how carefree it would be to be carfree

I read on a colleague’s blog about CarFree day this week (friday, I think). My colleague’s post was very enthusiastic about this event (to which I couldn’t help but think that almost every gig I’ve ever done with him required the condition that someone give him a ride… but I digress), and in theory I like this idea too. Unfortunately I can’t get exicted in practice until all the venues I play in all have a house drumkit (it’s probably too much to ask that it actually be decent), when they do I’ll gladly take trains or buses to my gigs.

I think the house-kit was a more common feature of gigging before my time. I know of only one operating club in Toronto that has a house kit (the Orbit Room) and the now-gone Top of The Senator had a little Canwood kit with an 18″ bass drum. I have seen various bits of drumkits in disrepair backstage at lots of clubs, but nothing that could be cobbled together to create a performance-ready instrument.

Depsite this, I have not resigned myself to transporting my drums in a military-grade HUMMER. For 80% (the other 20% require a bigger vehicle if I have to transport a PA system or other musicians) of my gigs I take my Tempus kit in a SMART fortwo diesel, which gets obscenely good mileage (I drove over 1800km roundtrip to Cambridge,MA for about $70).

So, I’m not professionally car-free yet, but I would venture to say I am “car-lite”.