I’ve decided to veer off just a little and talk about the group. When you’re out on the road away from home the band becomes like a family. Like a band of brothers. Of course you get into spats but heaven help the outsider that gets on one of the members. Gary Nieland feared no one if they were messing with one of the “guys”. Gary Sullivan has to be one of the most loyal people Ive ever known. Jimmy Jones was really easy going , I never saw him really mad but somehow I knew you could depend on him. Seems we always had two Gary’s. We gave Gary Nieland a nickname. I can’t really remember how we came up with it but to us he was “ Hoot” Hoot was a fantastic drummer. He loved to sing. He was quick to come up with new songs to learn as they came out. During this time we were doing whatever was popular so we did a lot of Beatles songs. Jimmy could sing about anything but leaned toward ballads. He did Roy Orbison, Elvis but also did up tempo stuff. I remember he did a great job on “crying” by Roy Orbison but never wanted to do it because he said it hurt his throat. Now Gary Sullivan would do anything for the group. Any song, any skit anything. Whatever you asked him to do he was all in. Rarely complained and was always ready to perform or practice. We did a lot of things together on our off time. As for me it’s difficult to describe ones self I’ll just say I tried to be a good member. I was often grouchy and I really hate that. Later in life I learned how to cure that problem. I just wish I had learned it sooner. One thing that makes me very proud is we never got into drinking or drugs. Not to say we never had a drink of course we did but we never drank much and certainly not while performing. Later on a different member had a bit of a problem but not any of these guys. We were very professional. No smoking or drinking,even water, on stage. No tuning or piddling between songs. On time following breaks. We just did what we were hired to do. Reno was a hard place to play because Friday and Saturday were two hours longer. Weeknights were 9 til 2 and Friday and Saturday 9 til 4 . Now let me tell ya by four am you are dragging. I once heard our group described as “ a rock and roll band that drinks milk and says yes ma’am and no ma’am please, thank you and you’re welcome” That made me proud. Btw that was my first wife that said that. Gotta give credit where credit is due. We all fell in love with Reno mainly because there was just so much to do. There were lakes, mountains, every kind of entertainment you can dream of. The people were extremely nice to us. Inviting us to dinner at their homes. Just being nice.
Its really hard to remember some things or get them into the proper time frame but somewhere along here George was no longer in our life. I don’t remember what happened I don’t think there was a blow up or anything like that.
Sometime towards the end of the year a different club came calling The Driftwood Lounge was another popular club and it was just nicer all the way around. The best thing was they just had live music four nights a week and would pay the same money. We would play Wednesday through Saturday. What a deal. We had been living in a Motel that also had apartments. Gary and I spun off and rented a regular two bedroom apartment just a couple blocks from the Club. It seemed as though we were settled into Reno for a while. Of course in those days you didn’t have to sign your life away to rent an apartment. I guess it never dawned on us we didn’t have things like sheets, towels pots and pans or anything else to set up an apartment. We bought the bare essentials. I remember using the packing quilts out of the equipment trailer for cover on the bed. Sometimes the visitors were turned off but what the heck we didn’t mind. The new club was great. Good crowds, nice owners and just lots of fun. I can’t remember for sure but we must have taken a vacation to come home for Christmas. We usually did and I know that about this time I changed cars. I remember being home and going to see the same guy I bought the impala convertible from He didn’t have anything I wanted but he suggested we go looking. We went to Mcalester. We checked out a couple of lots and then came up to another lot and sitting there all by itself was a 1964 impala two door hard top. Bright red. Omg I was in love. We drove it then he went inside to see if he could buy it. He bought it and I drove it back to Holdenville. Of course I had to finance it and there I hit a snag. I was going to go through First National Bank Of Holdenville. I sat down with Oren Wilbanks and he discovered a couple of problems. First of all I was only 20 and second I was gonna take it out of state. He kept saying he would really like to help me but he just couldnt do it. I really dont know how I pulled this off. I dont know if I thought it through or if I was sincere anyway I knew his son Jimmy from years past. I said ” Mr Wilbanks how is Jimmy doing.” he seemed almost surprised that I knew Jimmy. he commenced to telling me all about Jimmy I think Jimmy was in college At OU at the time. he gave me a complete rundown about him. when he finally finished he looked at me and said ” oh hell lets write this up” I kid you not thats exactly how that went down. so now I had a bright red chevy impala and was headed back to Reno. By the way I was never late on a payment. I promised him I wouldn’t be.
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