Robby's Lobby #157

BlogJune, 2020InRock.co.jp

Hey Hey In Rockers and Welcome to The Lobby ! It’s a strange one this month as I’ve only left my house to get groceries over the past 30 days! With the US under social distancing measures for the past month I’ve been splitting my days between homeschooling my daughter, figuring out how to exist in a band when the touring business has been shut down until further notice, and well, just not going stir crazy as we spend 24 hours a day in our little house in Buffalo. But through all of these challenges we persevere and will eventually come out of the other side of this whole experience better and hopefully a more compassionate people.

I’ve been doing a couple of online acoustic shows from my a little spare room in my house, with a couple of decent microphones and a few lights to make sure the quality’s decent. It’s been fun to revisit some really old songs and see what a solo acoustic treatment does to these old “punk rock” songs we haven’t performed in well over a decade, maybe 2! I even did a few PSAs during the stream, (to some blazing Bossa Nova music of course) and provided a demonstration of hand washing, mask making and some general “life hacks” for the isolation age we’re living through. One of the performances raised a few thousand dollars for the local nurses and doctors that are on the front line of this pandemic here in my community, as always it’s nice to be able to do something to help a bit in a time that everyone feels so helpless.

Goo Goo Dolls are working on a few things as we make our way through this time, doing some recording remotely and sharing files and sessions online to have some new things for you all to listen to, I would say expect to see something out in the fall/winter of this year. Luckily, I had some recording equipment and musical gear at my house and was able to assemble a recording system. With only a few minor technical problems to solve I was back in action pretty quickly, albeit alone in the spare bedroom of my house rather than in my studio across town.

So, I’m washing my hands, using sanitizer, wearing masks when I go out for necessities, wiping down my packages and, well, just staying at home … that’s all that’s asked of me, and I think I can do that. My wife, Miyoko, made it back to Buffalo from an extended visit to Japan a few weeks ago and with travel and touring suspended for the immediate future I’m going to take this time to enjoy being with my family in this rare extended stay at home.

We just found out yesterday that we are going to be in our homes for another 30 days from today, by the time this is published there will probably be a whole new chapter written about this situation. But I must say at this point it seems we’re in need of a paradigm shift on this planet, let’s hope we get a positive one. It seems the lesson learned here is we are all one people and are all affected by what happens on Earth, regardless of borders or beliefs, let’s hope we help one another solve this problem and keep that spirit alive well after the inevitable end of this crisis …

We’ll catch up next month, and I hope you are all staying safe - I’ve got a hand ? I’ve got a soap - washee washee washee washee washee washee - PPAP …

Peace and Safety …

Robby

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