It's "the day after" and all I can say is Wow!

Everyone who attended the Iowa Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame (IRRHOF) celebration Sunday knows what I mean. Right now I'm mentally and physically exhausted. Elated and sad, satisfied and disappointed, proud, and finally now able to revel in my thoughts of all the old friends I saw and all the new friends I made. This was more than any of us could have expected. From the rehearsals last week, to the warm up at the Val Air Ballroom (Des Moines) Friday night, to the Iowa Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame party Saturday evening, to the actual induction ceremony and of course the gig Sunday night. We were as high as any group of "boys" could get.

I would love to sit here and talk about how easy it was to put all of this together. About how for seven days it was just smooth sailing musically and personally. In reality, for having nine people bottled up in a studio for a week, each one passionate about the music and the direction this whole thing should go, we got along surprisingly well. But it soon became evident that this is the real world. We laughed, we fought. We laughed, we yelled. We were up, we were down. Passions were high. And in the end we put on a show that we are all very proud of. Each member's contribution was so important I could not begin to think of any individual we could have done this without. Each was a piece of the puzzle that became the end result, which I hope most of you saw, on Sunday evening, September 6th, 1998.

It's fun now to look back at the entire week with all of the ups and downs, interventions, and suggestions and think how all of that work was done strictly to create the 45 minutes we were on stage in Okoboji. The whole week becomes an incredible capsule event, with a beginning, middle, end, and finally a postscript on the lake at 2:00 AM Monday morning. And it was one we all will remember for the rest of our lives.

And during that final Sunday afternoon and evening, how many times did I think, "Why are all these people here to see us?" In a way, we were supposed to entertain them, but it felt more like they were there for us, than us for them. We felt like kings and I kept thinking how wonderful it is to have people like Tom Tourville and John Senn of the IRRHOF dedicating all this time and effort to keeping this little part of our lives alive and healthy. It was a part that was barely breathing until we received a call from them last March. Then it surprisingly and quickly popped to life.

I guess it was never dead.

-Mike McCormick, 9/8/98