Everyone can talk about something they have witnessed that stuck with them. Usually it's some superstars getting together to save the world or something, that's cool.
I maintain great moments happen in rock all the time by people not at all well known.
One came to me from my dim and distant past (most of the people I knew then are dead or in the nursing home).
The band was a group I moved to Austin to start right after getting married (1973). I can't tell you the name of it, we could not agree what to call it, so we each referred to it by the name we liked best (hoping the others would like it). I called it Jack Frost. Like many bands, we spent most of our time rehearsing in our living room. Yes, like the Monkees, we lived together - 8 people in a 2 bedroom house. Hang on, I'm getting to the "great rock moment in a minute or two.
We got our first job playing a homecoming dance for Waco High School. I was the point man, 'played guitar, organ, electric piano, saxophone, flute, and sang a bit. On our first gig, we were doing a song with twin lead guitars ("Blind Eye" by Wishbone Ash if you must know). When it came time for the twin guitars to do their thing, me and the real guitarist came simultaneously charging out to the front of the stage as if we had done this on the last 14 shows, when in reality, we never practiced it (in our cramped living/practice room? No way!) Didn't discuss it, or even think about it until "it" happened. We happen to glance at one another on the way out and traded grins. "This IS rock and Roll" Thought I...
About 10 years later I was emcee at a punk rock concert at a downtown park. A young group not unlike my own in 1973 took the 'stage' (flat spot actually). Their twin guitars came charging out with mucho gusto... and pulled their stacked amplifiers over in a tremendous crash. The guitar player's cables were too short! A 'great moment' thwarted by a tiny miscalculation. Fortunately punks thrive on this sort of thing...
