Space—The Final Excuse...

Today I recalled a few of the stories performing artists have told me over the years about "getting to the gig".

My favorite, and the saddest of them is the following: Years ago, I was on a recording session with legendary guitarist Eric Gale. Eric told me one of his "Dude, I Spaced" stories...though in his story, he was a beneficiary of that too-often used sub-excuse.

A well-known jazz composer and bandleader (whom we won't name here), was contracted to play a concert tour in Japan. He was travelling with a rhythm section (that's guitar, keyboards, bass, and drums), and some horns (saxophones, trombones, trumpets, perhaps). When the bandleader arrived in Japan, he hooked up with all but one of the band members. The guitarist he'd originally hired hadn't shown up. The bandleader called the guitarist's home in New York, to find that the guitarist was not only still at home, but was high on cocaine. He had forgotten to go to Japan! Eric was called in at the last minute, went to Japan, and saved the tour.

Imagine you're responsible for hauling all the equipment necessary for your employees to do their time-sensitive job, you take a left on the highway instead of a right, wind up 60 miles off course, and two hours late. Chances are that someone (besides you) will be slightly annoyed at this "turn" of events.

It's safe to assume that most people who have made it to the higher echelons of showbusiness, have earned their status, in part, because they made it to "the gig" a large majority of the time. Whether it was a 6AM call on a movie set, a deadline for a manuscript, or a 4PM bar-mitzvah, the successful people generally do what it takes to ensure they are there to do their thing when their audience expects them to be there.

Woody Allen taught us that "90% of life is just showing up".

Comedian Barry Sobel told us one of the many differences between New York and L.A.. He said that "In New York, when you tell your friend 'I'll meet you at the movie theater at 10 o' clock', you meet them at the theater at 10 o' clock!'...In L.A., they might not show up at all! The next morning, you call them up, and they say 'Dude! I spaced!'...'Dude, I spaced' is an excuse in L.A.!!".

Well, clearly the "Dude, I spaced!" people aren't ones we'd expect to see starring in a Broadway show, or playing concerts at arenas around the world. Typically, those who are successful show up on time, and rarely (if ever) "space".


Most of us are just hard-working people. If we have to go to Japan (or perhaps to downtown Kansas City) for work, we wouldn't be likely to forget that. In this day of so many things competing for our attention—advertisements everywhere, e-mail, podcasts, children, work deadlines, and...just the many distractions of day-to-day life in the "age of technology"—it's conceivable that even we might "space" on some important obligation or other. We might not forget to go to Japan, but..something that's time-sensitive might escape our attention once in a while.

How do we reduce the chances of missing an appointment, then?

There is an abundance of tools available to us today that will do everything from beep and buzz in our hands at a pre-set time, send us e-mail reminders well in advance of our appointments, pop up on our computer screens, and maybe even come to our door, ring our bell, and escort us out to whatever the "gig" of the moment is.

In the next post, we'll explore some of those options. Stay tuned. Write to me if you have questions.