I had been in Scotland for two days when I started seeing “yes” stickers in apartment windows and on car bumpers and streetlamps. I asked our driver, a proud Scotsman engorged with fifteen centuries of esoteric Scottish military history, a merrie portly sexagenerian with an enormous feather jutting backward from his hatband at all hours, what it was all about. After he had reminded me that the independence referendum was a month away, and clarified that the angels were all solidly lined up on one side of the question, I asked him to describe the opposing view.
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It's me and Jenny Scheinman. We'll play from her records and mine, and we'll probably do some tunes from the film we're working on, called Kannapolis. And as usual, country songs and fiddle music!
Dave Hoekstra's and Mark Guarino's obituaries are good starting places if you're unfamiliar with Springfield, Missouri's tall man of the bass guitar and recording console.
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Y'all, my set on Sunday is at the Star Stage, at 11:45AM. Alongside me will be Jenny Scheinman, Robbie Gjersoe, and Missy Raines, a perfectly gender-balanced quartet (or as my wife said, "half menstruaters and half women-beaters"). It's a free festival and one of the world's finest, so if you miss it then I blame you!
My return from abroad has been met by loud cries: "Praeceptor! Speak of thy exploits and all grotesqueries witnessed!" In my endeavor to give a thrillingly rounded and complete picture (what used to be called "novelistic," now "TV-like") I will break up my memories into installments. This first will concern the topic, "What I Read" (rhymes with "dead").
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I had the pleasure of contributing a small bit of harmony singing to my friend Steve's latest project, Funeral Bonsai Wedding, a couple months back; the record is released the 30th of this month. Somewhat in advance of that date -- this Friday -- Steve and the jazz players who accompany his songs on the record are doing a promotional
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Turns out I was slightly sanguine in the previous post, as regards the Old Town School show this Saturday.
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Your correspondent is unaccustomed to being away for so long, 5 weeks, but it has really helped, looking at this trip in retrospect, not to have had a day off.
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Well that was quick. I'll be at the Trigg Underground on Wednesday August 20 in lovely Edinburgh. It's at 152 Dundas Street and I start at 8. Capacity is small so get there early if you can. Go, Internet, yay for 2014!
The first week of this long jaunt has been fruitful and memorable, and many of the memories if not much of the fruit concern a crowded train ride with the Mekons through the midlands, bantering roisterously about ouds, Adolf Hitler, and cheese.
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Hi all,
I'm off to Portland and Seattle in the morning, for Pickathon and the Tractor respectively. With me will be a splendor-covered group of megapickers: Robbie Gjersoe, Aaron Till, Chris Scruggs, and, for Pickathon only, Don Stiernberg.
Then it's off to the UK for a series of dates with the Mekons or something very much like the Mekons.
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What's the matter with me? I need to get out of the business and just start busking. I'm playing at the terrific Mucky Duck of Houston tomorrow night (Saturday, 9:30 show) and never even posted it here. That's real stupid. I guess I'm counting on the usual solid turnout there, but you never know. Here's the link to advance tickets: http://tinyurl.com/Robbie-Fulks-July-26
It's The Scavengers. A more-or-less yearly event with K.C. McDonough, Gerald Dowd, Robbie Gjersoe, and me.
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Lou Reed died quite a while back, and I wanted to do something in his honor and memory but it took all these months to get a date together. That's mainly because Michael Shannon, who I asked to serve as Lou, singing the dark and the strange and the blunt and the funny and the heartfelt material from "The Blue Mask" (my fave Lou solo record), is "busier than a pair of jumper cables at a Puerto Rican picnic," as a comedian from the less ethnically sensitive 1970s used to say. This month Michael's holed up in Chicago while his talented wife works at Steppenwolf, and I nabbed him straight away. We played through the record's ten songs last night, and I can tell you for sure it's gonna be a hot one. Playing along: Alex Hall, Scott Stevenson, Jason Narducy, Grant Tye, me.
Because of Michael's celebrity, we're doing advance tickets on this one -- though at the usual low price of $10. To all the faithful who are accustomed to walk in at 6:55 and pull up a seat -- sorry! Get a ticket!
I wade hesitantly and maybe foolishly into the crowded waters of jazz commentary, as lightly armored with knowledge as I am, but I've been in the Miles mindzone all week, while preparing for my show last Monday. I of course welcome any correction or added insight from readers who are skilled jazz players or critics; I'm only, or should I say mainly, a fan, who occasionally dips a toe in as a practitioner.
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Merle Travis vs. Miles Davis. Yes friends, Missouri meets Kentucky on Monday night at the Hideout, where the nine-pound hammer faces the nine-bar jammer; smoke smoke smoke takes on shoot shoot shoot; cool battles coal; So What locks "horns" with That's All; hard bop encounters dry bread; friendly goes against unfriendly.
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In preparation for (also to raise money for) our trip next month to the U.K., where Jon Langford and Sally Timms and I et al are playing a bunch of dates, we'll be appearing Sunday at 7 at (where else?) the Hideout. If you like the thought of my going far far away for weeks on end, please stop by and contribute.
We'll also be playing a few tunes on WBEZ this Friday morning. Turn it on early and just let it stay on.
In preparation for (also to raise money for) our trip next month to the U.K., where Jon Langford and Sally Timms and I et al are playing a bunch of dates, we'll be appearing Sunday at 7 at (where else?) the Hideout. If you like the thought of my going far far away for weeks on end, please stop by and contribute.
We'll also be playing a few tunes on WBEZ this Friday morning. Turn it on early and just let it stay on.
It's been a while since I did a Monday with my dear friend Nora O'Connor, but here we come again.
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