50 Shades of Deep Purple and Red Faced by Diamond Tim

Being a freelance writer is a funny thing…sometimes you hear crickets when there are none, then a landslide of “gigs” come through! ( You can tell I’m still a rocker when I use the word gigs for all work.) Although Atlas Jams is my favorite, they allow me the freedom to “shout it out loud” when I feel like it…or when I just need more money. ha-ha.

Yeah, it turns out that writing is where my flag waves highest ( or so I like to think.). I still write songs & working on a children’s book & a biography, where many more stories like the one’s from “Diamond & Rust” will appear with even “more” detail ( wink, wink ). Other flags that fly aboard the battleship Diamond are as a hired gun vocalist ( most recently some Joan Jett demos in Memphis.), finishing up a “5 year war” over my daughter Cheyenne Summer’s death ( which makes for some pretty interesting lyrics,…now THAT’S a movie! ), Ebay is big as I seem to have a lot of rock-n-roll “swag” to sell! Taking care of “the farm” here is no picnic even for Ol’ McDiamond, but being the father of an autistic child takes a lot of patience, understanding, teaching & LOVE…my daughter Shenandoah Rain or “Shandi” as we call her is the surviving identical twin & the love of my life. Like a cat has 9 lives & down to it’s last, I don’t trust her with anyone, so I have formed a bubble of protection that nobody else could do but me! Yeah, I wish she could complete sentences & yes, her jumping & twirling are relentless…but she always has a smile, a laugh & has no idea about the “real world”, & I think the longer she doesn’t know about it, the better. It lasted ’til the end of the 80′s for me, LOL.

So, when I’m able to escape the farm, I try my best to…what’s that old saying about “dance like nobody’s watching”,(?) etc…Let me tell ya a “follow-up-funny” if you will, from the last D&R column ( Go back & read it if ya haven’t…I’ll wait.)…

Oh, you’re back. So, spent the day at Summer NAMM in Nashvile with my dear friend & Atlas Jams own Queen ( I mean Publisher ) Dawn Conrad Williams with her awesome husband Britt & one of my best friends & brother for life Tracy Davenport. It was the first time the 3 of us were together since 1985. Dawn’s father, Jim Conrad, owned the legendary Treehouse in Hallandale, Florida where we all came together with the likes of Judas Priest & Johnny Depp calling it “home” as well…it was like one big happy family, so in a sense we had a small reunion & some big drinks to go with it! Like I said, I’m gonna make the most of days like these…We later hit the Cannery and felt a sense of setting the flux capacitor to 1985 in the DeLorean we drove to get there ( It was really a Jeep.) I saw friends I hadn’t seen in years, now throw in some more beverages & I saw friends that weren’t there too! ( LOL ) The Jamie Simmons Benefit Show was a complete success, with the Simmonz boyz a rockin’, Willie Nelson’s Granddaughter, Raelyn a knockin’, Defense Wins Championships a chuckin’, Suckerpunch a punchin’, Gene Cook a cookin’, my ol’ buddy Robert Leath a buckin’ & Deep Purple a space truckin’…and WE…a gawkin’…that’s right friends, DEEP frickin’ PURPLE. And they indeed rocked the house to it’s foundation! We were “ALL” like teenagers again by this point, so the flux capacitor worked!!! Or maybe it was just the speedometer.

Now…let’s go back a few hours. After we got to the club I was buyin’ drinks for some ol’ friends & yeah I was feelin’ no pain, when I thought I saw another old friend who’s girlfriend don’t like me much and made him de-friend me on facebook. Now, I didn’t have my “reading glasses” so as I closed in, my mind believed it was him! I told him;

“Hey you son-of-a-bitch, how the hell are ya!?” Putting my arm around his neck & pulling him tight to me I said, “Listen my man, we’ve known each other too long & there’s just no reason for this petty shit & it’s not our dance! It’s your fucking girlfriend man! She’s no good!! You are letting her run your life & you need to realize this! Now I love ya, you know that…Hell, we’ve never had a problem before, never! Then she disagrees with my views, calls me names, tells wicked lies about me & makes you delete me!? I thought we were buds…anyway, I know that you probably feel trapped & caught in the middle & just want to keep the peace on the homefront, but just between us everything is cool, I got no beef with you…ok?”…

And the he said, ( in a strong English accent ) “Cheers mate, that’s sound’s ace, can I buy you an ale?”…

I thought to myself as I walked him to his table ( next to ours )~ funny, I don’t remember this friend having an English accent…Then I sit down at our table and look back over at them thinking~ That guy he’s sitting next to kinda looks like Ian Paice ( the drummer for Deep Purple )…then I think~ By God, I think it is…Then I see my friend Brandy sitting there too & say “Hi Brandy!”…and then all of a sudden, it hit me…like a warm wet ton of Play-Doh bricks ( enough for a concussion & stick on ya a while, just not enough to kill ya, ya know? Although I wanted to die. lol. )~ If that’s Ian Paice?…Then…Oh sweet Lord, the “friend” I was talking to, was not that friend but a semi-look-alike ( in my non-reading glasses haze )…it was only one of the most legendary bassist in rock history, his name of course, ROGER GLOVER. ( And let me state that this guy couldn’t have been more cordial & cool…I mean the man played along with it! I love him even more now, although I’m sure he still thinks I’m a nut, lol. )

I know in the darkness of the club, my face must’ve turned 50 shades of red ( at least 4 ). Luckily I had an “in” with Brandy as we were facebook friends & hadn’t really met yet, went to say hello & the polite hug…I then whispered in Roger’s ear, that I was “an escaped lunatic from the home of time traveling rockers that just dont drink like they used too, so please forgive my mistaken identity good sir”…I mean who’d a thunk!!?? > DEEP frickin’ PURPLE would be just hangin’ ’round in the club? I had no idea. Funny thing is, I bet the same thing happened to somebody else at the Treehouse almost 30 years ago with Judas Priest always hangin’ ’round there…maybe somebody said, hey, I never realized how much Bob looks like Rob Halford!?

Oh, & Roger did buy me that “ale”…He probably thought, I better buy this nut a bloody beer…but Pabst Blue Ribbon!?? C’mon.

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