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. 

An Angel With Scorched Wings

Sometimes it is difficult to comprehend just how awesome my life truly is. I get to sit around, listen to the music I love, read the books that I enjoy, travel wherever I feel like and basically just live an unencumbered life. This also occasionally includes my driving to a bar five minutes away to meet the woman of my dreams. Well, the woman of my dreams who is technically happily married with four kids but it’s the concept that’s important. Let’s not get technical here.

I’ve told this story a few times but it might explain just why I have such strong feelings for a rather unknown country singer. I first saw Kelly perform in 1998 at the American Music Festival at Fitzgerald’s in my hometown of Berwyn, Illinois. I wasn’t there to see her. In fact, I had no clue who she was. All I knew was a paragraph preview I had read that day in which a writer described her voice as being that of “an angel with scorched wings.” That’s just the way music critics write.

Well, I’m pretty well known for giving any act one or two songs to win me over so I went to the front of the stage to watch Kelly and her band (which included at the time Jon Dee Graham and Amy Farris, both of whom are awesome performers I discovered that night). My first thought as she took the stage was that she’s really pretty. About a verse into the first song I thought that she had a really pretty voice. By the end of the first song I wanted to marry her, preferably before the encore. That’s just how stunning the performance was.

There is just something about her voice that while sweet with a nice country lilt does have that edge of someone who has seen the dark side of life. Even a love song can be tinged with sadness and regret and it makes for some wonderful music. There have been many times in my life where the only thing that has kept me going is listening to What I Deserve over and over again. The title track might be my favorite song ever and it’s the only one that sends chills down my spine every time I hear it performed. With lyrics like “I have done the best I can but what I’ve done is not who I am” I don’t know how you couldn’t be moved.

So a few months ago when I found out that Kelly was going to be touring for the first time in five years and playing Davey’s Uptown I was just thrilled. I never expected to get to see her play in a venue that small again and hell, I was just happy to see her play live without having to fly down to Austin. She had a new band but continued her tradition of having a fiddle/mandolin player who I immediately fell madly in love with. That would be the woman with the bright red hair in the out of focus picture. I’m pretty sure her name was Eleanor. No matter what, she finally puts a face to one of my two standard daydreams.

(Explanation on that: Whenever you see me blanking out or lost in my own little world, I’m typically in one of my two Walter Mitty lives. One of which has me playing in a band, well, actually two bands. See, in the first I play guitar and sing lead with the love of my life playing fiddle and singing harmony. I get to do all of my Son Volt, Uncle Tupelo, Whiskeytown, alt country stuff that I love and could at least theoretically sing. Then for the second set I strap on an electric guitar and play lead while the love of my life takes up lead vocals and does a classic Liz Phair/Blake Babies sort of thing. Hey, stuff like this helps makes meetings go a lot faster.)

The set was surprisingly tight for someone who has not been on the road in years and who is now best known for her appearance in a Claritin commercial. She played most if not all of the new album but she also played all of the great songs from What I Deserve, a number from her self-titled disc but only one from Easy, which was a little surprising. She had the same voice that hits you in the heart and Kelly seems a lot more confident on stage now. In the past she was one of those singers who always kept her eyes closed but now she is much more engaging and much more comfortable with being the center of attention. Maybe it’s due to the fact that on many of her new songs she puts down the guitar and just sings. I’m not sure if I’m entirely behind it (part of me is always drawn to the whole girl with a guitar vibe) but it does make for a bit more rocking sound. I definitely don’t fault her for trying to change her style a little bit.

So of course I stayed after the show to get my few moments to talk to her. I wish I could say that I said something brilliantly witty but I didn’t. Thanked her for coming to KC, mentioned how I used to see her in Chicago back in the day and just thanked her for her music. She signed the CD booklet for her self-titled disc for me (a disc that it took me six years to find and I had to go to a neglected corner of a store in Lawrence to find it) which is awesome. And as the picture shows, I got to have my picture taken with her. At least now there is undeniable proof that I did smile once while living in KC. Honestly, this was the coolest night that I have had all year.

Now, if I could just run into Natalie Portman at the grocery store… Even without that, is my life awesome or what?

What to look forward to

(For some reason I’m not quite sure of I am listening to Carbon Leaf’s “Love, Loss, Hope, Repeat” right now. Great album but I am still flummoxed by the line “Some things are best kept between a girl and her horse.” I’ve read Shakespeare, Joyce, Goethe, Faulkner and J. K. Rowling and even with all that literary background behind me I have absolutely no freaking clue what that line means. Do women tell horses secrets? Does that mean they somehow believe that a creature whose only thoughts are “I hope my leg doesn’t break” and “I wonder when I’ll get some hay” understand their every innermost thought? No wonder I can’t get a date, I’m using logic on girls who are dreaming of Barbaro.)

Reading through the past few posts I think you could get the sense that I’ve been…well, I don’t want to say depressed because that isn’t right. More like in a funk (and not in the Mayor Funk sense of the term.) It’s been more of a strange mix of never having free time and never having anything to do. I’m not kidding in the lack of free time, I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve been charting out my days in an attempt to just find a free half hour where I could read a book. Then again, the past few nights I’ve just been sitting around on my couch playing Playstation so obviously I have more time on my hands than I know what to do with.

Part of the problem is that I just do the same things week after week. Go to work, play trivia, hang out at the same bars. I really am stuck in a routine that I definitely need to break. I just need to meet a few new people, start hanging out in new places or just do something radically different with my life. My life isn’t very exciting right now and that a) isn’t much fun and b) makes the blog that much tougher to write. And to be honest, I need as much material as I can get.

The other thing is that I just haven’t had much to look forward to. I wasn’t even really looking forward to see Damien Rice because of the band lineup changes. I need to always have a concert on the horizon that I am just dying to see. Something that makes a bad day at work more palatable as I can just put on my headphones and know that in a few weeks I’ll get to be in front of the stage when this song is played. And thanks to Michelle at Davey’s I have one huge night to look forward to.

Because this August, Kelly Willis (pictured above), one of my favorite performers and the woman who ranked #3 on my Perfect Mate list (meaning that if asked “Would you marry her and spend the rest of your life with her to the point that you will be eighty five years old and sitting in matching recliners?” I would answer yes in less than a second.) is going to be playing at Davey’s. This is like the coolest thing that has happened to me all year. I haven’t had a chance to see her play in nearly five years and now she’ll be at the best place to see music in town. This is going to be awesome.

I’ve also decided that it’s going to be my goal to have my picture taken with her. This shouldn’t be too much of a struggle. I’ve actually met Kelly before after shows (back when I spent most of my free time at Fitzgerald’s) and while she won’t remember me at least I can mention shows she played where there were only a couple dozen of us in the crowd. Plus, she knows some of my friends in Austin fairly well. And Michelle owes me a few favors so all of this should hopefully mean my actually getting my picture taken with one of my Perfect Mates. (And before someone thinks I’m going to go off the deep end I’ve met Kelly’s husband Bruce a couple of times as well.) Really, all I’m looking for is to be in front of the stage listening to music that has gotten me through tough times for years. I can’t wait.