Ken Glidewell, also known as Mr. K. died Tuesday morning of injuries sustained from a motorcycle accident on Memorial Day. I first met him only a few months ago when he was booking bands for Aces & Eights. But I wanted to tell the story of my conversations with him, so that people who knew him better could hear it, and it would not be lost forever...
I first got a message on my cell phone from a familiar deep, slow voice... He said, "ray... Ken Glidewell... I'm putting together the Bike Night Schedule for Aces & Eights this summer. Call me at Aces & eights... thanks..." If he hadn't said his name, I would have figured out the voice before the end of that first sentence. Needless to say, i was happy to hear someone form Aces & Eights calling me, let alone a local celeb! So I called him back right away.
I could tell from the start of the conversation that he was trying to figure out if he had ever seen us anywhere, or met us at some point, and how exactly we got on the Aces & Eights list if he didn't know who we were... But I expained that we did a few things for them last year and I was glad they asked us back... He then became comfortable talking to me, and we started talking about the band and where we have played and what we had been up to... And he didn't make me think he was probing for information... It was a genuine interest. We talked about bar owners that we played for, and surprisingly enough, we had the same things to say about each of them :) I mentioned to him that we were working on a CD and he proceeded to give me the names and numbers of people he had worked with around town, and he gave me all the advice he had to give about the whole process. All in all, the initial conversation with Mr. Glidewell lasted about 30 minutes, and I had a new respect for him. I admit, I was a little intimidated at first, but that did not last long. He seemed like a really genuine dude.
When we showed up to play the OUTDOOR Bike Night gig at Aces, it was raining... raining pretty good... We waited for a bit, and it finally slowed down enough to think about playing... Rain was looming in the area, but we had a break... Ken came out, stood next to us, looked at the sky... He turned to us and said, "Well, if you guys are crazy enough to play, then I guess we are crazy enough to have this thing."
We played. For several weeks before the gig, I kept telling the band, "We need to impress Ken Glidewell!" I felt like he already had confidence in us, and I didn't want to dissapoint him.
I hope we did ok... Thanks Mr. K... I wish we had more time with you...