I think originally where we hatched this 24/7 plan back in November.
[00:17:27] Andy: I do believe it was Charles.
[00:17:29] Charles: And we love this club. Garcia's, it's like I don't know, a Grateful club, Andy, would you say?
[00:17:36] Andy: Uh, yeah, inspired by Jerry Garcia and his, his daughter has some action in on it. And, uh, again, it just has jam bands and, and, you know, Grateful Dead cover bands and associated, people, and it's just a great place. The sight lines are great. You know, the beers are pretty cheap for the type of place. Parking, we get free street parking there. It just hits all, the balls. It's a good place.
[00:17:57] CAZ_24_7 Live Music Challenge: Yeah.
[00:17:58] Charles: it's a very nice [00:18:00] place, very nice place. And you can eat dinner there. They have tables there. So we saw this band called Grateful Dub. They play Grateful Dead songs with this reggae infusion, which I actually found very enjoyable. I was surprised. They didn't overdo the reggae aspect of it, they made all those songs, their own, I thought.
[00:18:21] Andy: No, I thought they were really good. And again, I just had heard of them, but they fit into the schedule. And again, I was very surprised, and the guy next to me kept going, "These guys are so tight. These guy-" I'm like, "Yeah, no, they, they were good." Again, it was really good. The main guy was a fantastic musician, and they had their own sound, and that, uh, that was the good surprising part about it.
[00:18:41] Charles: Yeah, and I think what you just said, what that guy said, I think in all the clubs we went to this whole week, there were no people phoning it in. I mean, all these bands and musicians we saw I thought they were top-notch, really good.
[00:18:55] Andy: I'm with you, Charles, where they were, they were putting their hearts into it. Most of these [00:19:00] musicians, even the high-end jazz guys and everything else we saw, were putting their time in and really loved the music. That was part of the good thought about it. You know, again, how these people made their living sitting here going out doing this every night, or trying.
[00:19:13] Charles: Yeah, it was good. So and then after that we were scheduled to go to the Beat Kitchen in Chicago, to see this guy, his name's Mark, M-A-R-Q. But, we ran out of time. There was no way to get there and back to the train by 11:30, so we had to scrap it and, and not do that. So yeah, that night we're, that's night two. We're down half a show, so now we're down one show total, and total cover charge that night was, 81 bucks I have.
[00:19:41] Andy: Yeah, it wasn't too bad.
[00:19:42] Charles: So yeah, that was probably our most diverse.
[00:19:45] Andy: That was a really good night too. I had a good time. I don't know if it ... Was that even the night it rained? I'm not sure which night it rained.
[00:19:50] Charles: Now the next two nights, we literally had tornadoes come through the area. On wednesday night and Thursday night. To [00:20:00] the extent that you had to delay taking the train.
[00:20:04] Andy: They knocked down the electric lines at Van Buren Street. It was some really honest to goodness, tornado-style winds right through where I was taking the train to. And it was, some crazy weather for a couple nights.
[00:20:16] Charles: It was crazy, and I had to pick you up at a different train station, 'cause literally the train could not make it all the way down to where it usually did because there were downed trees. And I had to drive through Grant Park, it's where they have Lollapalooza every year, to get to the train station. And yeah, there were lots of trees down and just their leaves were stripped off the branches and stuff. So it was super serious, like 90 mile an hour winds literally is what they were saying. So we started a little bit later, but we started at Buddy Guys Legends, which now on Wednesday, Buddy Guys is like our go-to place. 'Cause that show starts at 5:30, although again, we started late because of the bad storm. And it goes to Like 8:00 or 7:30?
[00:20:58] Andy: Yeah, 7:30 or 8 o'clock. [00:21:00] Again, a beautiful club though. Buddy Guy's is a g- a real nice, a real nice blues club on the South Side. You know, pretty much a premium. You're paying, you're paying extra to be there, but it's, it's worth it, you know, most of the time, and you're always seeing somebody quality.
[00:21:15] Charles: Yeah. Yeah. So like, so when you go to these early shows, you're, they actually, there's no cover charge unless you stay then past 8:00, then the main act you gotta pay, I don't know, 15, 20 bucks, something like that. So we saw this guy, Carlos Showers, uh, you know, he's, uh, part of the Ch- Chicago blues scene.
[00:21:37] Uh, he plays at Legends, you know, a lot. And we ended up seeing him then later that night on our last night at another blues club, and we're like, "Oh my God, is that Carlos?" And he had his guitar on his back, you know, and he walked into this club, uh, called Chicago, or Blue Chicago, but we'll get to that in a minute.
[00:21:57] Andy: So, so we watch Carlos for [00:22:00] a while, then we head over to this place called the Jazz Showcase. It had this, like, jam session of these... And this was also free, of these professional musicians mixed in with kinda like, um, younger kids, I would say.
[00:22:15] Yeah, they looked like they were for all mostly high school age. A- again, it was a really cool, jam session, where they had uh, bunch of older seasoned guys seeming about in their 60s and 70s playing with a bunch of, school age kids, and they were really enjoying and having a good time. It was, it, it, it was... That, that was cool. It was really nice to see that, you know?
[00:22:34] Charles: Yeah. And that, that club, Jazz Showcase, has been there since, what, I think 1947, and that's another, uh, really nice spot. I mean, it is just, has a chilled atmosphere.
[00:22:49] Andy: Nice little hidden gem.
[00:22:50] Charles: Yeah, and, um, yeah, it was, it was cool. I mean, and these, these kids were, I mean, they're super talented, obviously, to, to be there, and it was s- part of some [00:23:00] jazz youth program or something. So that was, that was cool. That was fun. And then, uh, we headed over to Martyrs, this place in Chicago, um, to see this, it's like, they called it First Time First Wish, and it's like this, and I didn't know this, uh, CHIRP, C, you know, all caps, C-H-I-R-P. It's like, uh, they have a radio station, um, that I believe is free that you can play on their app, and it was like, it was like a storytelling performance with this killer house band in between, um, these people telling these stories. So it's kinda like Moth Radio Hour kinda thing. people tell these stories, and then they- this band will play a song.
[00:23:49] Andy: Very NPR-ish. That's what it reminded of. I've never been to anything like it ever, but it, it, that, I, right away I told you, I was like, "Well, this reminds me of NPR." You know? But it was really [00:24:00] cool. And again, the band was, band would play something that was regarding what the person just told their story on, and it was, it was very cool.
[00:24:07] Charles: Yeah, 'cause that, that one, uh, rabbi, uh, who told a story about being in the Middle East, um, and then they, they played Dylan's, uh, Hard Rain's Gonna Fall or, the name of that song? Any- yeah, and I mean, that was fantastic. Uh, so, so yeah, we went, uh, we went there, stayed for a little, we stayed till the end I think, and then we, um, we were gonna go over to the Empty Bottle, and this other jazz place called The Hungry Brain.
[00:24:36] Andy: Oh, boy.
[00:24:37] Charles: But, there was no power ' cause of the storm.
[00:24:39] Andy: Well, at that point it was raining again, I believe, I, know I got out of the car to look for The Hungry Brain, running around in the rain looking for this jazz place, and I couldn't find it. And again, we were right... Yeah, Google sure told us we were there, but it wasn't there.
[00:24:56] Charles: Yeah, because the place, and I don't know if it's they're trying to be cool or something, but [00:25:00] there's no sign on the front.
[00:25:01] Andy: Yeah, it looked like a thrift shop.
[00:25:03] Charles: You did. It had these curtains and this lamp, and it was all dark. So we went to The Empty Bottle, and we're driving around, I'm trying to look for parking, and it's pitch black, you know? I'm like, " Oh my God." And then we see, like, 100 people outside on the sidewalk by The Empty Bottle, and there's no power.
[00:25:22] Andy: The whole block is out.
[00:25:23] Charles: So we had to scrap The Empty Bottle and The Hungry Brain, no power 'cause of the tornadoes and high winds, and went to go see this guy Mike Wheeler, a Chicago blues songwriter, vocalist at Blue Chicago. And these guys, that bass player whose name is Larry Williams, he's childhood friends with this guy Mike Wheeler. He did this bass solo, it's the best bass solo I've ever seen in my life.
[00:25:51] Andy: I was sitting there going, "It definitely was the coolest one I've ever seen in a club straight up, right in front of me by, you know, somebody I've never heard of." Unbelievable. It [00:26:00] was, it was so good.
[00:26:01] Just slapping and hitting and hit- oh, just doing a... It was great. You know, again, and me and Charles have seen a couple bass solos in our time, but this was, it was cool, just good. They were having such a good time. Again, it just where the musicians were having a great time.
[00:26:18] Charles: And that place again, that's where we walk in. There's two barstools right next to the stage basically, and we sat down. And that place, was packed, packed meaning, I don't know, there was, like, maybe, what, 60 people in there or something?
[00:26:31] Andy: I bet that place was another hundred.
[00:26:33] Charles: Yeah, maybe 100.
[00:26:34] Andy: And what, surprised us is a lot of tourists in there too, where again, not many people are from Chicago, but they're all tourists, and these people were loving it too. But it, it was just strange. Again, we were right on top of it. Like, the place was unbelievable. Yeah, both times we were, or we were in there a couple times. Mike Wheeler's coming to my local haunt tomorrow, Charles.
[00:26:52] Charles: Oh, yeah?
[00:26:53] Andy: He's coming to play with robbie Lee.
[00:26:55] Charles: Okay.
[00:26:56] Andy: At the station.
[00:26:57] Charles: Cool. Wow. You gonna go?
[00:26:59] Andy: Yeah, I [00:27:00] heard. I'm like, "Hey, Mike Wheeler's gonna be there. I just saw him at The Challenge." I don't know if his bass player's gonna be there. I should ask Bob.
[00:27:07] Charles: Yeah. Oh, man. that's cool.
[00:27:11] Hi, this is Charles Zona, and we're glad you are enjoying this episode of Seeing Them Live. If you would like to be a guest on the podcast, please fill out the form on our website at seeingthemlive.com. Also, if you like the show, please give us a rating on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
[00:27:32] And now, back to the show
[00:27:38] Andy: So, blue Chicago is a place where you wanna take somebody if they want, you're in town to see the blues in Chicago, or if you come to Chicago, you wanna go to Blue Chicago. For 20 bucks, you're seeing real stuff. Every time we went there, it was real blues people from Chicago playing the blues. It was great.
[00:27:57] Charles: Yeah, yeah. And, I saw on Mike [00:28:00] Wheeler's, uh, I don't know if it was Wikipedia or his website or whatever, his first gig was with, Muddy Waters' piano player, you know? So, and he's been doing this for, for years and years. are like the real deal. So, really entertaining, just awesome to see them.
[00:28:15] Andy: You, don't expect much at Blue Chicago. I think they had about six beers and no drinks, but yeah, you, you paid your 20 bucks and paid $8 for a Pabst and it was cool.
[00:28:25] Charles: Yeah. So, so that night we, uh, we gained half a show. We got a sh- half a show back, and we paid total cover charges were $30.
[00:28:34] Andy: And, again, that's just proof, Charles, and you had it, w- that we needed extra things in the back pocket to make things happen when things go bad. Because that's what we found out just in our, in seven days. A lot of things didn't go our way where you had to do something, you know, to, to make it happen.
[00:28:50] Charles: Yeah, exactly. So, um, yeah, those two clubs, the power was knocked out, so there's, you know, not gonna be anybody playing music. so yeah, the fourth night, [00:29:00] which is, what, that's Thursday I guess now? Again, we start at, uh, Buddy Guy's Legends. We see this guy Matt Hendricks who, uh, plays with this band, or this duo. He plays with this guy called Matt Hendricks. He plays with this guy, uh, Rick Cookin' Sherry. And they call themselves Greasy Gravy, which is kinda funny. But he was awesome, and again, that was a early show. It was free. But the radar, you know, the weather was looking real bad. So we kinda got outta there and went to this place called the Cobra Lounge, which I had never been to.
[00:29:35] Andy: Nice place.
[00:29:36] Charles: Yeah, and it's attached to a brewery, but, um, it was, it was kind of unclear to me. Like, I mean, maybe if you were outside, the brewery's on the other side.
[00:29:43] Andy: Yeah, I didn't understand because the brewery was never open when we were there.
[00:29:47] Charles: No, it wasn't. So, this is tornado warning number two at the Cobra Lounge. These younger, uh, I call them kids. They were, they had to be 21, but they look like they're about [00:30:00] 21. And we saw a couple bands called, uh, one of them was called Cherry Decay, and the other one was called Dog Caller. Not Collar, as they pointed out. It's Caller. And we stayed there because the weather was so bad. I mean, it got so dark.
[00:30:15] Andy: Oh, raining sideways.
[00:30:17] Charles: Yeah, and we were eyeballing the bathroom doors were these huge, beefy wood doors that we thought, "Well, if the tornado comes through, I'm gonna run in the bathroom," you know?
[00:30:29] Andy: Yeah, no windows, big doors, we were all safe. Again, that's how bad it was. It really was pretty crazy.
[00:30:34] Charles: It was really bad. and I believe there were some tornadoes that touched down that night. So when the weather cleared up, we took off and we went to, uh, this place called Shubas and, saw this guy Tommy Goodroad from Minneapolis, but he calls Chicago his home, and he plays, like, I don't know, a country, rock 'n' roll.
[00:30:56] Andy: Yeah, Tommy Goodroad reminded me of John Mellencamp or Johnny [00:31:00] Cougar in a way or whatever. Again, it was good country rock. You know, the guy was good. He was pretty polished. He had a nice band.
[00:31:06] Charles: Yeah, a really good band. so yeah, that was, well, that's a great, that's another great club, Shubas. I mean, it's really nice inside. It's got this nice wood carving over the stage and stuff, and just really, a really nice spot. So took in Tommy Goodroad for a while, but we had to, as usual, we had to leave.
[00:31:26] Andy: Had to change gears to to really get to one of Charles' old favorites here.
[00:31:30] Charles: Yeah, and, and, you know, now that I'm talking about it, this was pretty diverse as well. So we went over to the Liar's Club to see this band Season to Risk, and they're, they formed in, like, 1990, Kansas City, Missouri punk band. And, the lead singer, who I believe is named Steve he was very interesting to watch, let's just put it that way.
[00:31:55] Andy: I say more intense, but I don't know. Wow. Again, he was another character.
[00:31:59] Charles: [00:32:00] He was, man. very intense. the sound was very loud, very loud. And, they're playing, like, this punk music, but then occasionally he pulls out this little saxophone and he starts playing the saxophone as just kind of a noise kind of a thing. And that was, that was kinda cool. So, they were very entertaining. He was definitely entertaining.
[00:32:20] Andy: The, club is entertaining, Yeah.
[00:32:22] Charles: Yeah, The Liar's Club, the decor in there, it's got all these little, you know, lots of like KISS figurines and just all sorts of weird stuff all over the place.
[00:32:33] Andy: Pinball machines is the only place is wild. Again, I thought it was gonna be a lot bigger. I swear that stage in the area was made to hold 50 people.
[00:32:42] Charles: Yeah. It's not very big.
[00:32:43] Andy: Yeah, then the, again, that, that first, you know, the stage room is small. Small and loud. Oh, man.
[00:32:49] Charles: Exactly. It was, yeah, it was a loud one.
[00:32:51] Andy: I need to get my ear, my hearing aid recalibrated after that little bit. No earplugs or hearing aids for seven days, Charles.
[00:32:58] Charles: I had earplugs the whole [00:33:00] time.
[00:33:00] Andy: Well, not me. Not once.
[00:33:01] Charles: So that was night four. Thursday we gained another half show, so we're at the break even point. So we're even now, and total cover charges that night were $53.
[00:33:12] Andy: Charles, the more I'm starting to think my beer bill was more than the cover charges or any other stuff. Cause my whole point was every place we went, since Charles was driving, I would buy a pint of beer. So I had pretty much had a pint of beer at every place we went. Every, every place we went I'd buy a beer, and then we'd tip the band usually, and that, that was what we did at every place.
[00:33:31] Charles: And took a picture.
[00:33:32] Andy: And took pictures, yep.
[00:33:34] Charles: So now it's Friday. The weather's cleared up thankfully.
[00:33:37] Andy: I think this when I was having trepidations on the train ride home.
[00:33:41] Charles: Yeah. I mean, I thought the same thing. I'm thinking like, "Okay, why am I doing this? I don't know. This is hard." And, then, but fell into a rhythm like, Buddy Guys, that's our place. That's where start.
[00:33:51] Andy: Yep. You. started knowing where you needed to go to get the shows.
[00:33:55] Charles: Yeah, exactly. So we're becoming more familiar with this routine. We see this guy [00:34:00] Billy Flynn. He's a American Chicago blues, electric blues guitarist, singer-songwriter, and, he was great. Stayed there for maybe 40 minutes and then went back again then to the Jazz Showcase.
[00:34:12] Andy: Oh, that was good.
[00:34:13] Charles: ' Cause Buddy Guy's and the Jazz Showcase are, like, a quarter mile apart, and so, it's very easy to hit both of those. And there was this guy, Charles Rick Heath IV. He's part of the Ramsey Lewis Quartet. Now, the Ramsey Lewis Quartet was playing that night, and Ramsey Lewis' wife was on hand. and, they were, they were celebrating, you know, Ramsey Lewis, his life and stuff, and it was this guy's birthday, so they had a birthday cake for him that they brought in, and they put it down pretty much right next to us, right, at the bar.
[00:34:44] Andy: Yeah, the whole deal. That place was so nice. We, again, somehow we got the last two seats at the bar. You know, we're sitting there, you know, the guy's c- birthday cake is right there. All these famous jazz people are wandering around right by us, and you're like, "Wow, hold on here." It was really nice. [00:35:00] People were dressed to the Ts. Luckily, me and Charles both had collars on our shirts.
[00:35:04] Charles: Yeah, luckily I was wearing a collared shirt that night.
[00:35:07] Andy: Yeah, again, that Jazz Showcase that was a nice club. To see Ramsey Lewis' Legacy Band, which was really nice. You know, all these guys played with him for at least 10 years each.
[00:35:17] Charles: Yeah. so that was cool. From there we went back to Garcia's to see this band Jerry's Middle Finger. This guy, or this band, um, plays all just Jerry Garcia songs, right?
[00:35:30] Andy: Yeah, it's a tribute to the Jerry Garcia Band. So they have two girls that backup singers with them, and that's what Jerry had. So that's what they specialize in is Jerry Garcia, band covers, tribute band. You they're one of the premier bands. They're from, uh, the West Coast. I saw them out in, I think, 22 I saw them out in the West Coast, and it was a remote show where we were all in our cars and they were at a big armory and everything. But again, really quality good musicians. At least, uh, you thought they were good too.
[00:35:57] Charles: Yeah. I was gonna say, like, when you say, "Oh, it's this [00:36:00] cover band," but these guys made these songs their own. You know, this band, it wasn't like they were just playing, like, what you'd hear off of a record or something. They would jam, and they would go into these tangents. And, I thought it was fantastic. We hung out there probably that's the longest maybe.
[00:36:18] Andy: We almost saw the whole set, didn't we? Probably over, over an hour. It was a good set.
[00:36:23] Charles: Yeah.
[00:36:24] Andy: And again, at Garcia's we get to walk right up. We were within five feet of the stage. And again, we weren't there any s- any earlier or anything. We just, again, it's just a really nice place if, you know, if you wanna go see a good jam band show, the Garcia's is definitely a good place to go.
[00:36:39] Charles: Yeah. And it's, it's a very nice place. Top-notch. So again, we're getting in this, like, routine. So we started, we started Buddy Guys, and then we're ending at Blue Chicago again, 'cause we know that place stays open till 1:30 in the morning. Not that we would be there that late. So we hit Blue Chicago, but we ran into a little bit of a problem finding [00:37:00] parking. I mean, we eventually did find parking, but, you know, the World Cup was going on, and there's a bar, like, right around the corner from there that's, like, specializes in soccer.
[00:37:09] Andy: Yeah, that w- you Fados or what they have, but it's just specializing in every World Cup game there is.
[00:37:14] Charles: Yeah, so it was insane driving around there. There were people all over the streets and stuff, and I'm like, "Oh my God." And again, the, the clock is ticking, right? So miraculously, I find this one parking spot. I don't even know how it, but, um, we did. We went in and, uh, this guy John Primer was playing, and another top-notch blues guy.
[00:37:38] He's played with willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, Magic Slim. Yeah, he was Muddy Waters' guitar player, right?
[00:37:46] Andy: Yeah, when he died. He played with, I believe, the last five years at least. Then when I was doing research on him, he played, or he was in the movie with The Stones and Eric Clapton when they played the Checkerboard in 1981 when [00:38:00] they were in Chicago.
[00:38:01] Charles: Okay.
[00:38:02] Andy: The guitar player up on stage with the whole Muddy Waters and, uh, yeah, Clapton and The Stones during that whole session at the Checkerboard Lounge. So he, he, he had a lot of street cred.
[00:38:11] Charles: Yeah, and I think this guy's, like, 82 maybe, and that guitar he was playing was beautiful, this guitar he had. And he, you know, obviously, knew how to play it well. So yeah, that was the end of night five. We gained another half a show. Total covers were a little higher again. That night was 83 bucks
[00:38:30] Andy: Now, we're talking a Friday though too, Charles.
[00:38:32] Charles: Friday night you see four different bands, 83 bucks. That's not too bad. So, Saturday we can start early. So we go real early actually, so we go to this, to the Beat Kitchen to this bluegrass brunch, which started at 11:00 in the morning at, I don't know, I can't remember what time we got there.
[00:38:53] Andy: At 12:30 or I don't.
[00:38:55] Charles: Watch these guys do some bluegrass, which was cool. Uh, this guy John [00:39:00] Huber is his name. He's a Chicago-based bluesgrass musician. He's also the Director of Education at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago.
[00:39:08] Andy: I thought that was pretty cool. I would've brought something up if I would've known that.
[00:39:11] Charles: Yeah, yeah, I didn't know that at the time. Yeah, that was really cool. And they were good. We had brunch there, some egg sandwiches, and that was, that was nice. Then we went, and saw this group called Paper Machete back at the Green Mill. And again, this was like a comedy thing.
[00:39:26] Andy: Comedy band kind of deal again, so what, you know.
[00:39:29] Charles: Yeah.
[00:39:30] Andy: Very NPR-ish again.
[00:39:32] Charles: Yeah, kind of like what we saw at Martyrs earlier in the week. So we hung out there again, oh my God, grabbed the last two bar stools at the Green Mill, and hung out there for a little bit, and then went to this ... We left the city, so it's the first time we're leaving the city, and went to this place, in a western suburb called Fitzgeralds in Berwyn, Illinois.
[00:39:55] And I hadn't been to Fitzgeralds in ages, and it, the [00:40:00] place has gotten ... You know, they've added on to it. There's an outdoor place. And w- so we saw this band called Groove Witness outside, and, it's like a jazz, funk, soul, blues music. And they also listed that they play frequently at Andy's Jazz Club. So, we were outside sitting right in the front, and that was kind of cool.
[00:40:21] Andy: Fitzgerald's is another great club. Again, I haven't been there myself either in probably 25 years. It's nicer than ever. Just a, it, it looked like a nice venue. I wish it was near my house.
[00:40:31] Charles: Yeah, and it's, it's updated and, and they have this nice outdoor area. And what was cool about this band Groove Witness is two of the in the band, their grandfather owned the nightclub which would become Fitzgerald's, like back, what, in the '50s or something?
[00:40:46] Andy: Yeah, the '40s, '50s, the whole timeline of the place on the wall. It was again, really nice place. It's cool.
[00:40:54] Charles: So yeah, it's kind of funny that the grandkids of the guy who used to own the place We, we saw them [00:41:00] play, so that was cool. And then we headed to Tinley Park, to a band shell. This is the biggest show.
[00:41:05] Andy: Yeah, for our big show.
[00:41:06] Charles: Yeah, to see Santana and the Doobie Brothers. And I hadn't seen the Doobie Brothers since the '80s, and Santana, I think the last time I saw Santana was when he was with Jeff Beck maybe. That was a long time ago, too.
[00:41:21] Andy: Yeah, I was at both those I believe, Charles. In 1982 when we saw them at Chicago Fest uh, The Doobies farewell tour back then. And then, you know, I, I'm a big Carlos fa- fan and I've seen him, probably at least probably almost a dozen times now. But, they were, again, always quality. Both of the bands are, you know, top-notch.
[00:41:40] Charles: Yeah. And Santana, Carlos Santana, the percussion section was, just over the top. Man, it was, it was unbelievable. Very, very entertaining. So yeah, we, uh, we took in those shows. We met one of our friends there from high school, so that was kinda fun. It was kind of a, a reunion of sorts of when, you know, 'cause we [00:42:00] used to go see these bands when we were in high school.
[00:42:02] Andy: He was at the show when we saw The show when we saw The Doobies in '82 at the Chicago Fest too. Again, nice little reunion of sorts, and it was, it was fun ha- yeah, having him come along and having, you know, someone else, uh, you know, enjoying some music with us
[00:42:15] Charles: Yeah, and we had planned to go to see that, Andy, early on. So, you know, I'll count that as the total for the cover charges. Everything else we'd saw up until that point was free, so those tickets to see Santana and The Doobie Brothers were $54. would've probably gone to that one anyway, even if we weren't doing this.
[00:42:34] Andy: Yeah. But again, that was a cheap day anyway, $54.
[00:42:38] Charles: And we had a seat. We weren't sitting in the lawn. We had seats, so then, and they're, they're pretty good seats.
[00:42:43] Andy: And for $54 nowadays, that was not bad. That was a good show, again, quality. It was just good. Carlos is fantastic
[00:42:50] Charles: Yeah. So we gained half a show, so now we're up a show total. In total, the last two nights we gained half a show. So the last night, [00:43:00] Sunday, we were gonna go see Amyl and the Sniffers at the Salt Shed and then go over to the Empty Bottle, which is like, I don't know, a mile away. But I don't know about you, Andy, but I was so fried I couldn't imagine myself standing for like two or three hours.
[00:43:16] Andy: Charles, uh, again, I was with you. I was ready to buy our Amyl and the Sniffers tickets in the morning. But, again, I think we made the right choice. It was good, and in hindsight, if we would've done all that, we probably wouldn't have seen Buddy Guy, who the club when we decided to go. So the whole thing ended up being, you know, okay and being better in the run.
[00:43:37] Charles: Yeah. So we altered our plans. We're like, "Well, we're gonna go to Buddy Guy's," and we, we stayed this time to see the main act. This was, ... uh...
[00:43:47] Andy: It was Willie Dixon's son, wasn't it?
[00:43:49] Charles: Yeah, Willie Dixon's son, Freddie Dixon, was, uh, the main act, but we also watched... It's, it's like a jazz night for free. Early show was this guy Dexter [00:44:00] Sims, Alan Boroughs, Tyron Blair, and this woman they call Hilty, who is Hilty, Hilton. Yeah, and they've been playing at Buddy Guy's for, like, 10 years, I, I read. So, so we're sitting there, we're watching this jazz band and, and Buddy Guy walks in to the club, which he's gonna be, what, 90 years old.
[00:44:18] Andy: 90 years coming up. He has his birthday show coming up too.
[00:44:21] Charles: Like next month or something? Yeah. So that was cool. So he's, he's sitting at the end of the bar and, just taking everything in and, and the guy, the MC, who runs the place, you know, and collects cover charges from the tables and stuff, he was doing, like, this crowd informal survey asking, you know, how many people were from out of town, in the States, you know, people from California, all over the place were there. And then also out of the country, like New Zealand, Germany, Paris, Italy.
[00:44:51] Andy: We were the only local people. It was really surprising.
[00:44:54] Charles: Yeah.
[00:44:54] Andy: Were only people that knew Buddy Guy was even there, I think too. We're like ... Again, it was wild. When you see one of the [00:45:00] workers, "Yeah, my granddaddy wants to see you over there in the corner." You're like, "That's Buddy Guy's grandkid there working."
[00:45:06] Charles: Yeah. It was cool to see Buddy Guy in his club. That was awesome.
[00:45:10] Andy: Just there hanging out.
[00:45:11] Charles: Yeah, I think he must have enjoyed all the people that were from all over the world basically in his club that night to see Freddie Dixon play. And, and he was great. You know, that band was great. And then we went back to Blue Chicago, so we kinda stayed, as we started calling it, local. You know, started Buddy Guy's and then end up at Blue Chicago, and we saw Sheryl Youngblood, and again, she's a Grammy Award-winning gospel singer who was playing the blues, and holy cow, oh my God, she was fantastic.
[00:45:43] Again, we were sitting right up on the stage. It was unbelievable. It was a great, great way to end things. Chilled out. So we, we ended with the 24 shows. We did make it. We completed it. Total cover charges that night were [00:46:00] 35 bucks, and total cover charges for the seven days was $313 to see 24 bands at all these different clubs throughout the City of Chicago. Again, if you take off the Santana show, you're well under 300, ' cause we would've probably gone to do that anyway.
[00:46:17] Andy: Originally when this whole thing started, Charles, I told my wife $1,000 was what I was thinking gonna blow. You're good, scoping things out and doing your due diligence. I believe we got off really cheap, you know?
[00:46:29] Charles: Yeah. We saw some great bands, and, uh, it was a great experience and, um, a great way, again, you're thinking of doing this, people out there, maybe do it for a weekend. Try to go to 12 shows in a weekend in your city if you live in a larger city. It just forces you to go to clubs and see bands you would normally not see. I mean, I didn't really know, any of these bands, to be honest, other than Santana and the Doobie Brothers.
[00:46:55] Andy: Jerry's middle finger. That was about it. You're right, Charles. It took you out of your [00:47:00] comfort zone, made you go see some pl- again, go see new places. That's where I liked it. Some of these places are places where I want to go back to again. If we wouldn't have done it, I wouldn't even think of it. And then it reinforces places, like Buddy Guy's and Garcia's are just nicer places where you could take your wife and have a meal and have a good time and, see some live music. Then there's places like The Liar's Club where I'll probably never take my wife, or Subterranean.
[00:47:23] Charles: Yeah.
[00:47:24] Andy: But good to know that there's clubs like that still out there, though. We need clubs like those that the kids want to go to. The kids, you know, getting all worked up and everything. Nothing better than when the bouncer or the when we're taking our money, "Hey, guys, you know this is gonna be pretty loud."
[00:47:39] Charles: Yeah, like, well, yeah, we know.
[00:47:41] Andy: Don't worry my ear drums are are blown from rock and roll. I'm fine.
[00:47:45] Charles: So yeah, Andy, as we come up on time here, overall did you find the 24/7 challenge to be enjoyable?
[00:47:51] Andy: Yeah, I had a great time. Again, I love live music. A- and again, as we were talking earlier, it's like a marathon. There's so many segments to it, and it's [00:48:00] drawn out, and there's parts where it gets long and, when you're on the train at, 12:20 in the morning and it's raining out, and I know I gotta walk a half a mile home, and I gotta do it again tomorrow. But again, luckily enough, I don't know how you did it. Luckily I'm a teacher and , we planned it so when I was off for the summer, so I got to sleep in. But otherwise, it was tough. But again, it was... Like I said, it's like a marathon. I don't wanna ever do one, I never ran that far anyway.
[00:48:25] But it's one of those things where you learned a lot, you learned about yourself, and introspective. You're sitting there half buzzed on the train ride home. I'm thinking about all sorts of things about life and everything else, which it brings it up to, and it was cool, When you're thinking about other things and you, and you go, "Okay, I'll, I'll remember this week for the rest of my life." It'll be one of those.
[00:48:45] Charles: Yeah, I took, some vacation time and started a little later, at work, so it wasn't too bad. But yeah, I was gonna ask, would you do it again? And I would say I would probably not.
[00:48:54] Andy: No, again, I would almost like to see seven good concerts in a row [00:49:00] in a week maybe. But again, that would be tough where you live, to have seven good shows to go, "Okay, I wanna go see seven good concerts." But then you're talking that's gonna cost you a couple thousand just right there anyway.
[00:49:12] Charles: Yeah.
[00:49:13] Andy: When we sit here and introspect how much these people spent going to these shows where that guy that has the Guinness Book of World's Records for 279 or whatever right now, where you go, just for himself, if he spent 100 a ticket, that's 27 grand.
[00:49:30] Charles: Yeah.
[00:49:30] Andy: Just for himself, and he went with his girlfriend and everything. So you're investing not let alone time, money. 'Cause luckily, I got out of the whole week, I probably spent, probably 800 bucks with train and drinking and doing everything and eating when we did and whatever.
[00:49:45] Charles: Yeah.
[00:49:46] Andy: But I thought we got away cheap. Again, that's a festival ticket right there. And then as I told my wife, it was almost our own little festival, 24/7 Challenge of, hey, see as many, we're gonna try and see 24 bands in seven days and, or shows and see [00:50:00] what we, see what happens out of it.
[00:50:01] Charles: Yeah. And, the money thing, you know, like that guy Concert Joe, I think he said he spent like $700,000 going to live music and he's been to 26,000 live music events or whatever and, I mean, that's insane. But, that's what he likes to do.
[00:50:17] Andy: Yeah, no, again, it's somehow able to do it. I don't understand it. Again, I still believe he had to been working at a live venue place to be able to see all those shows.
[00:50:26] Charles: Yeah, maybe. But, do you have like a favorite show that stands out?
[00:50:31] Andy: The biggest surprise out of it, I would say I enjoyed Squint at the Subterranean. I just walked out of there with a smile. It was no place I expected to be in, drinking a Old Style 16 ounce with the, you know, this guy screaming at me telling me that I should be mosh pitting with him. It was entertaining. Again, that was out of not thinking what I wanted to see, that was really good.
[00:50:52] Charles: Yeah, I would put them at the top. I also, I like that Season to Risk, band at the Liar's Club.
[00:50:59] Andy: Well, that was very watch [00:51:00] surreal too. That place was like a surreal dream. It really was.
[00:51:03] Charles: Yeah. It's an interesting place. But honestly, not to sound wishy-washy, I enjoyed, you know, all these bands that we saw.
[00:51:11] Andy: Honestly, we didn't see anybody that like I go, "This sucks." You know?
[00:51:14] Charles: Yeah. Right.
[00:51:15] Andy: Maybe the band at The Empty Bottle where they weren't as good as I thought. You know, but they were still okay. Again, they were still playing their alternative rock or whatever.
[00:51:23] Charles: Yeah. So, Andy, would you do anything differently than what we did?
[00:51:27] Andy: No, I don't think so. Because again, we couldn't have incorporated any bigger shows. And we talked about this when we drove by, like, House of Blues and, you know, we have Navy Pier right there and all this other stuff to where you could've seen one big show, but you wouldn't have been able to see anything else. So then the whole challenge part of it's blown out. And I think, to do the challenge, you gotta do it like that. That's where you have to sit there and hit and move.
[00:51:49] Charles: Yeah, 'cause if you go see a band at House of Blues and you pay, you know, 50, 60 bucks and you gotta blow out of there halfway through the set of a band you wanted to see, I mean, there's [00:52:00] no, point, in doing that.
[00:52:01] Andy: And that's what we learned out of it, that again, we didn't get to enjoy some of the bands which we would've been able to see their whole sets. you know. You're always leaving to get to the next place. And it was definitely a sense of urgency against the clock.
[00:52:14] Charles: Yeah, you couldn't linger too long at a place. Maybe 40 minutes, and then you had to, move along to get to the next one. And then timing it, you walk in, and hopefully there's a band playing, which most of the time that happened with us, so we were fortunate that way to be able to take in the band right as they were coming on or whatever.
[00:52:32] Andy: It was a great learning experience. Again, I thought it was fun, the whole thing. Hey, would I do it again? No, but I'd do something. I'll go to more stuff again and go, keep going to shows. It was interesting to see, and I'd love to somehow talk to some of these guys and see how they made it through it.
[00:52:46] Charles: Yeah.
[00:52:47] Andy: It was a war of rock 'n' roll attrition again, or music attrition, where you had to keep going. You couldn't stop.
[00:52:52] Charles: Yeah, well maybe we could get Concert Joe on and we could talk to him.
[00:52:56] Andy: That would be a great episode.
[00:52:57] Charles: So all right, Andy. Well, thanks again for [00:53:00] coming on Seeing Them Live,
[00:53:01] Andy: Hey, no problem. Thanks for having me as always.
[00:53:03] Charles: And, I'm sure uh, you'll be back on sometime soon.
[00:53:07] Andy: Okay. Can't wait to be there. Thanks Charles.