The Montana Wedding Part 2

My band and I were about to find out the best part about driving eight hours (nine with the time change) from Seattle to Missoula, Montana was that when you get there, they open up a big can of WOW! As in: WOW, that sunset is spectacular! Wow, that’s amazing potato salad! Wow, that couple sure can dance! Wow, those two people in the bushes might have a baby in nine months! WOW!

The bride and groom, whom we did not know, put their foot down and insisted that the band join the party and have a good time. After we completed the setup, we were to join them for dinner with their guests; eat, drink and be merry until it was time to rock. They paid us up front and provided us with alcohol. Luckily for them, we aren’t hard drinking partiers that the stereotype describes because those are the two things you never do with musicians: pay them up front, provide them with alcohol. There’s a little tip for any of you looking to hire musicians (especially string quartets or church organists).

This is an extremely rare situation, being invited to eat with the wedding guests. As wedding contractors, we understand that we are booked to provide a service and we are NOT there to be part of the festivities until it is time to entertain. Unless of course you’re playing a friend or family member’s wedding, in which case there was one evil wedding planner that made us eat a boxed meal in a storage closet unbeknownst (hopefully unbeknownst) to our friends whose wedding we were playing (different wedding from this story entirely). We felt like Anne Frank’s family waiting for Miep to arrive with the rations and to tell us to stop flushing the toilet during the day.

To put it in terms for you Downton Abbey watchers, the band expects to be treated slightly lower than footmen, but slightly higher than a kitchen maid. We are fine with it, really. But getting asked to sit at the tables with the guests of a bride and groom we didn’t even know beyond one terrific Saturday night in an Irish pub, well that’s just like Lord Grantham insisting Bates give the toast at a holiday meal. (I don’t know if it is sadder that I’m referencing this British period drama, or that most of you understand every single word of it. Well at least we’re watching PBS, right?)

The bride and groom wanted us to be ready and strong for the night that was about to happen. They had created an event that was going to push us all tour limits both mentally and physically. The buffet was a necessary step, from the sumptuous meats on down to the potato salad and pot of beans, each food to fuel a particular stage of the evening. The potato salad was for a long energy burn, the meat was for strength and endurance, Jell-O fruit salad for that quick hit of spark to get the party rolling and beans to ensure that the ride home in the crowded cockpit of the Pathfinder would be memorable. The buffet was delicious and we were in the clutches of its sweet, sweet trap.

With bellies full of coal, we were ready to get this VFP Locomotive rollin’ down the track. It started off as a beautiful early evening with the sun beginning to set as the band began playing and the crowd starting to loosen up. It didn’t take long before the party was in full swing. Everyone was having a good time. I mean everyone was taking advantage of the host’s ample bar. Wine, beer, champagne, liquor and who knows what else was being ingested at an alarming rate. I was looking around for possible places people might stumble off to and sleep, you know, in case the crisis I mentioned in PART 1 happened again. (We’re a full service band, and part of what you’re paying for is our experience in the matters of helping to find loved ones led away by giant invisible animals.)

Apart from my own reservations of HOW MUCH FUN people were going to have, the vibe of the wedding was absolutely wonderful. Have you ever been to a wedding where it either feels tense, half-hearted or wrong? Of course you have, if you’ve been to more than three weddings, you’ve encountered this (Write the names of the couple on a piece of paper and burn it to make those feelings go away). This wasn’t one of those weddings and it was because the couple was crazy about each other—everyone could see it—and they cared more about each other and having fun with their family and guests than they did about the one gossamer bow that was peach instead of OFF WHITE! You could tell that this couple understood the wedding was about love and not decoration. However, that didn’t mean that some crazy stuff wasn’t about to go down.

After the ceremonial dances where we had done our best to learn their special songs and they did their best to not cry while they were dancing with each other (Bride/Groom, Bride/Father, Groom/Mother, Parents, etc.), it was the band’s turn to take the bride for a spin.

We’re lucky to have multi-instrumentalists in the band. Everyone plays another instrument…except me. We were able to switch out mid-song and send a representative out to dance with the bride for 30 seconds while another slips into the instrument and plays. The transitions were seamless… as seamless as a baseball, but you get the idea, we pulled it off.

By the time it was my turn to spin her around the dance floor, the bride was getting a bit tired (not entirely her fault, we tend to take Johnny B. Goode at roughly 2.3 times its intended tempo). I told her that it was really turning into a great reception.

The bride looked at me and with a playful/foreboding/happy/mischievous/clairvoyant smile said, “This party hasn’t even begun yet.”

I immediately removed my hands from her and covered my neck. She had delivered that line like every vampire in every vampire movie you’ve ever seen speaks just before their eyes dilate, fangs grow and they dislocate their jaw to sink their teeth into a foolish, foolish victim. I knew it was silly but I didn’t want to be a vampire.

She wasn’t wrong, it was only a few songs later, as the outdoor lighting came on and the sun had gone down that the wedding was crashed by a giant chicken.

At first, being stone cold sober, I was taken aback as I sat behind the drums watching a person in a very convincing chicken suit mingle about the crowd. Most of the crowd let the chicken walk by as if it were common place to have a possibly radioactive chicken just wandering around a formal party. The chicken didn’t just wander in off a street somewhere. We were at a bit of a destination spot. This chicken was here for a reason. Most people were too tipsy to acknowledge the bird, lest they be wrong about its appearance and find themselves in a twelve step program the next week.

The other guys in the band saw the chicken and I was careful to watch Nabil and Jeff, who had been handed one too many beers from the enthusiastic guests. Jeff was skeptical, while Nabil saw the bird and did not want to look at it. It was about time for one of our breaks anyway, so chicken time was as good as any to regroup and plan the next two sets.

Jeff and Nabil immediately switched to water as Martín went to get a closer look at the big bird and probably score two pieces of cake. I saw at least two young women lock-on to Martín as he left the stage like he was the last cookie on the plate and I sensed danger. Happily married, Martín is often unaware that his Argentinian exoticness and clean Spanish accent mark him for death among females like the sickest gazelle in the herd. Yet here he was, taking his chances with the lionesses at the watering hole.

“Where’d the chicken come from?” I asked Nabil and Jeff.

“You see it too?” Jeff joked—half joked.

“I don’t know, but I don’t think the bride and groom know it’s here yet,” Nabil said as he scanned the crowd, “This is an excellent wedding.”

“Agreed. The chicken is definitely next-level. I don’t know if we should charge more or if we should charge less for getting to see it,” I said.

“Fellas, I think we need to pace ourselves,” Jeff began, “I think this is one of those weddings that goes until someone dies, and this group looks very healthy.”

I knew what he meant. We were going to burn all of our songs quickly if we let the excitement get to us and we kept jacking up the tempos.

“Yeah, and we can’t let Martín sing anymore of his songs unless one of you has a chastity belt we can fit him with. I’m afraid he will be overpowered if we aren’t careful,” I said as the others nodded. “Speaking of our South American friend, can either of you see him?” It was now the kind of dark where an unsuspecting cake-eating Argentinian could be taken against his will and never be heard from again.

Martín came back with cake for everyone (and a little on his chin) and was nervously looking over his shoulder.

“That’s right,” said Nabil, “You’re being followed by at least two, possibly six Montana women. You need to be more careful out there. In fact, don’t leave the stage again without one of us with you.”

“I’m not leaving this gazebo again. I had two pieces of cake and I don’t want to risk a third,” he laughed, but it was that nervous, high laugh you make when you’re almost hit by a bus or an axe misses your hand on a chopping block. “And I ran into the chicken.”

“Did he say anything to you? Did he cluck?” Jeff asked.

“Uh, you guys,” Said Martín with an Argentinian sheepish look (more humble embarrassment than typical American sheepishness), “I think the chicken is a girl chicken, not a man chicken.”

“Why is that Martín? What makes you so sure?” Nabil asked.

“Because uh,” He started to blush, “the chicken had, uh,” he held out his hands in front of his chest and then adjusted them down for size.

“Martín, are you saying this chicken doesn’t just have thighs and wings, but also breasts?” Nabil asked.

“Um, yeah. And I didn’t mean to know, I mean, the chicken wanted a hug and so I, you know, gave the chicken a hug. I wasn’t going to say no to the chicken. It came to me with its wings out and I figured, ‘okay, Martín, you’re going to hug a chicken,’ and I felt something in my chest.” Martín said with a nervous giggle.

“Felt something in your chest? Like, you feel like you might be in love with this chicken? You think this chicken might be THE ONE?” I asked him.

“No, NO! I would never marry a chicken.” Martín replied with absolute certainty.

“But you’re saying it is definitely a hen and not a rooster?” Jeff continued the grilling of Martín, which is often VERY fun as he struggled with some of the more subtle usage with his second language.

“Of course it was a hen he felt. Otherwise Martín would have felt a co-“

“WHAT IS THAT?!?!” Nabil interrupted me, pointing into the darkness.

“…completely different species,” I finished as I stared in the direction of Nabil’s pointing.

After stepping out from the lights and letting my eyes adjust, we could see in the distance, the silhouettes of two people either engaged in a romantic act, or someone was trying to resuscitate a person using an untraditional form of CPR.

“Well, when I was trained, that was an automatic fail,” Jeff piped up.

“What’s that?” Nabil asked as we were all spellbound by the site taking place nearly 50 yards away near a tree.

“Everybody knows it is fifteen chest compressions and two breaths. This joker has them mixed up,” clearly Jeff had the same idea I had.

“You could go over there and set things right if we didn’t have to play now,” I said with a grin as I saw the inevitable. “Guys, look at the chicken!”

The bride, flanked by her toughest bridesmaids (which were all of them), approached the chicken directly and with purpose. The chicken flapped a little, staring in the direction of the approaching taffeta clad butt-kicking machine, unable to run away in the awkward costume feet.

Our break was over, but there was no way we were going to miss bride versus chicken for the World Wrestling title belt. We’ve seen many amazing things at weddings, but I don’t think any of us have seen a bride fight a giant chicken on her wedding day.

(What happened next is paraphrased slightly, but I tried to keep it as close as possible.)

“CHICKEN!” said the bride with enunciation as sharp as a poultry butcher’s cleaver, “Chicken, I want to talk to you!”

The bride was nose to beak with the chicken and many of the guests gathered around the two of them like it was 3:05pm after school at the flag pole and/or bike rack. I was tempted to check to see if the chicken was laying a giant egg from the tension. Everyone was ready to see the bride put a hurtin’ on that wedding crasher, because—and I don’t think I’m alone here—every bride has the right to knock out any guest she sees fit at her wedding up to and including the pastor that marries her if that guest threatens the integrity of her wedding day. I can’t think of a wedding where a person in a chicken suit doesn’t qualify for a beat down like that (maybe Gary Busey’s).

“Chicken… I don’t know you. I don’t know why you’re here or who you are,” the bride began, “but you are welcome at my wedding.”

At the part where she was supposed to pluck the chicken, baste it and stuff its cavity full of wedding cake, the bride did one of the classiest things I’ve seen done at a wedding. She just rolled with it, hugged the chicken and invited it to stay for the festivities, but gave it a casual warning to avoid the buffet as there were various forms of chicken foods being served. I thought it was a clever joke.

The party swung on in full force. Sometimes I thought more people had arrived, and others I wondered where everyone had went. But the band played on through a high energy set and then another. It was getting late, but the there was no slowing this group down. Normally it’s three sets and the wedding is over, but seeing as we drove all this way, the couple was really cool and the police hadn’t shown up, we figured we would play a fourth set.

Set four is where things started getting a little shaky. I was getting a bit tired behind the kit, but the songs Nabil was calling out were all quick, busy beats that require lots of drum effort and little guitar effort. The crowd literally kept us going with cheering and crowding our gazebo stage.

I cannot remember what song it was that the crowd went nuts on, but soon the stage was packed with new band members singing, playing the tambourine and cowbell. There were at least two air-guitarists and to my left, two ladies were trying to make a Martín sandwich. In true sandwich form, the meat of Martín kept slipping out from between them as he got more and more squished and soon he was standing directly behind me, avoiding the advances of the ladies off to the side of the stage.

It was about that time, that I witnessed some serious testosterone getting displayed. I don’t know if the ladies that were trying to dance with Martín had boyfriends, but if they did, it was the two guys standing directly in front of my drum kit, howling along with the songs and looking at the ladies. One guy took his shirt off and did push-ups, right there on the stage as we were playing. Not to be outdone, a second gentleman leapt up in the air to catch a horizontal support beam with his hands and started some very impressive pull ups. Those guys were in shape. That was all it took to refocus the ladies’ attention and give Martín some breathing room. But who knew what other dangers lurked in the dark for our Argentinian man candy?

Set five had the band venturing into new music territory. We were getting requests and playing songs we didn’t realize we knew how to play. The crowd just wanted more. That was about the time the United States army showed up.

Several soldiers from the nearby barracks had heard all the commotion and ventured over to see what was going on. Of course the bride and groom invited them to stay. In full fatigues, one of the soldiers wanted to sing a song with us that we didn’t know how to play. However, when a member of the armed forces wants to sing with your band, you make it happen, so we did. He wasn’t that bad either, and it seemed like a fitting way to end the night.

As we collected our gear, the entire park cleared out completely. Nabil came back to the stage after a few too many non-water drinks, holding a very nice bottle of rum.

“The groom gave this to us!” Nabil said, as if he were just given comprehensive health insurance for life. “He said we could just have it!” He looked at me with eyes that were having trouble focusing but his face had a look on it like he was five-years-old and he had just met Mickey Mouse. This is uncharacteristic of Nabil. He is not one to over indulge, but the weather was warm, we were working very hard and people were bringing him the wrong beverage all night. So it was more accidental than anything and enjoyed seeing a side of Nabil that is rarely seen. Jeff too had suffered this fate.

Jeff was confused about how to put his stuff away, yet was still packed up before everyone else, and his stuff is pretty complex (keyboard, sax, microphones, bass, amp). He was more confused when out of the night a man about our age stepped up on the stage and asked where everyone went. He was literally the last guest there and had taken a little nap I guess and missed his ride out of there.

The man chatted us up a bit as we packed our gear away asking us about the band and about what we do. He was interested in Martín because he could speak Spanish and wanted Martín to call his wife/girlfriend (unclear, but definitely domestic partner) to come pick the man up in Spanish. He explained that she had always wanted to go to South America and spoke excellent Spanish. The man thought having Martín call her would probably take some of the edge off of him and get his wife excited to speak Spanish with a native speaking Argentinian. He was right.

While we waited for the man’s ride to show up, Nabil asked the man what he did for work in the area.

“I’m an engineer,” said the man.

“I am too!” Nabil said with a burst of excitement, “do you work for a firm around here?”

“Firm?” asked the man.

“Yeah, do you have a group that you work for out here?” asked Nabil with slight clarification. I could see Nabil didn’t quite understand why it was a difficult question.

“BNSF,” said the man.

“Bien Es Eff?” Asked Nabil, this time looking for clarification.

“Burlington Northern Sante Fe,” explained the engineer.

Nabil quickly ran through the rolodex in his slightly clouded mind of every structural engineering firm he had ever heard of…twice.

I looked at Nabil and pulled twice on an invisible steam whistle, “Woo Wooooooo.”

It clicked in Nabil’s head and he looked at the engineer and laughed, “Sorry, I’m the other kind of engineer and thought we might know some of the same people.”

“Gentlemen, this has been one of my favorite verbal exchanges of all time and I will write about it someday,” I declared as I looked at both of them.

Meanwhile a truck had pulled up and a woman was now talking to Martín in rapid Spanish. They continued speaking as we packed up and the engineer headed to the passenger side of his pickup.

“Wish me luck boys,” he said as he tipped his hat to us and we waved good-bye.

It was clear that Martín had this woman under his aloof, spell. To speak with Martín is to love him no matter whom you are. He’s just a likeable guy. His charm is that he doesn’t understand his charm. He’s such an unsuspecting family guy that I think it makes him more attractive. He’s good looking and he speaks a form of Spanish that is much more formal than what we normally hear in the United States. The language sounds elegant coming out of his mouth, and you can’t help but wonder how his mouth makes all those hypnotic sounds.

So understand that although this woman was falling under Martín’s spell, Martín had no idea he was casting it. He could be saying something like, “In Seattle we go to the fish market and then we ride the elevator to the top of the Space Needle,” and it would sound like a Harlequin romance passage. The easiest way to fix this was to throw a bucket of water on this poor lady, but that would be hard to explain to her true love that she was about to drive home. We just made Martín busy carrying stuff so that she would take her man home thus breaking the South American’s spell.

We made it to the hotel we had paid for at around 4am. Checkout time was to be 11 but we had to be on the road by 8 the next morning to start the long drive home on time.

As we all fell roughly onto the two beds (Jeff/Steve, Nabil/Martín FYI), we all reflected on what we had just been through.

“Remember the time in the Pathfinder when we scared the crap out of Steve?” Martín asked as we all laughed.

We will always remember the time they scared the crap out of me on the way to the best wedding we had ever played together, and that’s the Damm truth.