Just show up...

Wednesday Night Music Club: I am going to be a little shorter than normal tonight as I just got off a plane and have an early morning meeting. Plus, I wanted to mention I am going to have a new rule for the Wednesday Night Music Club in that it will focus on music that has come out over the last year. I think the remainder of the video schedule will be…

Sunday: Best of 120 Minutes (Really good videos from the 80s and 90s alternative scene)

Monday: Remembering the 80s (Really bad videos from the 80s)

Occasional: Songs from the Alt Country Gutter (Whatever catches my interest from my Americana collection)

Anyway, here is a song from Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis album from last year. As has been documented many times on this blog that when I first saw Kelly Willis perform (which was back in 1998 and wow does that make me feel old) I decided that I didn’t just want to buy her records but that I wanted to marry her. Before the encore if at all possible. Well, she married Bruce instead and the two of them became some of my favorite musicians of all time. I’ve seen them many times over the years, talked with them after shows on several occasions and just found them to be incredibly nice and super talented people.

The reason I mention this is that I have been thinking recently about the old Woody Allen line about how 90% of life is just showing up. A lot of people take that to be that almost all of life is just pure luck. I think what it really points out how few people even bother to show up in life. I am a shy, socially awkward type of guy who would go to concerts by himself. But, and this is the big thing, I would just hang out, see really interesting bands that caught my attention and occasionally buy them a beer after shows. Some of them went on to be famous, some were never heard of again but I’ve ended up with all of these stories that would never have happened if I stayed at home living a literally virtual life. I’ve ended up with a pretty amazing life without really having a plan for it and mainly by just being willing to accept whatever happened. I’ve gotten better at showing up (fear still gets to me more than I would like) but I certainly appreciate it more.

Anyway, Bruce and Kelly are awesome and any reason to play one of their songs is a good one. 

The beer refreshing

Sorry for the lack of a post last night. I was too busy celebrating…uh…Tuesday. That’s right, just a regular good old run of the mill Tuesday. No, nothing related to the date at all. Why yes that is an empty Doritos bag behind me. Why do you ask? Can’t a man get hungry once in a while?

(Sigh. Same jokes every year. It’s just too easy.)

I read what might be the most amazing fact today. In St. Paul there is a monument to the Hamm’s Beer Bear. This is road trip worthy material. In fact, I’m planning a pilgrimage there as we speak (or read or type, whatever the appropriate phrase is.) For those of you who are unfamiliar with the wonder of Hamm’s here is the story of the greatest advertising gimmick ever.

As a kid I would always hope that the Hamm’s Beer commercials to air for two reasons. The first is the jingle was just spectacular starting with “From the land of sky blue waters (waters)” and ending with the crescendo of “Hamm’s the beer refreshing, Hamm’s the beer refreshing, Hamm’s the beer refreshing, Hamm’s!” The second was the fact that all of their commercials featured cartoon animals led by a large, jovial bear hanging out in a forest and having a great time. It seemed logical to an eight year old who watched a lot of Looney Tunes that animals would gather in the forest to down a few frosty brews after confusing hunters and dressing in drag. Or maybe they dressed in drag after getting drunk. Either way, as an eight year old I totally wanted to drink Hamm’s. Which might be why the beer doesn’t really exist anymore given that eight year olds really shouldn’t be your target market if you are a brewery.

But here is the thing: I still have fond memories of Hamm’s even though I never drank it. I probably would give it a try today even though I have never heard a person say one positive thing about the beer other than it was incredibly cheap. However, something like Milwaukee’s Best, which I did actually drink in my youth, is something I wouldn’t even use as lighter fluid. Of all the products I remember being advertised as a kid there is probably none (outside of the Snoopy Sno Cone machine) that I still remember as fondly today as Hamm’s Beer. They should teach the ad campaign in business schools if they could keep it from becoming a discussion of whether it is ethical to sell alcohol to minors.

Next time I’ll talk about the wonders of drinking Falstaff at Comiskey Park because White Sox fans prefer Shakespeare references with their beer.

Wednesday Night Music Club: In honor of yesterday here is one of my friends in the music biz (as in I received a Christmas card from him and his wife once) Bruce Robison reminding us to always ask ourselves in times of trouble “What Would Willie Do?”