SAYONARA, THIRSTY LION (&C.)...

Yes, “Syonara at the Thirsty Lion” went well—all the performances have been going well lately. Audience liked all the songs—I enjoy keeping people in stitches—even though most of them were there as fans of other performers (and of course voted for them—doesn’t matter). I got to do two encores, too (a good reason to be last on the agenda)—“I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas” (because both Eric and my daughter requested it) and “Pole Dancing for Jesus.” Didn’t sell any CDs, but did trade one with another performer. Daughter and her friend Kristine were only going to stay for one song, but ended up staying for the entire performance, which was nice. Best song? “I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas” is an instant and consistent crowd-pleaser, of course, but the other one people remarked on was “The Resurrection Blues.” I was asked if I have songs on iTunes. I don’t. Maybe I should. Met a lady there who wants to collaborate. We’ll see. We talked for quite a while after the performance, and I have a fair idea of her musical tastes (a lot like mine, minus the country music), but I still havent heard stuff that she’s done. (Gave her a business card—always have business cards—so she can contact me.) She says she has a good singing voice, with about a 3-octave range, and is interested in doing harmonies on some of my songs. That’s definitely doable. In fact, I could think of half a dozen songs where I’d rather have her singing than me. “Rotten Candy” was meant to be sung by a girl; so was “Dead Things in the Shower” and “When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You” (though that latter is deliberately androgynous and can really be sung by either a guy or a girl). “I Want a Man for Christmas,” too, is a girl’s song, and so is “Invitation to St. Patrick.” Of the musications, April Mattson Johns’ “Family Portrait” needs a girl singer, too. So there’s some stuff to do that might be a good test. Last four of those need to be re-recorded anyway—the recordings I have were done on the Tascam with me singing and playing rhythm, lead and bass, and one might say I got what I paid for. I’ll use Jim Loughrie’s shop studio if I can; he’s gotten rather good. His latest recording, of one of his songs sung by Sedona Marie (with Sedona playing flute, Jane fiddle, Ken lead guitar, Jim himself on drums, and Michael Dinan doing harmony, is (as Craig Imm, the Dodson Drifters’ sound engineer, used to put it) “tasty.” Recorded base tracks (rhythm guitar and vocal) today at Jim’s shop for “Sleepover at My House.” I still don’t know if it’s a good song—it hasn’t been tried out yet on a live audience—but I had to get it out of my head so I could work on something else. Like I told Jim, it was either his place or mine—and if it was recorded at his place, he could maybe do things with it. (He thinks it needs a kazoo lead. He thinks a lot of my songs need a kazoo lead.) Thoughts on collaboration: Full-blown collaboration (as opposed to the “one-night stand” variety where I’m just musicating someone else’s lyrics) is a daunting prospect, because you’re rummaging around inside each other’s heads. I have done it four times and two of those resulted in a (my opinion) decent product—“Dead Things in the Shower” (co-wrote with Bobbie Gallup) and “Born Again Barbie” (with Scott Rose). Those two plus “Drag Them Suckers In” were done long-distance, by e-mail, and I think I’d really rather do it that way—gives me more time to think (in case I need it—I may not). Doing it in person (which is how the abovementioned lady would like to do it) feels a little too immediate and rushed. I realize that’s how the professionals in Nashville do it, but I’m not them (and I’m also not very impressed with most of their product). And of course, history may enter into the reluctance, too. The only collaboration I’ve ever done in person was with the late Jeff Tanzer, who was lead guitarist for the Dodson Drifters; we wrote “Ballad of Mount St. Helens” together, after the mountain erupted in 1980 (it was for a contest), and the band recorded it and we sent off a tape (that’s how it was done back then). We didn’t win. Jeff and I usually wrote in competition with each other, like Lennon and McCartney, and the products were uniformly better done that way. (Also like Lennon and McCartney, we didn’t say who wrote what. And we had a habit of performing each other’s songs.) Joe