BAY CITY POST-MORTEM (AND SEPT. 25 SETLIST)...

A draft Sept. 25 setlist:

SET #1:
Dead Things in the Shower—fast two-step
Armadillo on the Interstate—slow & sleazy
Tillamook Railroad Blues—deliberate blues
Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues—slow & sleazy quasi-blues
Take Me Back to the ‘Sixties [NEW]—mod. fast two-step
For Their Own Ends (Southern Pigfish)—folk-rock
Duct Tape—mod. speed country
Steamboat Bill (Shields & Leighton)—rock ‘n’ roll
Things Are Getting Better Now that Things Are Getting Worse (Gene Burnett)—fast two-step
Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus—mod. speed Gospel
The Strange Saga of Quoth, the Parrot—talking blues (actually, a talking two-step)
Test Tube Baby—fast rock ‘n’ roll

SET #2:
When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You—fast bluegrass
50 Ways to Cure the Depression—mod. fast two-step
Hey, Little Chicken—slow & sleazy quasi-blues
Free-Range Person—fast bluegrass
Crosses by the Roadside—slow two-step
I May Write You from Jupiter—fast bluegrass
She Ain’t Starvin’ Herself—fast blues
Ain’t Got No Home in This World Any More (Woody Guthrie)—mod. fast two-step
So 20th Century (Coleman & Lazzerini)—ragtime
Un-Easy Street (Stan Good)—mod. two-step
Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad (Woody Guthrie)—fast bluegrass

Two one-hour sets, with a short potty-and-refreshments break in between. To make CDs for the band, I’ll need to record the “’Sixties” song, and re-record “Crosses” and “50 Ways” (I want to eliminate a verse from each one of those—I think it’ll make them better). Mike and Doc haven’t heard “50 Ways” or “Jupiter”—we did those in the first Failed Economy Show, and haven’t done them since—and nobody’s heard “Quoth.” (Actually, only John’s done “Crosses” before. Haven’t played that since our first concert in February 2009. I didn’t play it for a long time after it was rejected by a Nashville publisher, but I think I’m over that now. I don’t care what Nashville thinks. If I like the song, I’ll play it.)

I had written another version of this blog that talked at length about the Bay City Centennial concert, and I’ll do a brief post-mortem here. It was good. Some musicians who presumably know what they’re talking about said it sounded real good, and they were impressed. Best song? This time, “Test Tube Baby”; a bunch of teenagers had asked for a fast song, just as that one was coming up on the setlist, and we did have ‘em dancing in the sawdust. Second? Stan Good’s “Un-Easy Street. It makes people listen. “Steamboat Bill,” the Big Hit from 1910, came off good, too. It probably ought to be a permanent addition to the setlist.

One weekend’s break from concerts—next weekend, and we really should practice. Two concerts coming up fast after that—the Rocktoberfest on Sunday, Sept. 19, and the Bay City Arts Center concert the next Saturday, Sept. 25. I still need to arrange a date for a Garibaldi Museum concert, too.

Joe

A WEEK WITHOUT THE INTERNET...

TWO WEEKS since I’ve posted any issues of the blog? I am sorry. Not only has the new job kept me busy, but I’ve had no laptop the past week, and accordingly no access to the Internet outside of work (and I will not use the work computer for personal stuff). Got to read a lot, and play music some, despite the meetings that took two of the evenings this past week.

Central Point concert came off pretty good. Despite not having played together for three years, Dan (mandolin), Gary (electric bass) and I fit together well. And it was a good crowd—nice night in the park, and it brought people out—and they listened. After the show, Dan and I went to Johnny B.’s, the little tavern in downtown Medford, figuring we could make some music because there weren’t any bands scheduled. Nearly everybody from Screamin’ Gulch, the punk-rock band I used to play with down south, showed up (the percussionist was the only one missing), and we played until about midnight. Small but appreciative crowd. And two requests, surprisingly enough (it had been a long time, and I didn’t think anyone remembered): “Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues” and “Naked Space Hamsters in Love.”

Rest of the weekend was occupied with moving daughter back to college, so there wasn’t time to practice with the band. We’ll be doing the Bay City Centennial concert on the strength of just one practice. I don’t really worry about the rest of the band, but I need to make sure I can remember all the words.

Wednesday night was the open mike in McMinnville, at Cornerstone Coffee Roasters, and I’ve been making sure to go. They got five songs, “The World Enquirer” (which did have the audience clapping in time with the song), “Electronic Love,” “Song for Charity (and Faith, and Hope),” “The Strange Saga of Quoth, the Parrot,” and “I May Write You from Jupiter.” I think they liked “The World Enquirer” best. I don’t think those folks get to hear much bluegrass music. Sold a CD, too.

I’ve moved the Tascam and its little attachments back home. I don’t (and won’t) get time to record anything while I’m in Lafayette—and until I score a cheap laptop running Windows XP (for which I am not holding my breath—such a find would be almost unheard of), I don’t have any way to interface the Tascam with anything but “Alice” the home computer anyway. I have the new song, “Take Me Back to the ‘Sixties,” to record for the Coventry songwriters group—I’ve sung it enough in the car on these long trips that I know it by heart now.

And this weekend? Good thing it’s a 3-day holiday weekend: besides the Deathgrass concert on Saturday, I have a new back door to put in in the house, SOSA’s September newsletter to typeset, the setlist for the September 25 Deathgrass concert to figure out, record, and distribute, and the column to write for the newspaper. Next weekend, the band should practice for both the “Rocktoberfest” concert Sunday, Sept. 19, and the Bay City Arts Center concert Sept. 25. Oh, and posters. I need to do posters—and distribute them. (Poster for the Sept. 25 concert should be easy to design, since I already have all the photos I need (and can take more at Saturday’s concert). For the “Rocktoberfest,” I need to take a photo of Doc, too.)

I never got to distribute posters for the Bay City Centennial concert; there wasn’t enough time. I did get a message out to the “joelist,” and to the thousand or so “friends” on Facebook, and posters to the Arts Center. I hope that was enough.

Joe

TWO DAYS TILL CENTRAL POINT...

One more day of work, and I’m off for southern Oregon, and the Southern Oregon Songwriters show in Central Point Friday night, 27 August. (Dan and I are on at 6:50 p.m., on the bandstand in Robert Pfaff Park—behind the post office. If you’re in the area, do come. Should be fun.)

Dan will be doing three new songs at the concert (we’ll practice ahead of time). I’ll do five, I think:

Armadillo on the Interstate—slow & sleazy
Free-Range Person—fast bluegrass
No Good Songs About the War—slow two-step
Hank’s Song—mod. fast two-step
Meet Me at the Stairs—fast bluegrass

Nothing new, but there is one song (“Stairs”) I’m sure they haven’t heard before. Since Dan and I both have CDs for sale, that’s an appropriate one to close with: the chorus openly pitches buying CDs to help the starving musician.

I have a first verse now, I think, to the nostalgia-for-the-‘Sixties song. Need at least one more. Two would be better, but if I’ve got just two verses, I can repeat both bridge and chorus after the break, like I did in “Rotten Candy” and “The Frog Next Door,” and that’ll pad it enough for time. No, I won’t be playing the song on stage in Central Point (or, likely, at any of the other gigs this concert Season), but I may well finish writing it en route—that’ll be my next long trip in the car, and those are always good for writing.

My primary goal at this point is to have the thing done in time to fire it off to the Coventry writers’ group over in England. I missed sending them anything last month because I was just too busy with the new job and all. I’m still busy—but at least I’m not spending five hours every day commuting back and forth any more. I have the recording equipment with me—though I don’t have any way to hook it up to this Windows Vista-afflicted laptop to transfer completed recordings (the little Tascam’s brain is big enough to hold only one song). An alternative to upgrading the laptop (which may not be worth upgrading) would be to use the “line in” port on the old Akai CD burner, dump the Tascam’s song file to a CD, and upload that to the ‘puter—but the Akai is still in the studio, and I’m not sure I feel like hauling it around.

Band practice was good—I’m continually impressed by these guys. Our rendition of “Steamboat Bill,” the 1910 hit, is classic rock ‘n’ roll. I’ve been wondering what a musician (a piano player, probably) back in 1910 would have done with the song; it probably would have been performed as some version of ragtime—which isn’t that far away from rock ‘n’ roll, really: I think the emphasis is just on a different “syllable.” We could use another practice before the gig, to polish the songs that were a little rough; it’s going to be a crammed weekend, but I’ll have to try to make the time.

At practice, my little Yamaha amp had gone into Reverb Mode, which made the acoustic guitar sound very electric and distorted—and made the band play faster. A lot of the songs sounded really good played that way—but that may be a setup that’s hard to create on stage. When we do the show, I’ll be playing through a PA, not the little amp, and I wouldn’t be able to get the distorted-electric sound without an effects pedal—which thus far I’m disinclined to buy. I have looked—I’d still like one for the Electric Banjo—but I’m not buying. I suppose my actions—multiplied many hundreds of times over, of course—are the reason why there’s no economic recovery: people have to invest, to buy durable and frivolous things, and they won’t do that until they think times are going to be better. And right now, I don’t.

Joe

THE McMINNVILLE OPEN MIKE (&C.)...

Looks like I didn’t post an issue of the blog mid-week. I know I thought about it, and even had one partly written. It has been a tad busy, and commuting back and forth to the job—a 2.5-hour trip each way—has left me, by my count, all of three hours to myself, per day, if I’m lucky. It may get easier—I did find a place to stay (a room in someone’s home in Lafayette), and I’ll “move in” (clothes, guitar, laptop, recording equipment, and books) Monday.

Wednesday night’s open mike in McMinnville was good. I gave them “Bluebird on My Windshield,””Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus,” “No Good Songs About the War,” and Stan Good’s “Take-Out Food.” (I seem to have developed a pattern here. One serious song and one religious song each time—until I run out, of course. I don’t have many of either variety.) TWO encores—and both were requests for songs I had done last time, “Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues” and “I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas.”

At one point, I did check out the crowd, and noticed the place had gotten full since I’d started playing; the audience also mostly drifted off after I was done. Is this the beginnings of a fan base over there? I hadn’t told anybody I was coming—just told the hosts last time I would try to be back. Yes, I expect I’ll be back again in two weeks if I can. I gave the hosts posters of the Deathgrass concert in Bay City (and they announced it to the audience), and also got to put a poster up on the coffeehouse’s bulletin board. Gave the hosts a free CD, too.

There’s one duo (guitar and bass) that seems to play the coffeehouse regularly (they were there last time, too), and they’re not bad. They appear to know what they’re doing, and to have been playing together for a while. Mostly old country standards. They could use a lead player (or a rhythm player—I think the guitar dude could play lead if he had the opportunity)—but I’m disinclined to take on extra work. Between the job, Deathgrass, the newspaper (just the column, these days), the ContraBand, and a couple of occasional opportunities to play music, there is not much free time.

I haven’t written anything in a while, either—and I know that will start to bother me after a while. I might have something, though. The latest challenge from Jon Harrington’s Coventry (U.K.) songwriters wanted songs about “sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll,” and I can do that. An anthem to the ‘Sixties, I think—that period of which ‘tis said if you remember it, you didn’t really live through it. (Since I was mostly a Good Kid, I do remember the ‘Sixties. Interesting times.) Chorus and bridge (yes, there will be a bridge, even though I abhor bridges) are done; the trick now is to craft verses that are as good as the chorus and bridge are.

If I do manage that, would I want to incorporate the song into the Deathgrass concerts? I don’t think so—not the first two, for sure, and since the third comes pretty fast on the heels of those, maybe not that one, either. I’m highly organized about performances, and try always to have everything worked out and practiced ahead of time; accordingly, the setlists for the Bay City Centennial and the Rocktoberfest are done, as is the Rap for the former (I’ll do the Rap for the latter this weekend). This weekend, I’ll also distribute Rocktoberfest setlists and CDs to everybody. The Rocktoberfest organizers want photos and bios of the bands, too, so that’ll be my excuse to take pictures of everybody (I can catch everybody except Doc at Sunday’s practice—I’ll have to do him separately). After the practice, I’ll send out the notices for the Bay City Centennial concert—I always want to make sure first that I’m advertising something that’s going to be good (though with this band, I don’t think there’s any cause for worry).

Joe

"ROCKTOBERFEST" SETLIST (&C.)...

I’d say I got everything done I was supposed to do this weekend, but it wouldn’t be true: I still have the application for that city-manager job in Alaska to finish. (I still need to mow the lawn and bake cookies, too.) Being employed doesn’t leave a lot of time to do things like that—but the statistical reality I have to face is virtually the only people who are being offered jobs these days are the ones who already have them. (My getting a job was really a fluke.) While I’m temporarily employed, I need to market myself as heavily as possible.

Setlists, CDs and posters for the Bay City Centennial concert are done; I dropped off John’s and Chris’s at their houses, and mailed Mike his. For the poster, turns out I did have good photos of some of us, taken last fall by Carol Ackerman with my camera; the only one I was missing was Mike, and I found an acceptable one of him online. I’d like to do better, but this works for right now.

I’ve arranged (I think) to have Jim Nelson run sound for the “Joe’s Birthday” Deathgrass concert 25 September at the Bay City Arts Center—and also to record the performance. I’d like to get the raw material for a live album out of it. It’s a 2-hour show—24 songs—and I should be able to extract 12 out of that for a record.

Potential setlist for the Rocktoberfest Sept. 19:

Dead Things in the Shower—mod. fast two-step
Tillamook Railroad Blues—deliberate blues
Our Own Little Stimulus Plan (Betty Holt)—Buddy Holly-style rockabilly
For Their Own Ends (Southern Pigfish)—folk-rock
Dance a Little Longer (Woody Guthrie)—country rock
Test Tube Baby—Elvis-style rock ‘n’ roll
She Ain’t Starvin’ Herself—fast blues
Angel in Chains—country death metal
Rotten Candy—fast bluegrass, with Gospel beat
Un-Easy Street (Stan Good)—mod. fast two-step

10 songs, concentrating on the “rockers,” but with our classic opener and closer (both two-steps) and one bluegrass/Gospel tune. The rest is blues, various subspecies of rock, and country death metal. (“Angel in Chains” is the only new thing on the list. I’d really like to get the opinions of at least some of the band before including it on the setlist, though. I like it—but does (or will) anybody else?)

I’d really like to play at the open mike in McMinnville Wednesday night, if I can fit it into the schedule. This will be the first one since my “debut” performance two weeks ago, and if I’m consistent about it, I’ll both get their attention and be considered “dependable” and a candidate to be a paid performer. (And it is nice to have an appreciative audience. Those folks don’t know how rare that is.) They like the humorous stuff (that’s good—that’s mostly what I write), and I can throw in one serious song and really get their attention. This time, I could give ‘em “Dead Things in the Shower,” “Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus” and (serious) “No Good Songs About the War,” and if there’s time for a fourth, maybe “Bluebird on My Windshield.” And if they want an encore (they did last time), I could do something fairly outrageous—how about “Electronic Love”?

The McMinnville open mike and Saturday afternoon at the Library are my only music this week—though we should have a band practice, too. The Labor Day gig will be only two weeks away.

Joe

BAY CITY SETLIST...

Draft setlist for the Bay City Centennial:

Dead Things in the Shower—fast two-step
Tillamook Railroad Blues—deliberate blues
Things Are Getting Better Now that Things Are Getting Worse (Gene Burnett)—fast two-step
Steamboat Bill (Shields & Leighton)—rock ‘n’ roll
Eatin’ Cormflakes from a Hubcap Blues—slow & sleazy quasi-blues
For Their Own Ends (Southern Pigfish)—folk-rock
Ain’t Got No Home in This World Any More (Woody Guthrie)—fast two-step
Welcome to Hebo Waltz—fast waltz
Duct Tape—mod. speed country
Hey, Little Chicken—slow & sleazy quasi-blues
Test Tube Baby—rock ‘n’ roll
Armadillo on the Interstate—slow & sleazy
Free-Range Person—fast bluegrass
Dance a Little Longer (Woody Guthrie)—country rock
Our Own Little Stimulus Plan (Betty Holt)—Buddy Holly-style rockabilly
Un-Easy Street (Stan Good)—mod. two-step
Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad (Woody Guthrie)—fast bluegrass

17 songs (normally, a 1-1/2 hour set would be 18 songs, but two of the Woody ones here are substantially longer than usual). The list includes both the “local color” songs, “Hebo” and the train; it’s mostly old standards the band have done before and do well. “Steamboat Bill,” written in 1910 (and one of the most popular songs of that year), is our main concession to historicity, but there’s three Woody Guthrie songs on the list, too (of three different styles), and he’s a little historic himself.

“Steamboat Bill” and “Ain’t Got No Home” the band haven’t played before. The latter, though, has been on setlists before (it’s just always got cut to save time), and it’s one of those classic two-steps people just seem to slip into easily. Often, when I’ve played this elsewhere, the audience will end up joining in on the last line of each verse, and it’d be nice if that happened here.

Next steps (I have to be ruthlessly organized these days)—record “Steamboat Bill,” make CDs and setlists and get them to the band, and set up time to practice. All that has to happen this coming weekend. Practice probably the following weekend, since I believe John’s out of town this weekend. The other task for this weekend is to typeset the programs for the two Southern Oregon Songwriters Assn. summer concerts in Central Point (I’m playing at the second one of those).

And the poster. I know how I’d like to design the poster, but I’ve got to take people’s photographs for it. If I could use the Deathgrass logo (the stuffed dreadlocked skull hanging from the mike stand) as the centerpiece, and surround that with mug shots of the musicians with their instruments, it’d be neat, and would make a nice set piece for future concert advertising. I probably have a usable photo of me in the archives, but will need to take photos of everybody else—probably one by one.

I have all the same stuff to do with respect to the “Rocktoberfest” concert, though that’s two weeks later, has a different (and shorter) set, and we’ll have Doc with us. Still, it’d be nice to have that one done, too. It’s not like I have a whole lot of free time these days.

No music at the Library this Saturday (the staff will be busy at the county fair), and I don’t seem to be able to get back to Garibaldi early enough on Friday nights to sit in with the Friday Night Group. With luck, the Contraband will be getting together to practice, and I won’t entirely lose out on chances to play music.

Joe

THE BAY CITY OPEN MIKE (&C.)...

The Bay City Arts Center open mike Saturday night was good: we had 12 performers, including a poet, a standup comic, and a short-story author (all very good), plus the musicians—Opal (electric autoharp), Bud (guitar), Elsie (accordion), Chippewa Bob (saw), Jim (piano), and Noah, one of Mike Simpson’s “Rockshop” kids, did an original song with little Max on drums. Had an “acapulco” singer, too, and first Opal and then Elsie were able to give him musical accompaniment. Thanks, guys.

Some folks insisted I play something, too—I hadn’t planned on it, since we had plenty of performers, and it’s their show, not mine—so I gave them “In the Shadows, I’ll Be Watching You” at the end. And we followed everything with a general jam session by the musicians, most of whom had come there wanting to do that, rather than play solo like usually happens at an open mike. The solo performances were videotaped (thanks, Charlie), and next weekend, I’ll see if I can’t make DVDs out of it for everybody—the office’s old Macintosh says it can do it, but I’ve never tried.

An experiment that did work out: instead of charging the Arts Center’s usual gate fee (since there was nobody to man the door and collect it, anyway), I just put out a donation jar next to the big bowl of homemade cookies, and people did indeed toss money in—more, in fact, than the Arts Center usually collects in gate fees at these open mikes. I think this is definitely the way to go. Yes, one can question whether folks were donating for the music or the cookies—they did eat almost all the cookies—but who cares? Does it matter?

It was nice (and satisfying) that some of the musicians came because I asked them to, and they said they had fun and I think they want to do it again. The monthly open mike may be on a roll now—a “set piece” that just gets bigger and bigger from here on, and can be one of the area’s regular cultural events. This, I think, is how we make the Arts Center the centerpiece of the community (and Bay City really needs a centerpiece): we have events that get people coming here, and they begin thinking of the Arts Center as a regular Place To Go—and subsequently, to schedule their own things at. I’ve made this pitch to the Second Street Market folks in Tillamook, too, but don’t think it’s sunk in yet.

I have seen minimal advertising thus far of the Bay City Centennial celebration, and expect the Deathgrass promotion will be the bulk of whatever gets out there. I’ll make sure our posters, flyers, press releases, and radio spots mention the other “acts” (while concentrating on us, of course); I’d like to see a big crowd at this, and the promotion is something we can do. I still have to figure out the setlist (I have to arrange the setlist for the “Rocktoberfest,” too), and get CDs of the songs to everybody. That last is probably a job for next weekend. This weekend is going to run out of time very quickly.

And for the Bay City Centennial CDs, I need to record “Steamboat Bill.” The second verse of that song is a bit choppy, and could be improved, I think—and I can probably do that. Jeff Tanzer (lead guitarist for the Dodson Drifters) and I never hesitated to improve other writers’ stuff—we even did it to Bob Dylan and Hank Williams—and I suppose Ren Shields, who wrote the lyrics for “Steamboat Bill,” should be no exception. Next week’s commuting back and forth to Lafayette (2 to 2-1/2 hours in the car each way) should provide plenty of time to work on it.

Played Sunday night with the ContraBand—Jane (fiddle), Kathryn (guitar), and Fred (keyboard). I don’t know if the contra dance organizers want us back, but we’re going to continue playing together anyway, I think. I think the goal is to have a band that can do community dances at (for instance) the local Grange Hall—filling a crying need in the Failed Economy. To the extent I can, I want to participate.

Joe