The Redding Brothers

Last weekend, we performed as part of The Easter Seals' Telethon Of Stars. Here is an image from that performance. This concert was televised in Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, and Tennessee.

Taylor Kuykendall from Huntington WV's Herald-Dispatch chose Chauvet from our album The Physics of Immortality as his second Song Pick. Read his excellent review at The Herald-Dispatch.

Continued from part 1, and part 2

Our car battery was dead. We were stranded in the country, in the parking lot of a old furniture store, miles from our hotel and from Walmart. It was 1:20 AM, and dogs were barking at us. Fortunately, we had made it off the road, and had a battery charger - a battery charger that would be helpful if only we could find a plug.

But this was in the country where plugs were unlikely to be found, and it was very dark. Dark, that is, except for the giant, old-fashioned flashing lights of the BRAY'S FURNITURE sign. Their gaudy glow was the only thing I could see as the car was failing and I was losing control. It had guided me to safe parking like a light-house guiding a ship home.

By its light, we scouted the parking lot, looking for some sign of a conventional plug. As a last resort, we looked at the large flashing bulbs themselves, and discovered our eagerly sought plug. It was far too obvious, and shocking that we could simply unplug this light. But it was our rescue!

It was only a matter of pushing our car over, unplugging their sign (then plugging it back in to another socket), and hooking our battery charger up to this giant flashing contraption. We hoped that country manners allowed for the sharing of electricity with passing rock bands.

This time we knew we had long wait. So we slept in the car as it charged, hoping not to be surprised by a country deputy or anyone with less law-abiding motives.

At 3am, we woke up, and the battery charger had actually made some progress. We unplugged it, and jumped in the car as it started, trying to preserve all the battery power we could. The tense ride back to the hotel had us watching the battery meter all the way, still wondering if we would make it up until the point we actually pulled in.

In the morning, we had a leisurely breakfast, and then plotted our return. By charging it in our rooms overnight, the battery had made it up to at least a quarter of a charge, and we decided that with no headlights or air-conditioning, we should be able to make it back. We almost did.

Along the way, we preserved battery charge by re-fueling without turning off the engine, by keeping dashboard lights off, and by not using turning signals.

But a few miles outside of Nashville, the battery ran out once again. At the same place we first broke down. Irony?

This time we had a charger, and made it into a McDonalds parking lot, where we were able to plug our battery into their lightpost. An hour and a half later, we decided we could make it the 30 miles or so back. We unplugged and hit the road, making nice time, and passing by my exit.

We could have stopped at my exit, but the problem is, we don't park the trailer there. We needed to make it 6 miles farther to park the trailer. We thought we had it. We made it 2.

As in all the cases before, the power suddenly started plummeting, the car started whining, and we realized we had only a minute to find a stopping place, or our car would find one for us. We were stranded 2 miles from my house, 4 miles from where the trailer needed to go.

Fortunately, one more charge at the local TA truck stop would get everyone home.

Continued from Part 1

We decided that the best thing would be to drive the 13 miles to the nearby Walmart, purchase a battery charger, and then charge the battery all night in our room.

By the time we got to Walmart, however, our battery was drained, and we realized we couldn't make it back to the hotel. We were stuck.

Until the lovely folks at Walmart decided to let us charge our battery from the power plug on the front of their building. All the employees got into it, pushing our car over against the wall. We then hooked up our $30 battery charger conveniently purchased inside, plugged it into our battery, and began to wait.

An hour or so later, it was 1:20am, and I thought that the battery looked charged up enough to get us back to the hotel room. So we unplugged, waved goodbye, and hit the road as quickly and efficiently as we could. Naturally, I kept our lights dimmed to preserve charge.

Everything seemed to be going well, until I was suddenly unable to tell if my headlights were on or not. The window became very foggy, and from what I could see of the battery meter, power was plummeting. We were in the middle of nowhere. Everything was falling apart as I watched, the loud whine was sounding, and I couldn't see the road. Except - a large flashing sign appeared through the fog, an old-fashioned arrow pointing to "Bray's Furniture". We pulled into their parking lot as the car died, narrowly missing a ditch.

We were happy not to be dead directly in the middle of an old country road with no lights. Just being in a parking lot was a good thing. But we were stuck miles from our hotel, our trailer, and the helpful Walmart people. How would we get back to the hotel?

Continued in Part 3

The other day we made the drive from Nashville to Freed-Hardeman University, to play a concert as part of the inauguration of the new University President, and as part of an event aptly titled "Soccer-Palooza". Little did we know how much effort said trip was going to be.

Apparently, shortly before the trip, the alternator on our SUV went out, leaving us with a nice, constantly depleting, battery charge.

We were unaware of this until we were a short distance outside of Nashville. In rapid succession, the battery meter began decreasing rapidly, the dashboard lights stopped working, and our windows refused to roll down. It was like a scene from a horror movie. We were stuck in our car, plummeting down the interstate with no gages and few controls. The last thing to go was the speedometer, hitting 0 mph even as we were doing over 70mph. Then a shrill whine began emanating from the car, and we lost acceleration and power altogether.

I pulled over to the side of the road. We were 20 miles from the nearest town, AAA wouldn't help a car with a trailer, and no police drove by during the next two hours.

Fortunately, Ryan Hogan came to save the day, buying us a new battery, and driving out of town to bring it to us. We couldn't replace the alternator in time to get to the show, so we had to hope that the new battery was fully charged.

It wasn't.

But it got us to FHU. We had a great time playing a concert in a soccer field, meeting interesting people, and doing our part to usher in the new University President. We finished late at night, and were checked in to the local hotel.

But how would we get back in the morning? If the battery wasn't fully charged, would we actually make it?

Continued in Part 2 and Part 3