Why is it that the first time I have some solo writing time in months every single one of my favorite jambands has to come to the New York City area???
String Cheese Incident played at a community college not too far from Asbury Park on Saturday night. It was a cute, fun, round room. Unfortunately their long-time sound engineer had just quit / been fired over longstanding gripes with the managers, and so the same quaint factors made for an atrociously muddy mix.
Danced up front during second set, and got down a little with a bunch of freaks I love the STRING CHEESE INCIDENT, but was too in my head over the departure of Jon O'Leary to really enjoy.
We zoomed up the Garden State Parkway, thru the Holland Tunnel, and walked in to the Knitting Factory just as New Monsoon started up, sometime after 1 a.m. After the debacle in Lincroft, we were happy to be in a happy-vibed crowd, albeit a small one. And much dancing and festivity took place. Guitarist Jeff Miller was the most relaxed I've seen him over the last several years we've been following them, and so the music was brilliant.
Sunday NM played again at Mexicali Blues in Teaneck, joined by Hot Buttered Rum String Band. One of the storm's players, Bo, who's instruments are acoustic guitar and banjo, lost a close family member and was home visiting. It was the band's first appearance without him, and they were wistful at times, but still very high powered. Aaron Redner, the fiddler from Butter, filled in an alternate part for him on Calypso. And then Erik Yates joined in for a couple a few songs late on banjo.
Butter had opened with a gorgeous set of their usual hot and spunky stuff. Another meltdown!
I arrived a tad late, missing the exit for the George Washington Bridge in a bit of musical mayhem, and having had to turn around in Fordham. I don't know the river crossings or the northern parts of the metro area nearly as well as Brooklyn, so it was a tad of a hairy ride. I always think of my Dad and my Pop-pop when we ride by Yankees Stadium, 'though, and also muse about where my Bronx relatives on the Barrett side lived. So it's definitely a different nostalgia trip for me than for darling hubby.
A good crew of GoudaFriends were in the house, for we all do love the sound at Mexicali Blues, and it was pretty nice sized crowd for a Sunday night! Next up: Yonder Mountain String Band.
Monday, October 17, 2005
Thursday, October 06, 2005
La Dolly Mama
We were among the crowd thronged into Lindley Meadow of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park Sunday to hear Miss Dolly Parton sing at the “Hardly Strictly Bluegrass” free music festival.
There were, of course, quite a few Dollies in the audience, dressed to impress in the masquerade of diva queens one might expect in such a queer-friendly urbana as Baghdad by Bay. But my favorite was the woman we all came to see perform on the Star Stage, spangled out in turquoise and silver, rouged and dashingly blonde, and wielding at times a matching teal electric guitar.
There was little sign of “the hippie-styled” / vintage show she had put on at Radio City Music Hall six weeks earlier, although the setlist relied similarly on the Sixties-standards recorded on her upcoming release, Those Were The Days (Sugar Hill Records, October 2005).
She sang “Me and Bobbie McGee” with a nod to Kris Kristofferson and Janis Joplin. She cooed “Crimson and Clover” with a stand-up-like commentary on the pungent aroma of that incense-like herbal intoxicant, known colloquially as “grass,” which seemingly permeated the audience. And among her half a dozen or so other songs, including several peacenik ballads (“Where Have All the Flowers Gone” and John Lennon’s “Imagine”), she regaled us with a poignant version of “Coat of Many Colors,” dedicated to her Mama, who sewed it for her during a childhood where rich and poor were relative categories reflected against such mirrors as pride, identity, and dignity.
You might remember some of the lyrics about a pieced-together, recycled rag jacket that the enterprising and economic seamstress compared favorably with the bibical story of Joseph’s “technicolor dream coat:”
Dolly Parton, “Coat of Many Colors”
Title song of 1971 RCA Victor album
Back through the years
I go wonderin' once again
Back to the seasons of my youth
I recall a box of rags that someone gave us
And how my momma put the rags to use
There were rags of many colors
Every piece was small
And I didn't have a coat
And it was way down in the fall
Momma sewed the rags together
Sewin' every piece with love
She made my coat of many colors
That I was so proud of
As she sewed, she told a story
From the bible, she had read
About a coat of many colors
Joseph wore and then she said
Perhaps this coat will bring you
Good luck and happiness
And I just couldn't wait to wear it
And momma blessed it with a kiss
Chorus:
My coat of many colors
That my momma made for me
Made only from rags
But I wore it so proudly
Although we had no money
I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
So with patches on my britches
Holes in both my shoes
In my coat of many colors
I hurried off to school
Just to find the others laughing
And making fun of me
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
And oh I couldn't understand it
For I felt I was rich
And I told them of the love
My momma sewed in every stitch
And I told 'em all the story
Momma told me while she sewed
And how my coat of many colors
Was worth more than all their clothes
But they didn't understand it
And I tried to make them see
That one is only poor
Only if they choose to be
Now I know we had no money
But I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
Made just for me
My mother was also born in 1946, but to far wealthier circumstances. She and her two older sisters (Dolly was one of 12 children in Appalachia) wore matching wool coats with fancy buttons and coordinated berets from New York's finest mercantile. And my grandparents bought similar sets for my sister and I in the early 1970s, before we grew too wild to bother with such decorous styling. The "class" politics of coats and clothes and rags and stitching... All I can say about it right now is let's hear it for the needleworkers... UNITE!
There were, of course, quite a few Dollies in the audience, dressed to impress in the masquerade of diva queens one might expect in such a queer-friendly urbana as Baghdad by Bay. But my favorite was the woman we all came to see perform on the Star Stage, spangled out in turquoise and silver, rouged and dashingly blonde, and wielding at times a matching teal electric guitar.
There was little sign of “the hippie-styled” / vintage show she had put on at Radio City Music Hall six weeks earlier, although the setlist relied similarly on the Sixties-standards recorded on her upcoming release, Those Were The Days (Sugar Hill Records, October 2005).
She sang “Me and Bobbie McGee” with a nod to Kris Kristofferson and Janis Joplin. She cooed “Crimson and Clover” with a stand-up-like commentary on the pungent aroma of that incense-like herbal intoxicant, known colloquially as “grass,” which seemingly permeated the audience. And among her half a dozen or so other songs, including several peacenik ballads (“Where Have All the Flowers Gone” and John Lennon’s “Imagine”), she regaled us with a poignant version of “Coat of Many Colors,” dedicated to her Mama, who sewed it for her during a childhood where rich and poor were relative categories reflected against such mirrors as pride, identity, and dignity.
You might remember some of the lyrics about a pieced-together, recycled rag jacket that the enterprising and economic seamstress compared favorably with the bibical story of Joseph’s “technicolor dream coat:”
Dolly Parton, “Coat of Many Colors”
Title song of 1971 RCA Victor album
Back through the years
I go wonderin' once again
Back to the seasons of my youth
I recall a box of rags that someone gave us
And how my momma put the rags to use
There were rags of many colors
Every piece was small
And I didn't have a coat
And it was way down in the fall
Momma sewed the rags together
Sewin' every piece with love
She made my coat of many colors
That I was so proud of
As she sewed, she told a story
From the bible, she had read
About a coat of many colors
Joseph wore and then she said
Perhaps this coat will bring you
Good luck and happiness
And I just couldn't wait to wear it
And momma blessed it with a kiss
Chorus:
My coat of many colors
That my momma made for me
Made only from rags
But I wore it so proudly
Although we had no money
I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
So with patches on my britches
Holes in both my shoes
In my coat of many colors
I hurried off to school
Just to find the others laughing
And making fun of me
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
And oh I couldn't understand it
For I felt I was rich
And I told them of the love
My momma sewed in every stitch
And I told 'em all the story
Momma told me while she sewed
And how my coat of many colors
Was worth more than all their clothes
But they didn't understand it
And I tried to make them see
That one is only poor
Only if they choose to be
Now I know we had no money
But I was rich as I could be
In my coat of many colors
My momma made for me
Made just for me
My mother was also born in 1946, but to far wealthier circumstances. She and her two older sisters (Dolly was one of 12 children in Appalachia) wore matching wool coats with fancy buttons and coordinated berets from New York's finest mercantile. And my grandparents bought similar sets for my sister and I in the early 1970s, before we grew too wild to bother with such decorous styling. The "class" politics of coats and clothes and rags and stitching... All I can say about it right now is let's hear it for the needleworkers... UNITE!
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