It was nearing the end-of-summer and the band Parousia found itself back at the Eagles Roost in the sleepy lake-side community of Olcott to play one last time before the club shuttered its doors for the season after the big Labor Day weekend.

Tonight’s show at the Eagles Roost was part of a “double-header” for the band. Earlier in the day, Parousia performed outdoors at the “Hertel Happening”, a city of Buffalo annual food, art and entertainment event. It wasn’t easy producing two shows on the same day, there were a lot of logistics and sacrifice involved. Band members and road crew alike had to wake up early on a Saturday morning, drive to Economy Truck rental on Genesee St. to rent the truck, pick up the other crew members and musicians, drive over to the Music Mall in Cheektowaga and load up all of the equipment.

Then, drive back to Buffalo, find a way to get access onto Hertel Avenue and to the exact place on the street to park the truck and set up our instruments and P.A. system. Once establishing where the band was getting its electricity and where to lay the cables, we went all out and mic’d up the drums and ran all the instruments through the sound board. The side of the truck was used to hang a giant banner displaying the Parousia logo. After all, if the band wasn’t getting paid for this performance, then we needed to get the biggest-bang for our “promotional buck” as possible. From set up to tear down, the band’s participation in the Hertel Happening was exhausting and now the band and road crew had to take it all down, load up the truck then drive to Olcott to unload the truck, set-up the equipment and play three sets music.

Our road crew was exhausted and surly by the time the band arrived at the “the Roost”. After all they had to load / unload and set-up the stage twice in one day with no extra pay, (not because we were cheap, we were broke) and not to make it easier Parousia was a large-sized band with lots and lots of heavy shit, like a Hammond L1 organ with a rotating Leslie speaker, a Fender Rhodes piano and an ARP Omni synthesizer. Three huge guitar amps, a seven-piece North drum kit with hardware and wooden drum riser, just to name a few… I remember Dave Styn saying in a huff, “I can’t wait until I graduate, then I can tell all you guys to go fuck yourselves!”… I don’t blame those guys for feeling stiffed, and I wish we could have paid them more, but griping aside they always got the band through the gig. Hats off to our faithful crew who always rocked!

The Eagle’s Roost paid Parousia $250.00 for a Saturday night show. Because the band was booked at two separate venues on the same day, we assembled a ‘larger than usual’ entourage; including Dave Styn (sound) and Mike Carroll (lights), Steven (Mike’s friend), Steve Styn (Dave’s brother) and Keith Huels (Garth’s brother). With eleven people in total making up the band and crew, it was a bit of a circus.

The Hertel Happening paid nothing for Parousia to play there, but it didn’t cost us much either, just the extra gas for the rental truck. The expense for both shows that day totaled $223.00. Basically the free show cost the band an extra $28.00 which was made back in exposure thanks to a free-lance photographer snapping a picture of the band and that photo appeared in the next day’s Buffalo Evening News picture page.