It happened… The band got together.
What’s the story, morning glory?
It turned out to be the jam we didn’t know how much we needed.
I felt it before anyone arrived
That quiet anticipation that lives somewhere between your chest and your hands, the kind that reminds you why you ever picked up a guitar in the first place. I spent the morning setting up the room, measuring space, moving gear, and making every inch count. Not just because we needed the room, but because I needed the ritual. The preparation has always been part of the music for me. If I get the space right, the night will follow.
I started setting up mics to record, already thinking through the invisible problems before they could become real ones: the PA angle, speaker placement, and where feedback might creep in if I got lazy. Speakers angled just enough. Mics placed with intention. Headphone mixes built in Logic in case we needed them, a way to keep clarity without volume taking over. These are the quiet decisions that never get noticed when they’re right, but always show up when they’re wrong.
Two guitar tracks per amplifier
Always. Two perspectives on the same idea. Bass went direct, clean, and dependable. Drums were mic’d the way experience in this room with this kit has taught me: top snare, bottom snare, kick, and two overheads to catch the room breathing around the kit. Matt’s vocals went into the PA because it had to feel like a band, and I ran a direct out from the PA into the interface so Logic captured everything as it happened. Once it was all armed, it just went. Red lights on. Levels steady. That low hum before the first note that feels like standing at the edge of something.
Around 3 p.m.
Matt arrived and started loading in. That’s when the anticipation finally tipped into reality. Cases opening. Cables are hitting the floor. Tom showed up soon after, and we did what we’ve done a hundred times before: quick sound check, amp levels, recording levels, the familiar nods that say yeah, this’ll work. No speeches. We just started playing.
The Oasis Medley
“Don’t Look Back in Anger” kicked it off, followed by “Live Forever,” and then a slightly derailed “Wonderwall” thanks to a capo that landed in the wrong place, compliments of yours truly, which got corrected a few bars in. Nobody stopped. Nobody cared. It rolled straight into “Morning Glory,” like muscle memory we didn’t know we had, songs we’d absorbed from years of listening, not playing. At one point, Matt laughed into the mic and admitted he could probably start an Oasis cover band and be perfectly happy doing it. It wasn’t about the band or the era so much as Matt’s knack for it, his ability to step inside a song, make it sound right, and then make it his own.
From there, we kept orbiting Pavement’s “Summer Babe.” I don’t know why that song became the gravitational center of the day, but it did. It kept sneaking back in—sometimes straight, sometimes twisted into mashups. At one point it collided with “Crush with Eyeliner” by R.E.M., the kind of thing that only happens when you stop trying to be right and just listen to each other.
When Scott arrived, the room shifted. A slow, stretched-out version of “Sometimes” marked the start of a deeper, heavier chapter of the afternoon. Not flashy. Just enough to let everyone settle in, like easing into cold water.
Everything sounded locked
The drum kit felt tight and alive. Matt’s Rickenbacker through the Vox rang out all chime and sparkle. Scott’s Tele cut through with that familiar trebly twang. My PRS was sidelined, off getting a ding repaired, so I grabbed Ruby, my 1981 Fender Lead, one of my original guitars from college. Plugging it in felt like shaking hands with an old friend. Same weight. Same scars. Same voice.
Then, without warning, we took a hard left into “Sexual Healing” by Marvin Gaye. Total curveball. But that was the theme of the day; we weren’t trying to prove anything. “Read My Mind” by The Killers came next, and we stumbled through it the first time. Forgot parts. Stopped. Looked it up. Listened. Tried again. The second pass wasn’t perfect, but you could hear our version starting to form. That’s always been the fun part, finding yourself inside someone else’s song.
After about an hour and a half of covers, we drifted into originals. “Be You” came first, a song we finished but never truly finished. Played live in the early 2000s, never recorded, never locked down. This time, it landed differently. The guitars blended in a way that made the room feel bigger than it was. The tones painted something emotional and familiar. Matt’s vocals were right there—present, confident, locked into something deeper than the notes.
As the song faded, he couldn’t resist:
“ICE, baby, I saw your girlfriend…”
And just like that, we were back in “Summer Babe.” Like a wink.
No ceremony. No symbolism
Later, my oldest daughter’s boyfriend sat in. No ceremony. No symbolism. Just a Zildjian shirt and the unspoken understanding that if you’re here, you play. Of course, it was “Summer Babe.” He held his own. Matt tossed him into a loose jam, then handed him the grail “Rockin’ in the Free World.” Watching him behind the kit felt like watching the torch move, not dimming ours, just catching somewhere new. Music passed along the way; it always has been.
After that came “Finder,” maybe our worst version yet. No harm done. On to “Black and White,” then “Home,” then my oldest jumped in to sing “Hammer,” gloriously out of time and key.
By then, my back had opinions. We pushed through a full-band version of “Sometimes” and closed with “Cortez.” It felt big. Earned.
By the end of the night, the room had that familiar ringing silence that follows a long, loud truth. Family drifted in and out. Friends laughed. Songs fell apart and stitched themselves back together. Nothing was perfect, and none of it needed to be.
It wasn’t about reliving the past.
It was about realizing the past is still with us—and the music is still moving forward.
And so are we.