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Just Plain Day 7
Our last full day in LA started off wth us getting lost for the first time during the trip, but quickly turned into a wonderful experience itself. We had arranged to head south toward Anaheim, and to meet with member Joey Arreguin at his home and his Love and Laughter Studios.
We arrived and parked in his front yard, per instructions. Joey had a nice house in a small neighborhood and when he opened the door, he had a strong friendly aura about him. The kind that puts your instantly at ease and makes you quickly like the person. Joey brought us into his living room where he had a small but powerful music workstation set up. After some chit chat, he played some of the bumper music that he does, and his work includes doing the bumper music for Disney's Duck Tales. Joey has a great background in the Latin Music community, as well as pop, r and b and other genres. For Joey's complete bio, watch for him in our Just Plain Mentors section on the web site coming very soon! It was meeting Joey that made me decide to add that section to the group, and I can't think of a worthier person to include in the first group!
After playing some great short pieces he had been working on, he took us out back to his home studio. (See pictures on the web site, Day 7). He had one of his interns working there, and Joey told us about the work he does with community students, giving them hands on experience that they would not have the chance to get anywhere else.
We left there to check out his full size studio that he runs with his partner. On the drive to the studio, I got to know Joey and found my great initial impression of him fell short. This guy is truly a wonderful human being. His son is finding great success in his musical career, and it is no wonder with a Dad like Joey. He told me a lot of interesting stories about his career, but most importantly was his sense of community, and his mentoring efforts. This is someone who epitomizes the Just Plain Folks motto "We're all in the together." We arrived at his larger studio, which is discreetly hidden, but wonderfully laid out inside. It would be a very friendly and comfortable location to record any project in, and is big enough to house an entire Orchestra. We met and chatted with his partner for a bit, but were running late. Remember, my two brothers had been along on the whole trip, which up to this point had pretty much been exclusively about Just Plain Folks and business. But clearly me and Joey weren't done talking. (Yeah, I know, I am never done talking!). So he offered to take us personally to our first recreational destination, the famous Crystal Cathedral near Anaheim. My older brother is an Architect and had always wanted to see it. Joey graciously bought us lunch across the street and we continued our chatting. He told us a story about being one of the few non Church personnel ever to get to play the Huge Pipe Organ in the Cathedral. He explained that right after the service was concluded, large doors, the size of the side of the Cathedral opened up to the heavens and a flock of Doves were released to fly out. What a beautiful image! And what a beautiful way to end our official Just Plain Folks business. Joey is a first class guy, with a first class studio and first class talent, and I look forward to working with him going forward.
Okay, now our very brief tourist activities...
We said our goodbyes and headed over to the Crystal Cathedral and got the grand tour. What a beautiful place and a glorious day in Southern California. I snapped a pic of my two brothers in front of the Cathedral (See pic on website).
After the Cathedral, we headed over the the mall around the corner which had a Gameworks in it. A little piece of advice. If you ever go to a Gameworks, which is an hi tech video game parlor run by Sega and Spielberg, for lack of a simpler description, stay away from the Horse Race game. Trust me on this! Playing that game was physically harder than if I had personally carried the damn horse around a real race track on my back. It took me about an hour to recover and I nearly puked!
We spent the rest of the evening shopping at the nice quirky
mall and headed back to our hotel room to await our pre dawn
flight home.
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Just Plain Plane Gone!
We stayed up all night, afraid that if we fell asleep we would
miss our plane. I was so pumped from the trip that I couldn't
have slept anyway. A few weeks before the trip, I had seen
a fluff news piece on the dedication of an airplane for baseball
pitcher Nolan Ryan called the Ryan Express. Well,
damned if our airline didn't make a special announcement that
we were among the first to get to fly on the famous Nolan Ryan
Express! What a nice punctuation for a trip that was so filled
with first class people, first class experiences and first class
memories. We were riding out on the Ryan Express! Thanks to everyone
who clearly made this another of those landmark experiences on
my life, and the life of our great organization. They proved once
again that in Just Plain Folks, "We're all in this together!"
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Just Plain Brothers
I want to take the time to thank my two brothers Chris and Lewis. When the idea of the trip was bantered around over the Christmas holidays, they both decided they wanted to come along, to experience it all, and to actually spend a week together for the first time in our lives. My older brother Chris, a successful architect, is 39 and lives near Dayton, Ohio. My younger brother Lewis, our Just Plain Webmaster, is 22 and lives here in Indianapolis near me. Due to the age differences, and our move to Indiana when Chris was 18 and Lewis was less than a year old, we grew up in two segments. Me as the little brother to Chris in Ohio, and then switching to me as big brother to Lewis in Indiana. Although we knew a great deal of the trip would be associated with Just Plain Folks, and meeting with possible sponsors, covering the NAMM show as journalists, and attending member shows and meetings, I don't think any of us realized the total domination of the trip Just Plain Folks activities would have. They barely had any time to be "tourists" or to be "on vacation" and I want them to know how much I appreciate their selfless participation in such a crucial week in the life of this organization. An anonymous quote I used a while back is quite appropriate here:
"Your friends are the ones who will stand by you, when they would rather be anywhere else."
I guess that goes for brothers as well! Thanks to both of you.
Chris and Lewis, for being patient and helping the dream of
Just Plain Folks become a reality!
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Special Notes: Thank you for reading this far! It is people
in our group that invest the time and effort to read and participate
that makes our group so wonderful! Coming soon will be an issue
on how to get the most from Just Plain Folks, and how you can
help us become the greatest songwriters organization ever! Also
coming soon is the member CD issue, and preparation for our New
York/East Coast trip in May and our Nashville Trip/Showcase in
July. Hope to see you all out there!
Go to Nashville pics