DM Blog

After going to see Jimmy Bosch play with Lacalu at Lula Lounge on Saturday the 11th, not surprisingly, my health took a very swift, debilitating plunge — I needed all of Sunday and Monday to recuperate… Though I was feeling much better by Tuesday, I was still ridiculously fatigued and not able to do much. But nevertheless, I was determined to make it out to Lula Lounge to watch Bobby Carcassés play with Hilario Durán and Jane Bunnett – part of the Lulaworld 2013 festival.

Just before leaving the house, I started to get worse and felt super sick so I came very close to just staying in bed and abandoning my plans. But instead, I decided I would take a couple extra pills and push myself very hard to go at least for half an hour so I could take some photos. And then once I got off the subway at Dufferin Station, I was again super close to calling it quits and heading back home… Argh!

But I was very glad that I pushed myself so hard and made it out to Lula Lounge that night. Within seconds of walking in the front door I was greeted by Hilario who invited me to sit with him and the rest of the musicians. Never underestimate the value of friendship! Within a couple minutes, even though I was still feeling lethargic and super exhausted (just getting there was like running a marathon), you’d never know it from my mood. One of the worst things about having Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and being confined to the house all the time is that your "friends" pretty much abandon you and you feel very lonely all the time. I can’t blame them though – it’s not easy to want to be around someone who’s sick all the time…

So it was a superb start to the evening – not only did it feel great to actually hang out with people again, but their warmth and energy was also a huge mood-booster. Hilario, Amhed, Adis, Luis, Pablosky, Riverón, all of them – not only are they exceptional musicians and super humble, but they’re also very genuine and really great people – it’s impossible to feel anything but happy in their company. (Thanks!)

Now without further ado, here are some of the photos I took that night, as well as a short YouTube video:

For my liking, a lot of the photos are too grainy, not sharp enough and have too many distracting shadows, but it’s also too intrusive to use flash for a show like this and my Nikon D90 doesn’t do well above an ISO speed of 800… Pathetic. (I had rented a Nikon Speedlight SB-900 last weekend which I used for the Jimmy Bosch concert – very cool, I gotta get me one of those!)

Obviously I stayed a lot longer than just half an hour. In fact, I ended up staying for the whole show. Never underestimate the value of friendship? Definitely. But also never underestimate the power of music! Even though going out that night meant I’d again be confined to bed the next day (literally all day), I was very glad I pushed myself and made it out that night. Music has always been a large and important part of my life and not being well enough to even pick up a guitar, let alone my basses, takes quite a toll on me. And on top of all the CFS symptoms I’m dealing with, I now have tendonitis in my right wrist (ouch!), so for now, playing any instrument is completely impossible… Clearly, you can see how the much-needed mental therapy I got from the music was well worth the physical sacrifice!

I wanted to get these photos up on Wednesday but I guess I sometimes overestimate what I’m physically able to do. I had them ready to go early Thursday afternoon though, but I still hadn’t even looked at the video clips and I wanted to upload everything all at the same time… And then on Thursday afternoon I had a Genius Bar appointment at the apple Store, and I ended up having to leave my computer there for repairs (which I wasn’t expecting) so I was without a computer for a couple days… I know it has almost been a whole week since the show has passed, but at least the photos are up now, finally!

Coming up next, I have some photos from last Friday of Amhed Mitchel’s CD release at Lula, as well as photos of Yani Borrell’s CD release on the same night. I’ll get them up as soon as I can.

I had originally intended to make it out to a lot more of the Lulaworld performances, but now that I’ve gone to a couple of them I realize that I really do need a day or two in between to let my body recover and prepare… it’s a shame. And then on top of that, I’ve also realized that the weight of my Nikon D90 plus a heavy lens and a Speedlight attached is probably adding to my tendonitis issues, or at least not helping it heal any faster. So either I can not use flash, crank up my ISO and accept that the photos will suck and have a lot of noise, or, I can scale back by not going to as many events… Too bad.

Be sure to check out the event calendar at lula.ca for more information on the Lulaworld festival which runs until May 31st. There’s lots of great music going on – maybe I’ll see you there, or if not, I’ll be jealous of you that you were able to go!