It’s Sunday morning and we’re headed to a house concert that I fear is not destined to be populated. There are 4 RSVPs and two additional “attendees” from Facebook, one of which emailed me later to say that he wasn’t actually coming. Fortunately there are TWO hosts, which means that with 5 actual audience members, the hosts increase the crowd by 20%. The concept of the house concert is that we get together for Bloody Marys and a house concert – and my fear is that there will be a WHOLE lot of Bloody Marys and that the music may just be secondary.
At least we’re all friends here!
I can’t complain too much. Last week was very, very full and most of it was full with success. Frankly, a breather would’ve been nice after the Strathmore Mansion show: we sold the place out (well, we missed by 3 tickets, actually) and the show itself was one of the most satisfying, passionate, exciting and thrilling we’ve had in quite some time. The fact that it was lucrative to boot did NOT hurt. When I sit back and think about it, the band is very, very good. And whatever fears and lack-of-confidences I may have about my own voice are more than made up for by my Love of my fingers and style and presence…. And whatever fears I have about MYSELF are canceled out by the rest of the band in any case. I’m very fortunate in my bandmates – some of the most talented, amazing people on the scene – and when I play a show like this I get a little growly… we should be playing shows like THIS every week!
Our opening act, Primitivity, was dazzling. A fierce cello quartet based out of the sound of Megadeth, Primitivity is fronted by a Loren from the College Perk days and backed by Robby Burns – also of the Perk days. We saw a lot of old Perkians scattered in the audience and in general, it made for a great reunion.
I just like this photograph from Bocktown. It sort of expresses a perfect merch table. We’ve sold some CDs, there’s some names on the mailing list, someone brought me a drink and there’s a twenty in the tip cup. After almost 80 degree temperatures in Louisville, KY, do you think we liked this weather in Pittsburgh? HAIL NO! (get it?)
However, that was just the beginning. (somehow, my weekends are the BEGINNING of the week, not at all the endings). Sunday we played with Petal Blight at one of the nicest gallery spaces in the city. Monday we all headed out to Teavolve to catch up with new friends Kegaro who were passing through on their way home to New York City. Tuesday was our usual first-Tuesday-of-the-month gig at Brewers Alley. We had a decent crowd of people there, many of which were actually there to see US – and I got there early enough to actually have dinner! That automatically makes the night better. Wednesday night Heather kicked off the new Java Mammas open mic. Thursday night I kicked off the new Six Mile Coffee open mic. Friday was Telegraph Station in Alexandria, VA – which was actually just a really weird show…. Saturday’s gig was canceled due to the weather – and today is – today.
Kristen’s station wagon is filled with gear and fatigue. Amy Law is in the back. She’s got an art show running in Takoma Park today and is riding with us since it’s about a mile from where our Bloody House Concert is. Kristen’s at the wheel and is skipping over the slower acoustic pieces on her iPod, focusing on some grinding, slightly more energetic pieces like the Audioslave that’s pouring through the speakers right now. I’m typing, eyeballing the grey and looming sky, and typing again. No-one on the road seems quite awake. A yellow car is sitting at an intersection for which he has no stop sign, the driver apparently immobilized by a huuuuuuuuge yawn that we suspect is keeping him from even noting our existence. A giant white truck just pulls out of a 7 Eleven parking lot completely oblivious to the fact that we exist. Kristen swerves around the snout of the massive beast, honking her Subaru’s displeasure and making a displeased growling moan sound through her teeth.
After the hail storm we encountered a rainbow on the way to our show in Greensburg, PA. I wish rainbows photographed better. Or that I was better at photographing rainbows.
Thank you Bruce Cockburn for my vocabulary and imagery for the morning: If I had a rocket launcher, some son-of-a-bitch would die.
95 South heads us towards Washington DC, source of so much of my angst recently. Friday night, as I was driving home from the Telegraph Station gig, President Obama was being broadcast Live congratulating his government on finally reaching a budget compromise. It was strange to turn my head to the left as I crossed the river and realize that the white-lit building from which he was speaking was within sight. The bridge beneath me was solid, thanks to federal dollars… and the jet passing over me was in one piece, mostly thanks to federal oversight… and the boats beneath me had been inspected and were water-worthy and the people piloting them had licenses and the car I was driving was moderately safe – all because the Federal Government has it’s fingers in a whole lot of pies… and too many people don’t have the scope of vision to realize that there’s a REASON the government spends money… and I listen to Obama’s glowing praise of Congress and I think about how he’s divorced himself from actual leadership, sitting back and making speeches when things happen, whether or not they meet with his goals and agenda. I’m glad that Planned Parenthood was defended. I’m sad that once again an entire argument was based on a lie (we’ve got to get rid of Planned Parenthood because federal dollars shouldn’t be used for abortions… well… federal dollars are ALREADY prohibited from going towards abortions you lying shits!) and no-one is willing (or loud enough) to stand up and just call out those whose entire POINT is based on falsehoods. Washington, if you could do ONE thing I’d ask that We The People be allowed to sue politicians when they just out-and-out make shit up!
Sigh.
But I’m relaxed again, and abandoning those tensions. I let the burgeoning headache subside as Audioslave fades to Zeppelin and we start driving over less-cared-for-roads that show that once you’re off the federally-kept-up interstate system, state-run maintenance takes over and shows just how effective THEY are. I almost can’t make out what I’m typing for the vibration of driving over pitted, cracked and broken road.
Our last night in PA was worrisome. We were playing late in California at Wood Street and then playing a radio show the next day in Washington and unfortunately, at this point it seems that everyone we’ve known at California University has graduated or was out of town. Fortunately Joy Ike hooked us up with a friend of HER’S who was willing to leave a door open for us. We could creep in… but he’d be out pretty early in the morning so please, just lock the door behind us. We never crossed paths. We knew from the hair around the house, the tiny animal hatch in the basement door and the scrabbling sounds in the morning, that some other CREATURE Lived there too, but it was just as much a mystery… until well into the next morning. Then we met this little beestie, and a friendlier beestie we couldn’t have hoped for. Don’t know the name, don’t know the breed, maybe we’ll never know anything but GREAT DOG!!!
