God knows I’ve been party to a lot of parties. The Democratic Party, until recently the ‘Chicago Cubs’ of politics. The party line my folks used to have such fun with in downstate New York (didn’t know there was one, did you?), the ‘party of the first part’ that kept showing up in all my divorce proceedings. And the party of three that when I’m in it, always gets seated behind the pillar next to the kitchen door…
My late uncle was known as a ‘party’ boy, yet he fought with the Free French in WWII and took any number of wooden sailboats across the Atlantic. It can’t be a party, really, out there on the ocean with nothing but a bit of lignin between you and perdition. Of course, he was an entertaining soul, always the life of the, well, party.
I’ve been to a number of parties as well. My favorite was always the ‘after the gig’ party that blues musicians have by instinct. I remember one in my living room:
People are milling about, smoking this that and the other. One guy is leaning over the table, playing his sax into the phone receiver. Two guys are bouncing on their toes, snatching records back and forth off the turntable. “Man, yeah, but you gotta hear this!”..
There’s another party in the back room that involves substances only found in nature, but I’m not in that party because I’m in…grad school. Yep, the molecular genetics grad student sits at the table in the corner and inverts matrices while the party swirls around her. Some of these folk are famous (One, Curtis Selgado was the inspiration for the Blues Brothers and taught the boys everything they did in the movie… He’s not here tonight, but he will be.) Robert Cray is in Portland tonight, but his girlfriend is here with her side man Butch, brother to Robert’s bass player. Butch is a favorite of mine, and I look up and smile when they make their entrance, an entrance enhanced by the slightly naughty feel of their showing up together...
There’s a long-running argument among a clot of blues afficiandos about whether or not white boys can sing the blues. Curt’s not here or we wouldn’t be having this one.. They used to argue about whether white boys could play the blues but Stevie Ray put paid to that one. This argument surges back and forth from kitchen to living room before settling beside the beer keg.
It's a party alright, without a party dress in sight. Strangely, this is the kind of atmosphere in which I can really concentrate. ADHD is a funny thing. It’s no party, that’s for sure.
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Comments: 106
Now, I'm going to read it about five more times, because I am completely in love with the tone of it -- it's almost frenzied to me, without being frenetic or over the top. It seems kind of stream of consciousness, and I can NEVER pull that off (mostly because my thoughts, as they tumble around in my head, resemble those of a 4 year old hopped up on Mountain Dew and HoHos.)
Really -- I'm envious. And blown away. Did I mention I'm blown away?!
Envious, Joy? I'm dizzy with it.
Mountain Dew and HoHos Sure, just tell everyone what I eat and drink.
Sarah rulez.
Drew Thorton as in "Kentucky Blueblood Drew Thorton parachuted to his death in September 1985 carrying thousands in cash and 150 pounds of cocaine" is worth looking up, btw.
Your writing never ceases to amaze me. This was a fantastic ride, and your word play was wonderful.
Wow!
You're one hell of a writer, Sarah!
WOW!
Go on! Keep me awake out there!
You put me in the middle of the room with this Sarah. This was wonderfully expressed.
That's why you have to write it down. Also, the more often you write it, the better the story gets.. Kind of like the stories my father used to tell about *me*, come to think of it...
Gotta go
Otherwise, yeah, Sarah rocks. She's covered all there is to cover on the theme before I finished my second cup of coffee for the day...
Curt was an *amazing* stage presence and no slouch as a singer.
To quote Curtis "I love you like a dog! I love you like a dog in heat!" BTW then he got religion and his act went down hill. He still performs. Google him.
And Janna - it was Amos that I had in my head..
P.S. no funeral for me... Can't get the logistics in line. Which is a real damn shame.
Curtis, the Belushi connection...
That's pretty crappy. From the length of the closing credits in most movies, you'd think they include people who swept the floor or brought the pizza.
I haven't seen that movie. Should I?
Someone get back to me on this..
As to church organists, I like them, too. You have to get into the improvisational theater philosophy of life (Never Deny) and you end up meeting everybody. Until you go all whahounie shaped and end up living alone in the woods, that is...
n.
A complex polymer, the chief noncarbohydrate constituent of wood, that binds to cellulose fibers and hardens and strengthens the cell walls of plants.
Are you okay? I'm worried--you were in the middle of answering my question and then you suddenly had to go lie down... (No one has answered, by the way, but don't stress yourself out... It's okay... Even though I have no idea whether I should watch that movie or not... No idea at all...)
Blues Brothers and Ferris Bueller are two of the best films ever made in Chicago and the surrounding area.
My ex put up $1000 and bought 3% of Robert Cray's gross back when Robert was just one of a million great struggling musicians. Then he hit Billboard #1. Don't know if XII collected, though. I was long gone by then.
Re comment about 15 back, Curtis Salgado was such a big part of the whole Blues Brother's thing that when it got to look like it was going to go through the roof some legal eagle decided it might mean Curt could collect, big. So they edged him out. He was just a broke musician, so no $ to fight it. But his legend lives on...
(Pants - note correct use of apostrophe...)
He will be playing Tuesday night somewhere near Visalia, California, because Devo won tickets to see him.
I think it was Animal House.
Where's Nippy? I'm going to search him out and we'll get to the bottom of this..
Lucky Devo.
I haven't seen him since I was but a babe, myself. Well, 30-ish. Seems awful young now..
It wasn't terrible...
I used to go to concerts all the time. Now I'm broke and have tinnitis, but I enjoyed the crap out of my 20s.
My thirties were wonderful... I got to hang out with these folk. Took Gatemouth Brown all over town in search of I forget what, and got invited to join Clifton Chenier on tour (it was just old southern gentleman politeness of the musician variety, but I've never forgotten it.) R.L. Burnside spent a week with us... Got to see Junior Walker talk to the wall in a peach-colored velvet suit. I loved it all, especially the dancing...
B.B King plays San Antonio almost yearly! Saw Buddy Guy, Katie Webster and Latimore about 10 years ago. Love Robert Cray but have yet to see him live...
Aniko* please go rent and watch The Blues Brothers, even the sequel was worth watching if only for the music!
There's so many I haven't seen. Not many of them come through Flat...
So, if I'm getting the gist here, you're saying that Pat Boone's white-boy release of Little Richard's "Tutti-Frutti" didn't put the whole "blue-eyed soul" thing to rest? (Yes, I'm kidding!) I do mourn the loss of SRV though. His helicopter crashed after a concert in Spring Valley, Wisconsin, that I had hoped to attend. I should've known better than to let a work deadline take precedence, 'cuz some opportunities will never knock again.
Aniko, please please do see "The Blues Brothers"... consider it a mission... from God.
(I'm commenting so late in this thread that I can't keep track of all of the things I should be commenting on.) How is it, Sarah, that your "stream of consciousness" writing reads more coherently than my re-re-re-revised writing? Oh wait, now I remember... you're an excellent writer!
I've done matrix inversions! Have you ever tried 3-dimensional matrix balancing? Perhaps it has been refined in recent years, but I used to try it with our travel matrices. It always seemed like such a great idea in concept, but it never seemed to work nearly so well in practice. Like so many things, alas.
Someone stop me. I'm on a roll.
In no specific order to the comments:
I'm also envious, but about something different, too - you could study during a party? I can only imagine what my grades would have looked like with that ability. lol
Oh, homemade Kahlua is easy and delicious - 1 cup of instant coffee, 1 cup of sugar and 1 cup of 151 rum. How can that make you sick? Oh, I know, they didn't let it season for a few months, first. Sure beats Mountain Dew and HoHos. (Everyone knows it's Pepsi and HoHos!)
Umm, haven't seen The Blues Brothers? It's like saying, "Who needs to see Star Wars or Casa Blanca?" Completely different gendres, and you might hate any of them (although, HOW?) but you GOT to watch all, at least once!
Also, not sure who showed up first (Eric or Janis), but Janis Joplin also proves white gals can do the blues.
All in all, I wish I knew you back when we had lives. lol Good writing! Thanks.
Kahlua, when I made it, involved cold-pressing coffee to make a thick brew, then adding the other stuff. I think their problem was that they drank *way* too much of it. It's a liqueur, after all.
As to the studying, somehow the chaos siphons off the chatter in my skull. Doesn't work for writing, as my son will tell you. I chase him out. Or would if he were here. Actually, if he were here, we'd watch House re-runs and laugh our butts off and I'd get nothing done..
Actually, I've never heard it is supposed to refer to the gold rush or to the poppies. I used to think it had something to do with the strait and the sun shining through it, but it turns out that John Frémont claimed to have named it "Chrysopylae" (Golden Gate) because it reminded him of a similar protected harbor in "Byzantium" (Constantinople by then, but anyway) called Chrysoceras, or Golden Horn. That's in his memoirs, so it takes precedence, I suppose.
Some people on the Galata Bridge across the Golden Horn in Istanbul, ca. 1990:
Geeze, can't I get something more momentous, like saving orphanages? Or killing some evil people? Myself?
Lynn said: "Umm, haven't seen The Blues Brothers? It's like saying, "Who needs to see Star Wars or Casa Blanca?" Completely different genres, and you might hate any of them (although, HOW?) but you GOT to watch all, at least once!"
You know, my comment to Sarah on Apr 18, 2009, 4:09pm EDT was, well, ironic. It was hard to miss what she meant by her humorous response, and I noted that this was probably a movie worth watching. But a "GOT TO" list--I don't do that. There would be more movies to put on it than one could watch in a lifetime, especially if one were to realize that movies are made outside of the US and the mainstream studios as well, and started to worry about those. And then there are plays, books, museums... I wouldn't expect to be able to catch up, unless I set my standards extremely low.
I'd pass up the beer, and listen to the choirs rather than the organs, but I'm with you otherwise. Life really is too short.
(I do get to Europe all the time, but then I'd still need the money to travel around and buy all the stuff... Some of the wines and cheeses are cheap--I spent a week in Spain once living on nothing but wine, bread, and cheese--but some aren't...)
Anyway, the point is of course that everyone's list is different, and it may not include what someone else declares a "GOT to".
See. Never Deny. I want it all...
There tended to be two kinds of women that hung around the bluesmen, female singers and arm candy. I was neither, and so no one knew what to make of me...
A couple of years ago I got involved in a benefit at a local club for Curtis Salgado's new liver. I introduced the acts and auctioned off stuff that people had donated. I've never met Curtis myself. I think the last time he was in the Bay Area was about 4 years ago. I was very lucky that I wasn't involved in the scheduling of the acts. There was a bit of conflict on the day of the show involving some strong personalities.
I think John Nemeth is currently the best white blues singer who tours a lot. He's a nice guy, relatively low key. When he cranks it up in his upper register he gets a very soulful sound. He's from Idaho but is based in the Bay Area. Definitely the best singer and harp player ever to come from Idaho.
Sorry to hear about Curt's liver. He was not, in fact, my favorite person on the planet, but neither did he get the fame he deserved.