Troublefaker Stories: First gigs at The Workshop

Hey! Again, I hope you're enjoying these stories as much as I'm enjoying writing and illustrating them. I'm still astounded at the amount of people who write to me or approach me to let me know what they think! This email list was never this active before, not in sending and certainly not responses. 

Still, it's a way to process the end of what was basically the driving force in my life for nearly 14 years. Some memories are good and some are not. I will try to save you from the not good ones when I can, but I can't promise to candy-coat anything. 

So... The Workshop. It was pretty terrible as far as dive bars go - at least in my opinion - I guess they had good beer but everything on the menu was angrily deep fried. The only thing I remember eating there was fries. It was torn down several years ago to make room for condos and a parking lot. I did manage to find a couple of photos, though. 

These were taken by some guy named Nigel around 2007, who really loved this place.

Ethan set up the first gig. I think the owner was a family friend so it was a pretty easy gig to land. Honestly I had no idea what to expect. It had been a while since I last performed with a band and my memories were a bit fuzzy. There wasn't a stage, but they moved a bunch of tables so we could play on one side of the room away from the door. 

In digging through my archive I could only find pictures from one of the two gigs I have proof of. Can you guess which one? 

If you guessed anything but the Halloween-themed show, you would be wrong

We all (except for Ed) dressed up for this show (unless Ed was dressed as a serial killer, you know they look just like everybody else) and Ethan was late because his makeup took longer than anticipated. I went out of my way to sew a Pink Ladies jacket and bought a beehive wig, and Laurel... Laurel went incognito. Or invisible. I dunno, you tell me: 

Ethan, Me, Laurel, and Ed at The Workshop 2006

This week's comic covers what my photo archive could not: Our first gig. It's true that we got booked with metal bands at The Workshop, but we also were booked with them at other venues as well. Ethan said it was just something that bookers do so I accepted it. At the time I was unaware of what other bands were in the scene or that it was possible to offer a bill with more appropriate styles. I have since learned better. 

Comics are up there with music as my main creative outlet, but they take time and resources. I have soft-launched a Patreon page where I offer exclusive and behind-the-scenes content. The details will have to wait for next week, though. I have to get it all sorted first. I can take donations through PayPal and as wynnecblue on Venmo, though, if you can't wait for my super-expensive $1/month Patreon. 

As always, thank you for reading this far and subscribing to my email list. Please feel free to forward this to your friends and encourage them to sign up!

See you next week! 

Your friend, 
Wynne C Blue 
https://wynnecblue.com