This is a poem that a fan wrote about the bands last 2 shows.

6/22/03 2:11am The Last Note (for Blue)

So the head with ears ringing lies on my pillow,

Looking back over the years of my life and my string of heroes.

There they were one more time, taking the stage on a Saturday night,

To an unsuspecting crowd that at last call,

Heard the last note, the last of eighteen years of private fame and fortune.

It is all given now by the way side,

Friends who knew tragedy,

Who have seen hell in their own lives, and in the lives of one another,

And here in the glow of their spotlight,

When once it was for the rich future,

And it ends now with nothing but the love of the music and the hope of the children’s future.

It ends now with the love of the stage and the woman dancing in the front of the bar,

They shake and move to invisible beats and hands that shape their bodies into mighty rock and roll,

And it was like any other show,

A smoky Hermosa Beach bar filled with generations of late night revelers,

A collection of the South Bay’s finest,

I will never do the scene justice with any words that I could write down,

But will try to relay it to you as best as I can.

It was another show,

Long lost friends reuniting in their own right,

Sharing beers, and tall tales,

But the faces are older,

Some of the bodies are fatter, and some are skinnier,

Some are getting married,

Some are all ready fathers and mothers,

I could do nothing but sit back and watch as the crowd began to roar when Brian got ready to sing his part in I Know You Rider,

The beers could have been torches of light,

Illuminating the passion of his voice,

And the sound of his notes, here once more were his angelic whispers.

Or the joy of seeing Mitch take his microphone off the stand ,

And wander the stage and sing,

Or Jeff holding the dancers captive with another strong beat,

And that was what these guys were all about to us young pups,

Watching Rizzo sail across the guitar like a true rocker,

These were our heroes,

There was always and there was always supposed to be Electric Blue,

They were the source of the parties I used to stare at raging across the street when I was in eighth grade,

They were the band we all wanted to grow up to be,

They were the band of friendship, good times, and summer sunsets,

New friendships were constantly being born with and around them,

These guys captured our lives,

A constant for eighteen years,

They were the rock and roll dream, the standard by which we would all be judged,

And where my own personal creativity was born and inspired,

And so it seemed right to have Dave break a string,

Or have yet another beer spilled down my front by a girl dancing at the edge of the stage,

Or to have Johnny there to mix and record another one of their shows,

It was the end of a piece of our lives.

Our heroes, the band, our rock and roll dreams where closing their own curtains,

And after tonight, there would be no more Electric Blue once the gear was packed away one last night,

Or the mops surfaces to clean up the sticky floor.

But the dream is constant and real,

At least I think that I can see it differently now,

I used to believe that it was about the stadium filled back stage with women, cases of whiskey and wine,

All though at first to a group of young guys playing in high school, I will bet that was the dream,

But I think that something for them changed out there on the road after all of these years,

That it became a love, a passion,

That this was not a job, but a special calling to inspiration, to friendship,

Yes, it was something special I can see it now as I think of the girl that was sitting at the end of the bar,

She was dressed to go out, but sat alone sulking when first she arrived,

She looked great, a low cut top, low rise jeans, long, flowing brown hair,

But as the music grew and she became aware, she began to awaken,

She was moved by the inspiration, by the friendship

And found herself like all of us,

Trapped inside the ocean of music,

Inside the dream that all things are possible,

That all that matters is right here, right now,

Those notes coming from the stage, the infectious vocals of these men,

The laughter of the women and the smiles of the guys dancing,

That was all you needed to see to want to leave your present place,

And join in the celebration , the celebration of life , of being alive and able to listen to and enjoy all things,

I would like to think that for a moment, she was touched by the very thing that touched me so long ago,

A shower of passion and a burst of laughter.

And when the last note of One More Saturday Night was played and we thanked the band and the band thanked us,

And the people headed for their cars,

I had to sit for a moment and reflect with a tear in my eye,

That I got to know their dream,

That after all of these years I think I might understand the reason behind the long life of this band and their music.

It was not about being famous, being rich,

For these men all ready had these things with one another,

They were each other’s biggest fans, not just musically, but in friendship,

And those friendships are what made them rich.

I see now that they had a dream of unity,

Unity of their collective inspirations becoming one force,

A force that could sway tired eyes to wild dancing, excited eyes,

A force that could take this poet to his bed at 2 am and inspire once dead pens to move with new life,

And more so, a force of love,

Love for one another, a love for their music and how it brought forth friendships among them and to those of us who came to the shows,

And so that was your legacy Brian, Mitch, Dave and Jeff,

That is what you leave behind with me,

A dream of unity,

And the example of the kind of love that exists and endures among men.

7.27.03 Reunion, Pt2

Where once stood a man obsessed with his own death,

Constantly pondering suicide, a life on the edge,

“A man on the edge” dreaming of his own last breaths,

Now there is a different child, standing alone in a bar,

Sipping on diet cokes in a quiet reflections,

As the clock stops around him and school children drink and play like they always have running to the beat of their invisible drums,

They find comfort in their old roles, old dreams, old jokes and old conversations,

And the insanity of the night echoes out into once weighted, heavy dreams,

The fantasy is alive, and the blood flows once more,

The man on the edge finds a different dream,

A calling out of spirits, a reunion with God,

As thoughts from afar come upon him, carrying with them the thoughts of this present day,

Yesterday starts to fade with a series of inspirations,

The man was ashamed at times of the boy who wanted so badly to be loved, to be older, to be wiser,

But could never move his lips, move his mouth to smile,

Could only care about you liking him, and him loving you,

A constant search for balance, a see saw of emotion, that always fell heavy to one side,

The boy that used to fall apart once left alone, with thoughts that took hold and dominated him at times,

And these thoughts themselves, could surrender any man, let alone a boy,

They were louder then all of the children could hear, louder then all of the adults could care about it,

It all exploded as the fantasies all ended, the delusions came a head, and the boy struck out his life,

Struck out with his hand to make his own heart bleed as if to punish God, all invisible destinies, all deities, anyone who had charted his path in life,

But the journey was not ended, it was not close to beginning, there was the skeleton found in the closet of dreams

The father who witnessed graduation for the heavens, not from the front row of the football field.

Yesterday fades,

And with it so do the voices, they are still here, but not as loud as the man remembers in younger days,

There are even moments when they are not even there at all.

The dreams are off center,

There as a moment on the sea shore that changed all of life for the boy,

He spent the night with friends drinking and playing ball at sixteen down on the esplanade at Torrance Beach,

There was a moment when he took his finger and wrote poems in the sand,

And then it all made sense,

The boy was of the earth, he was of the sand, the water the moon, the stars,

His finger creates his vision onto the grains of sand, the grains group together forming the words he creates,

And like his poems , he could be a creation himself formed with another finger,

The boy finds that his life is a pen, ever being moved, ever being created,

With that thought

A wave comes to the shore, wiping clean the slate where he had just created his master piece and the water reaches around his bare ankles,

As if to say, “hello”

And the thought of being alone vanishes,

There is a peace,

That was the night,

I found that there was beauty in all life,

A spirit that creates,

And wipes away mistakes,

Wipes away shames,

And though I never believed my own thoughts all of those years ago,

The memory remains,

And with a flash,

Standing in a bar surrounded by old children, old friends, old memories, jokes and conversation,

Yesterday is gone.

Written by By Chris Aguilar about Electric Blues last 2 shows

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