SARASOTA SLIM: News

That's right folks - we got our 15 seconds of local fame thanks to the good folks who put on the Cotee River Blues Fest in New Port Richey. It seems that Virginia Johnson of Bay News 9 needed some footage of one of the bands so we were suggested and PRESTO!!! we have our 15 seconds of fame to be aired every hour starting this Friday until the Fest is over I guess!!!

It seems that the good folks in Nigeria have nothing better to do than try to scam people. I just got my first fake 419 Nigerian money order for $4000.00 to go play a party in Salem, Oregon. http://www.sarasotaslim.com/images/scamcheck72dpi.jpg
I actually called the CIA and they said unless you've lost money they don't have any time to fool with it.

Here's the text of the original email:

From: whiteguy21239@yahoo.com
Subject: Salem Invitation.
Date: September 29, 2007 3:10:24 PM EDT
To: slim@sarasotaslim.com

Good Day,
I have a party in Salem, which I'll love to have you; the party is a send of party of one of my co-worker that will be relocating.
I'll love to have your band to Come and perform on that day, the total numbers of guest that will present at the party was 50 and the party is going to be an indoor event. I'll provide you with staging and lighting .
The date of the party is 11/10.
Let me know if your band is not book on that day.
Here's the party venue,
Salem City Hall
555 Liberty St SE
Salem, Oregon 97301
Let me know the amount you'll ask for to come and perform at the party.
A friend called Greg Adams introduced me to your band.
If you'll be staying overnight around that area, I'll want you to quote the hotel fee with your performance fee.
Let me know what it's going to cost to have you on that day, and include your phone numbers in the next email.
Regards,
Gary Westbrook.
N.B I don't mind to pay more money to get the best band.

_________________________

OK - after getting several more emails and even a few phone calls (one with a caller ID that pointed to Nigeria --- 23417656838 ) I got the money order and then - you guessed it - he sent this email:

Hello Gene,
Sorry I have not been contacting you since some days ago, and I am also expecting you to email me as well.
It’s like we’ll not be able to continue with the party, so things happen between the organizers and we have choose not to do the party.
I think I should let you know, the man that will be getting transfer was lost in a car accident in California, and this has brought the most shocking moment to the member and other staffs that’s why we decided not to continue with the party.
What I’ll want you to do is that I’ll like you to deduct $1000 from the money you have with you, and I’ll like to have refund of the rest of the money.
I’ll keep your contact details, and invite you for any future event that we may have, that’s for being sincere.
I’ll like to have the money sent to me, I’m still over here in Spain, and I’ll like to have the money. You’ll be sending the money to me via western union, and here are the details that you’ll be sending the money to,
Name ROBERT WILLIAMS
Address CALLE, MATINEZ 7,30004
MURCIA SPAIN.
Go to any western union outlets around you to send the money, you are going to be asked to pay some money to send the funds, I’ll like you to deduct the transfer fee from my money and have the rest of the money sent.
You’ll be given some 10 digits numbers call M.T.C.N I’ll like you to email me the numbers as soon as you have the money sent.
Regards,
Gary.

__________________________

OK - enough time wasted on this BS. Hope this info being posted here helps prevent others from falling for a fairly simple scam.

GH/SS

After a long and difficult 2 to 3 years in the nursing home my mother Mabel, the youngest of four, finally joined her two sisters Eva, Roberta, and brother Bob. We plan to scatter her ashes on Siesta Key Beach as she requested. While rooting through some of her belongings I ran across a pic I had never seen before. http://www.sarasotaslim.com/images/hugemomdadinokinawa1951.jpg

http://www.sarasotaslim.com/photos-group-19.html

For years I had long hair and never worried about hair cuts or barber shops. Then a few years ago I went into stealth mode and got a traditional hair cut. Jack's next the El Cap helped keep me clipped 'till Jack finally retired in his 80's after serving St. Pete for at least 50 years. So when Jack closed I went looking for a new hair clipper and stumbled into some strange goings on right down the street from my house. Who woulda thunk so much was happinin' right around the corner?!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_aLFP4MhYI

(This is a trailer for a reality TV program based on the life and times of Tim and his barber shop in St. Pete-A-Bug FLA - the soundtrack has a familiar ring to it!)

On Valentines day 2007 our sweetheart dog Nappy passed away suddenly :( :( :( :(

http://www.sarasotaslim.com/images/nappyx472dpi.jpg

My 15 seconds of fame will air tonight at 11pm. on channel 13 NEWS. News host Loyd Sowers asks me questions about Tampa Red and I try to answer and pick a little for a special thing on Tampa Red. Thanks to SBS DJ and blues-o-file Larry Lisk for sending Loyd and camera crew my way. (Loyd says it will also air at 8am. tommorrow morning too)

http://www.sarasotaslim.com/images/luckyslimadd.jpg

http://www.sarasotaslim.com/images/ssluckysam72dpi.jpg

Way back in 1988 the Sarasota Slim - Lucky Peterson Blues Band was tearin' up the bay area and beyond. Since then Lucky has moved on to become one of my all time favorite musicians and is by far one of the funkiest people on the planet. Come see some great blues at Bourbon Street in New Port Richey on Thursday, January 11th. Special guest James Peterson (Lucky's dad) will be there too.

Tecknogeek failure that I am, I have not yet figured out how to convert some of my old VHS tapes of the band into YouTube clips. So here's a big thankyou to Mark Lester for being the first one to do it. He had some footage of us from the outside courtyard of the Silver Ring in Winter Haven way back in 1993. The band members were: Doc - bass, Quency - organ, Jungle Denny - Drums.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HuDEBLeEoA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6Y0w9_UizQ

OK all you wine drinkers I need your help. I need you to send me or bring me all your old wine bottle corks. Only real cork - not the new artificial type. I'm redoing Possum Studio and 1 wall will be covered in cork just as soon as y'all get through drinking enough wine - now get busy!

Just got a new recording toy! It's called an Alesis HD24. I recorded the last couple of gigs and although there are a few bugs to work out - I was able to get some stuff from each night. It's mixed and available as an MP3 download or stream right here on my music link. FREE
http://www.sarasotaslim.com/music.html

Mark Olbrich is the bass player from London who came over here on "holiday" with his family a few years back and we met and became friends. We did a little jamming while he was here and later he arranged for me to go with him and his band to a blues festival in his original country of Poland where we played the 2005 Rawa Blues Festival. Mark was a wonderful host, tour guide, band leader, and bass player, and he was sharp enough to have it all recorded and it turned out to be a fine CD if I do say so myself. Mark Olbrich's web site is
http://www.thebluesbass.com/
Paddy Milner played keys with us and really makes each song special. He is by far one of the best piano players I've ever heard and it's a real musical treat to have him on this project with us. Paddy Milner's web site is
http://www.paddymilner.com/
Holding the rhythm section together is the ever popular Sam Kelly - voted British Blues Connection "Drummer of the Year" 5 years running. Sam Kelly's web site is
http://www.sam-kelly.com/

I only have a few copies of the CD right now (more are on the way) but you can listen to it here...
http://www.sarasotaslim.com/music-group-18.html

You can also buy copies here...
http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/mobe
or from Mark direct...
http://www.thebluesbass.com/

It's a good thing he's hard headed 'cause that's where he landed - on his punkin' head! For those of you who have not heard the bad news - Damon Fowler - bay area blues guitar slinger-singer - had a bad accident in his van back in December. The doctors have started patching him up with skin grafts for his shoulder and head which were ground up pretty bad by the road. Them doctors don't come cheap and there is an ongoing series of benifits to help raise $$$ for his outrageous medical bills. I missed the big one at Skippers 'cause we were working so we could pay some of our own bills but I will be at some of the other benefits planned for him at Bourbon Street, Osceola Tavern, and the Music Ranch.

Ho ho ho and hee hee hee - I got the Christmas jams in me!

Here's some holiday tunes by yours truly and some of my musical elf friends. For all the good little boys and girls who might get iPods for Christmas - FREE mp3 downloads!
http://www.sarasotaslim.com/music-group-17.html

We still haven't made much progress toward mending any fences with Skippers Smokehouse but on a brighter note we have kissed and made up over at the Ringside Cafe! This is great news folks 'cause this means we'll be playing one of my favorite places and it's right down the street too! Our first date there is a Thursday in December and I'm sure we'll be there often in 2006 so be sure to come out and show us some hometown love when we play there. If the place is packed with wild women drinking icey cold adult beverages they'll be sure to have us back more often. (It's a tough job - but somebody has to do it)

Go to the "Guitar Shred Show" link and then go to the "the Mountain of the Tapping Dwarfs" and click Jam.

http://guitarshredshow.com/mika/index.html

I finally got my other Deluxe working again. It has a bigger new output tranformer and sounds GREAT! I'm willing to sell the output transformer it had to a good home. It's a Deluxe "upgrade" and looks like the one on the right...
http://www.allenamps.com/images/ot228f.jpg

Our first Gig Gone Bad is the Shed in Homosassa. Hurricane Katrina blew Homosassa River levels too high to do last Sunday's gig at the Shed. The Parking lot was flooded and water was only about 2 inches from covering the area where we would have played.

Another Gig Gone Bad is Bayou Bleu in Sarasota which would have been October 22 - HOWEVER - they just called and told me they will be CLOSING! Too Bad - another venue bites the dust.

On a GOOD NOTE...
Our gig at the Great Southern Music Hall in Tally was GREAT!

By now everyone has probably heard that BIGFOOT has trundled off to the great North in search of higher education. We're using various drummers until one clicks and stays the course for a while. Folks in the St. Pete-A-Bug area can see us at the Ringside and 4th Street Cigars on Tuesdays and Thursdays with drummer Dangerous Dave Bushman. At 6'4"? I think he's all growed-up now and his playing is all-pro as well. On Fri-Sat 19-20 at the Smoking Dog and Sunday at Greggo's we'll have certified drum-crazed New Orleans MONSTER James Vinardo who will bring that 2nd, 3rd & 4th line along with him. We used him for a gig the other day with no rehearsal - only a very brief phone call between us to get directions to the gig - and it was AWSOME! We did a couple of numbers that use that New Orleans "second line" style of drumming and he nailed it. In my book he's one of the top 10 drummers on the planet. We also have NJ transplant Tommy Z playing keys with us on many of these gigs. TZ is another one of them all-pro keyboard players who has played gigs large and small with famous rock stars and all. We'll talk more about him later... and now a word from our bass man Sugar Bear: "dem low notes make people happy - when I hit that low B - people get happy feet!" - - - Guitar player Josh Nelms: "No - it's those high fast twiddly notes that make 'um rock" And lastly, one of those weird musical statements from the Slimster hiself..."it's the notes you DON'T play that allow the song to breath that gets inside a person".

We're doing every other Tuesday at the Ringside Cafe - Flip Flopping with Sugar & Glen Evans on the other Tuesdays. Glen has Mike Chavers on bass and vocals, Josh Nelms on guitar, and Sugar on vocals and harp. On our Tuesday we have Dangerous Dave Bushman on Drums, Tommy Z on keyboards, and Sugar Bear on the low notes.

Where's Bill when we need him?
We have a new regular gig right down the street at the good ol' 4th Street Cigars EVERY THURSDAY!!!