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The 2009 Joe Songbook is done. (Mostly. I’ve found a couple more corrections I can make. I like to be perfect.) The product is a 1.67MB Acrobat (*.pdf) file, that can come on a CD with a cute Depressionistic label if people want. I can sell the CD for five bucks, including mailing, and recover costs. Or e-mail it for free. (Anyone within earshot (or eyeshot) who’d like one e-mailed for free, contact me through the Usual Outlets and I’ll take care of it. I will need your name and e-mail, of course, and I think we’ll do a trade-off (since things shouldn’t be entirely free or you’ll assume they have no value)—if you do this, I will add you to the “joelist,” if you’re not on it already. Don’t worry—as I routinely tell people at gigs, you’re only going to get notices of gigs, and of when the next CD comes out. So you won’t hear from me a lot unless things get really busy, and you are not going to be bothered with “important news” about what I had for breakfast.) I was asked how I’m managing to reach this songbook market. I’m not. I don’t think there is a market, really; the only person who’s likely to want a Joe Songbook is another musician who’s interested in performing my stuff, and I think that’s a really limited number of people. I mostly wanted to see if I could do it, and get the production costs down to a reasonable level, and I did that. I expect I will be giving away a dozen or so of the attractively-labeled CDs as Christmas gifts. Sara may want a couple for the county library, and there’s one music-store owner I would like to make sure has one on his shelves. The primary value of the “eSongbook” may simply be as an example. As noted previously, I do not know of anyone else doing this—but it’s doable (here’s proof). Could I do this for others? Sure, it’s easy; I’d recommend keeping roughly the same format—including a discography, links, and a bio, and peppering the lyrics with lots of photos, in other words—and I’d want everything, including the photos, supplied to me so I didn’t have to spend time either hunting for or creating stuff. (When I ran my own graphic-design shop, I used to charge double for work I had to do that the customers could have done themselves.) There’s a bigger question being begged here, though. What AM I doing to promote my music? The answer, I’m afraid, is “Not much.” I’m still well-known to only a small group of people. Yes, the fans I have are pretty determined ones—but there’s not a lot of them. And I’ve sold CDs (I’m almost out again)—but again, not a lot of them. A large part of the “not doing much” problem may stem from the being-unemployed problem. Except for the occasional gig or job interview, my life completely lacks structure: I don’t HAVE to do anything, including eat and get up in the morning; add in a severe paranoia about being rejected (having been rejected for every single job I’ve applied for for 18 months), and I’m encouraged to put just about everything off (not that I needed much encouragement—procrastination has always been one of my strong points). I did see in a blog by fellow songwriter Vikki Flawith tips for imposing structure on one’s life; the tips were intended for the self-employed, but it seems they’d work equally well for the unemployed. A key point is setting aside blocks of time for certain activities (something I used to do when I was working)—so many hours a day in the studio, for instance. I could expand on that easily, setting aside blocks of time for promotion—and for job applications, even. Doing that stuff simply because “this is the time when I do that stuff” might help defuse the paranoia factor, which has gotten really bothersome. So I’m up early (high winds and horizontal rain woke me anyway), and I’ll keep to that routine, and since I like to sit at the computer when I first get up to unstiffen my back, I’ll do the Red Queen Thing (“half a dozen impossible things before breakfast”). I do have some promotional things I’ve been putting off (of course). And I took all my rejection letters out to the burn barrel and burned them. I don’t know if that was cathartic or not, but it sure did make a big fire. And as several people have already reminded me, there is probably a song in it. Joe

Well, the so-called Big Storm is past—they recorded winds of 89 m.p.h. at the Coast Guard tower, and the power went out four times. We have maybe a day’s respite before the next one (I can see the wall of clouds offshore). I had someone tell me this week, “Your songs don’t follow that verse-chorus-bridge pattern like you’re supposed to. But they’re good.” It was tempting to applaud them and say, “You got it!” It is not necessary to follow that pattern to write something that’s good. I think the pattern fixation on the part of Nashville “experts” is born partly from not really knowing what makes a good song (“We want something exactly like the last hit, only different”) and partly from gatekeeperness—it is another way to restrict entry to a circle that is intended to remain closed. What makes a good song? Audiences like ‘em. That’s the only definition of “good” I consider important. There are a handful of rules I try to apply to songs I write. They are rules I made up myself, for myself; I do not know if they’d be applicable to anyone else. There ought to be a HOOK—it’s the “filename,” to use ‘puter language, that people are going to remember the song by. There’s a TIME FRAME that accommodates people’s short attention spans (I like to keep my songs between 3-1/2 and 5 minutes). It’s a COMPLETE THOUGHT—no loose ends, or unanswered questions. It GETS YOUR ATTENTION IMMEDIATELY, and BUILDS from there. And it’s DIFFERENT: it’s either saying something new, or saying something old in a new way. Note that pattern didn’t enter into that at all. I’m always experimenting with pattern: I have songs with no choruses (making it a challenge where to put the hook), or with bridges instead of choruses; I have songs where the chorus has the same music as the verses (another no-no), and plenty of songs without bridges—because I consider bridges generally unnecessary. And playing around with pattern helps ensure that every song sounds different—something else I’m insistent about. I apply the same rules to lyrics I want to musicate. A lot of other folks’ stuff, of course, will be in the “proper” pattern, because they’ve been told it has to be, and I won’t be bothered by it, because it’s their song, not mine. The “proper” pattern is quite capable of producing a good song. (One of mine, “Rotten Candy,” deliberately followed every one of the Nashville Rules as I knew them, and it’s not a bad song. You should hear it sung by Polly Hager.) It’s just not the only way to do it. The only additional thing I require of “musicatable” lyrics is they HAVE TO SING—I have to be able to hear a melody as I read the words. That doesn’t always happen, even with a well-written piece. UPDATES: The Songbook “Acrobatted” pretty good (and compressed to 10% of its original size in the process—it ended up only 1.6MB), but there is one problem—Acrobat for some reason doesn’t preserve any underlinings from PageMaker, and when I’m doing lyric sheets, I always underline where the chord changes are. I will have to flag them a different way (italicization, probably)—but it will entail going through all 65 songs and making dozens of little corrections in each one. Otherwise, it’s going to be a good product. My wife found (while cleaning) a printout of the old “Joe is Great!” brochure I’d designed back in 2005—it was one of the files that got deleted when “Alice” the ‘puter got her Windows XP operating system in 2007. The information is a bit out of date, and I definitely have better concert photos now, but I like the way it starts out: “Dead dogs. (And cats. And birds. And other things.) Injured Santas. Born-again Barbies. The Bible like you never heard it before. Welcome to the songs of Joe Wrabek.” I’d like to include the “Joe is Great!” text in the Songbook, if I can figure out a way to incorporate it without changing all the page numbers. Joe

Just finished updating THE JOE SONGBOOK with the 2009 songs. The book is now 103 pages long, with 65 songs (with discography, links and photos—I can’t resist dressing things up). For the record, only 14 of the 65 songs are about dead animals. (Those are still the ones people remember best.) A copy of the songbook is going off to Lorelei Loveridge in England tomorrow. She said she was interested in performing some of my stuff, and I’m happy to encourage it. I don’t know what (if anything) of my songs she’d like, but the songbook is rather a diverse, “something for everybody” collection. With luck, there’s something for her. There are only two co-writes in the book—where someone else and I jointly wrote the lyrics, as well as me putting it to music—“Dead Things in the Shower” (with Bobbie Gallup) and “Born Again Barbie” (with Scott Rose). None of the “musications” are in there, because I don’t consider those “my songs”—as far as I’m concerned, the song “belongs” to whoever wrote the lyrics. All I did was provide a delivery system for their excellent lyrics. (And they’re excellent lyrics because I’m not interested in dealing with anything else.) (There’s a third co-write that’s not in the book—“Chipmunks Roasting on an Open Fire,” co-written with my daughter Kimberly a couple of years ago. It’s not in there because I really don’t remember the chords. I suppose I will have to puzzle them out again, in case somebody requests it sometime over Christmas. All I remember is I couldn’t do Mel Torme’s music because it was too complicated—all those “fruity” jazz-type chords—so I figured out a country music progression that came close. But I don’t see that I wrote it down anywhere—and writing it down, for me, is the key to remembering it.) I had originally envisioned the songbook as a saleable item, but production costs ended up way too high; between paper, and ink cartridges for the printer, and a cheap 3-ring binder, I was over five bucks a copy, which meant I’d need to charge ten bucks a copy, and I couldn’t see anybody paying that. Lorelei’s is the third copy I’ve simply given away. A thought, however: those high production costs were for the songbook in HARD COPY form—printed on paper, in other words. What if it were ELECTRONIC? If I could convert the songbook, which is a gigantic PageMaker file, into an Acrobat (*.pdf) file, and drop it onto a CD (if it’ll fit), I’d have production costs down to a couple of bucks. I’d have an excuse to design a neat label, too. Everybody with a computer and Internet has the free Acrobat Reader program—and I know from experience that the files generated by my old Acrobat program (I have v. 5.0) can be read by the latest version of Acrobat Reader, because I have that. This could work. Is anybody else doing e-songbooks? Not that I know of. The Christmas Show poster is done; the first copies got distributed yesterday, with many more to do. I want to make sure copies get into the hands of people I’d like to impress with my graphic-design ability (the editors of the two area newspapers, for instance). It is eye-catching; if it’s on a bulletin board with other posters, it’s going to be the one that gets noticed—the rest will fade into the background. And it’s black-and-white—easy to reprint. We had some of the folks from the 5-1/2 Piece Band from Rockaway at the Library, so I got to try out some new stuff on ‘em. “The Dog’s Song” is a keeper; everybody likes it. Ditto for “Me and Rufus, and Burnin’ Down the House”—though part of its charm, I’m sure, is that librarian Sara likes it, and it was about her house fire. My rendition of “Santa, Baby” came off okay—I’d spent most of the day practicing making my voice drip sultriness—and now I suppose people will be requesting it (it was a small audience, but I’m sure they’ll talk). And I had one lady from the audience ask if “Armadillo on the Interstate” was on a record (which it isn’t—which just reinforces my intention to have it on the next one). Joe

Chris, John and I—what you’d call the core of “Deathgrass,” I guess—have been asked to play at the City and Port of Garibaldi’s Christmas potluck dinner, on 16 December, three days before the Christmas show. We (and our spouses) are all invitees to the dinner: John’s the city administrator, Chris works for the Port, and I’m on the Urban Renewal District’s budget committee. We’ll have a keyboard player—Bruce, the husband of Mary the city finance officer. And I’m told these City and Port folks want to hear Christmas songs. I’m still expecting the only one who’s going to be singing is me, and that means we’ll have to have Christmas songs I can sing. There aren’t many. Besides the three of mine, I know “White Christmas” (famoused by Bing Crosby) and “Blue Christmas” (famoused by Elvis); both were done by very good singers, but just happen to be in a narrow range that I can sing. I found a couple of others. There’s a blues number Elvis did on one of his later Christmas albums (during his let’s-see-how-many-drugs-we-can-take-before-we-pass-out period) that was really cute, if a little raunchy, and I found the lyrics; hight “Santa Claus Is Back in Town,” it was originally done by a band called The Mavericks, and I can sing it. I found I can also sing “Santa Baby,” which Eartha Kitt made famous—yes, another one of those songs that really needs to be sung by a girl. After recording Polly Hager’s “Cougars and Cub Scouts,” which came across, somebody said, like “Hugh Hefner drooling over the pool boy,” I’m quite comfortable doing “Santa Baby.” I wonder how a generally staid audience would take it. One traditional Christmas carol I know I can play (but am not sure I can sing) is “Silent Night.” A couple of years ago, I worked out a lead to it on the banjo (and I now have an Electric Banjo)—just out of perversity, because “Silent Night” was originally written for the guitar. I also found you can make “Silent Night” really danceable (and still recognizable) if it’s played as a two-step instead of a waltz. I should probably include it just for shock value (as if the audience weren’t going to be shocked enough). And there’s the song daughter Kimberly and I co-wrote, “Chipmunks Roasting on an Open Fire.” I think everybody’ll recognize the old Mel Torme melody, even though that’s not what I’m playing—I had to do it as country music, because I couldn’t play those jazz chords. However, I bet if the keyboard player were picking (or whatever it is keyboard players do) the Mel Torme notes, they’d pretty much fit the chords I’m playing. I did get real close—deliberately. We’ll have to do my Christmas songs, of course—I know I can sing those. I figure people would request “I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas” if we didn’t play it, so we’ll play it and save them the trouble. I don’t know if they’d request “Santa’s Fallen and He Can’t Get Up,” so we’ll play it and avoid the question. And most of them have not heard “(This Time of Year) Even Roadkill Gets the Blues.” So… three of mine, one co-write, one traditional Christmas carol, and four covers (three of them recognizable Christmas hits)--two Elvises, one Bing, and one Eartha Kitt. That’s 40 minutes. I wonder how long they want us to play for? On other fronts: the Christmas Show poster is done—I did use the Depression-era photo of the kids gathered around the scraggly-looking little fir tree, and it came out okay. I’ll show it around a bit before distributing it. And the newspaper wants me to start covering Garibaldi City Council meetings. They’re paying only a pittance, but it’s a pittance more than I had. And I’m getting paid for writing. How cool is that? Joe

I think the Failed Economy Christmas show is a go. Setlist is done, the Rap is done, and we have a lead guitarist—Mike Simpson, the music teacher for the school district. (Mike was the organizer of last month’s “Rocktoberfest,” and has trained a couple of neat middle-school rock bands.) And we have “Doc” Wagner—probably the best blues harp player in the Northwest. I think it’ll be one heck of a show. Wish we could record it. I delivered CDs and setlists to everybody today (with lyrics for those not familiar with the material). No luck—at least, right now—at re-recording “Test Tube Baby” in a key I can sing it in (the recordings I have are both in A, and I want to do it in E); the old soundhole pickup keeps cutting out. Hey, Santa—if you’re handing out gifts to the possibly undeserving this year, I have a list… Assembling the Christmas setlist was an opportunity to listen to some stuff I’d done on the Tascam a year ago, and I can tell I’ve become a better guitar player over 12 months’ time (and if I notice, it’s got to be obvious). It’s nice to know my unemployed period has been good for something. Making the setlist CDs was also an opportunity to use “Alice” the ‘puter’s Audacity program for more than just generating click tracks and adding sound effects. A number of my recent recordings on the Tascam have come out at really low volume (that may mean the old Tascam itself is wearing out—Santa? Are you listening?), but I was able to dump the recordings into Audacity and boost the volume to what might be “normal” levels. I used it to equalize the volumes on all the tracks on the CD while I was at it. I think when this is done by a professional, it’s “mastering.” I’m not sure what you’d call it when I do it. Audacity also has a nice feature that lets you change the tempo of a song without changing the key. I used that on the Nashville recording of “Dead Things in the Shower” (the band plays it a lot faster than the record), and also on Gem Watson’s recording of “Test Tube Baby” (because I’ll play that a lot faster, too, when I’m with the band). I’d like us to get together to practice mid-to-late next week (Doc will be out of town until then). That will hopefully give everybody a chance to at least listen to the stuff. I am curious to see what “spin” everybody puts on it; I may have recorded these songs as country music, but I’m the only “country person” in the band—John (bass) and Chris (drums) have heavy-metal backgrounds, Mike (lead guitar) is rock, and Doc (harmonica) is jazz and blues. The product could be very interesting. I have the poster to design—I’d like to use the soup kitchen photo I had on the last Failed Economy Show poster, but am not sure how to give it a Christmas theme. I might have to find a different photo. I wonder what sorts of Depression Christmas photos might be out there in Internet-land? I have the radio station DJ to contact about publicity, and Jane Scott Productions to try to enlist in videotaping the show for re-broadcast on cable TV (in two counties—it’d be nice if we could get that). And a little over four weeks in which to turn this into the Biggest Event of the Season. Music this week at City Hall (Friday) and the library (Saturday); the ArtSpace Restaurant in Bay City is open again, and I should take them one of my CDs. The Old Mill RV Park is about to start their Christmas bazaars again, too, and I should hit them up to be part of their live music (they do pay), even though they flatly rejected me last year. I should be used to rejection by now. Joe

Here’s a tentative setlist for the Christmas show: SET #1 (12 SONGS): Dead Things in the Shower (fast two-step, in C) Armadillo on the Interstate (slow & sleazy, in C) [NEW] Santa’s Fallen and He Can’t Get Up (fast bluegrass, in C) Tillamook Railroad Blues (deliberate blues, in D) Things Are Getting Better Now That Things Are Getting Worse—Burnett (fast two-step, in C) Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues (slow & sleazy quasi-blues, in C) For Their Own Ends—Southern Pigfish (folk-rock, in E) Duct Tape (mod. fast two-step, in C) Bluebird on My Windshield (fast bluegrass, in C) [NEW] Test Tube Baby (Elvis-style rock ‘n’ roll, in E) Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus (mod. fast Gospel, in C) Un-Easy Street (mod. two-step, in C) SET #2 (11 SONGS): [NEW] The Dog’s Song (rock ‘n’ roll, in E) Hey, Little Chicken (mod. slow quasi-blues, in C) When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You (fast bluegrass, in C) Our Own Little Stimulus Plan—Holt (Buddy Holly-style rock ‘n’ roll, in D) [NEW] Even Roadkill Gets the Blues (slow two-step, in C) So 20th Century—Coleman/Lazzerini (ragtime, in G) Free-Range Person (fast bluegrass, in C) Final Payment—Watson (mod. two-step, in G) Rotten Candy (fast Gospel, in C) I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas (slow & sleazy, in C) Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad (fast bluegrass, in C) Some bluegrass, some rock ‘n’ roll, a little blues, a little ragtime, and a lot of country. Eight tunes from the Failed Economy Show, the rest “Joe songs”—most of them known crowd-pleasers. Includes three Christmas songs (all by me), and one song by Woody Guthrie (with a nod to the Grateful Dead, who made it famous). I’ll put ‘em all onto a couple of CDs and hear how the package sounds. There are four songs on the list that the band has not played before. Two are Christmas songs; the other two are pretty traditional rock ‘n’ roll. I worried about “Even Roadkill Gets the Blues”—there’s a band back East somewhere that usually does my songs around Christmas season, but they didn’t want to play that one because they thought it was too sad (the lyrics are very dark—I was unemployed at the time, and not feeling at all good about it). So I played it for the Friday Night Group and asked their opinion. They were teary-eyed, all right—but from laughing. I think the song comes across as too over-the-top—especially coming from me—to be taken seriously. It’ll be okay. Thanks to the awful weather, Saturday’s thing at the library drew only four musicians, including me, and the other three were all really good, and there was virtually no audience, so we got to do fun stuff. For me, that was “The Strange Saga of Quoth, the Parrot” (never played in public before), “Me and Rufus, and Burning Down the House” (for librarian Sara), “Crosses by the Roadside,” and “Santa’s Fallen and He Can’t Get Up.” All came across real good. And I finished musicating and recording Polly Hager’s “Cougars & Cub Scouts.” Definitely one of those not-for-everyone songs (especially with the cougar’s part being sung by a guy), but one of the purposes of music is to make people think, and this does that. I could see this being done in a burlesque show. I wonder if I’ll get to be in another burlesque show? I haven’t heard anything from our ringleaders… Joe

John, here's one you can look at if you've a mind to. Hight "Me and Rufus, and Burning Down the House." Link is Thanks. Joe

The music video of “Me and Rufus, and Burning Down the House” is finished, and uploaded to YouTube. Link is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp2G7K8znZ8. The video footage was shot last Sunday at Sara’s house, and is of Rufus the English bulldog doing Dog Things out in the yard; I matched that up with the soundtrack, and used still photos with text overlays during the Rap. It came out kinda cute. I doubt I’d change anything, though there are things I’d do differently next time around. What did I learn? First, my little digital camera doesn’t “do” zoom very well. Closeups get fuzzy, and look amateurish. I should not try to do closeup filming in the future. The standard lens setting produces pretty sharp images, and it’d be best to keep it that way. Second, the “video” setting on the camera generates an audio track (or at least Windows Movie Maker thinks it does—there’s actually nothing there). That with-the-video audio track interferes with any audio track I import, and distorts it something awful. But if I mute the with-the-video audio track, it’s okay—even though the with-the-video audio track doesn’t actually exist. Third, the camera can only shoot about a minute’s worth of “film” before it has to shut down and save what it did. That makes videoing me playing (which I’d like to do next time) a little problematic, because it could not be done all in one shot. I had originally envisioned filming me from start to finish playing rhythm guitar, and then splicing in pieces—me playing lead, just plain singing, footage of other things, and so on. If I have to work in one-minute increments, it’s still possible, but it’s more work. I have talked to daughter Kimberly about using her camera, which is a lot better (and three years newer) and has a lot more memory. So we want to do it again, with another song. What I want to do next time is film an entire song’s worth of me playing rhythm guitar—ideally, I’m somewhere where the song can be played through speakers, but otherwise, I can use a portable CD player and headphones. The lip (singing) and hand (guitar) movements will be in time with the music, because I will have been listening to the recorded music as I was being filmed. Then, we (I’ll need help—someone else has to run the camera) film some snippets of me playing lead (including closeups—not zoomed—of the hands during the lead break), and maybe singing. And some extraneous footage of vaguely related subjects, and maybe some still photos, too. The snippets, extraneous footage, and stills get inserted at strategic points, replacing parts of the “base” video track. I think it’s possible to do all of that in Windows Movie Maker. I do have a song in mind—“Milepost 43,” the true story about Al David’s missing underwear. It’s a fairly short song, and the “cast of characters” is pretty simple: I need underwear, a suitcase, and a rest area (got all those), and some roadside signs (the hard one to find may be the “Milepost 43” sign, but there should be one nearby—a lot of state highways start at the Coast, and are measured going inland). I could even incorporate the band, if they were willing—just need to record the song with the band, and then film the band and band members as they were playing along to the recording. I think I just described something that might take a while to finish. I wonder if I’ve got anything I could do sooner? AND: A quick musication-and-recording job this morning, of a cute song by Polly Hager, “Cougars & Cub Scouts.” Did it as real fast bluegrass, so it comes in under 3 minutes even with a lead break. I shouldn’t be the one singing—it’s obviously a girl song—but Polly asked me to. I figure I didn’t have a reputation to damage, so I did. Music tonight at City hall, tomorrow at the library. Joe

Well, the November Failed Economy Show isn’t going to happen—can’t get a lead player. With the idea that we could maybe do a pre-Christmas show instead, I reserved the Dance Floor for Saturday, 19 December—six days before Christmas. John (bass) and Chris (drums) are both in. Now the question becomes whether I can nail down a lead player (or two) for that date. A Christmas show could be fun. We’d still make it a benefit for the food bank, but we can avoid (sort of) the “message” songs (or most of them) and just play fun stuff. For the setlist, I’d envision maybe a dozen of my songs that are consistent hits, and a dozen of the most danceable numbers from last May’s Failed Economy Show. City Hall’s Dance Floor is big, and we might as well take advantage of it. I have two Christmas songs that need to be on the list—“Santa’s Fallen and He Can’t Get Up,” which is pretty fast bluegrass, and the classic “I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas,” which is slow and sleazy country. Both were on the last CD. There’s two more Christmas songs I’m not sure of: “(This Time of Year) Even Roadkill Gets the Blues” is a good two-step, and Don Varnell’s “Another Crappy Christmas” (which I did the music for) is calypso. Both have really dark lyrics, though. On the Joe songs side, I’d like to include “The Dog’s Song,” which I think the band could do a real good job on, and also the old Dodson Drifters hit “Test Tube Baby,” and “Love Trails of the Zombie Snails,” which was going to be a Southern Pigfish song (because the lyrics are so strange). All can be played as rock ‘n’ roll and ought to be right down these guys’ alley. The band has never played them before, though. I haven’t tried to spring that many new songs at once on the band for a while. On the promotion side, I want to use every minute of the five weeks of time between now and the show. That’s enough lead time to see if Jane Scott Productions can commit to videotaping the show (which would get it on cable TV throughout two counties), and see if the newspaper will promote it (I can promote it in my column, of course, and a surprising number of people appear to read that), see if the one local DJ I know (met him in connection with the Rocktoberfest) will promote it on his show, and get posters up literally everywhere in the area. If I can convey the idea that This Is The Place To Be on Saturday, 19 December, a lot of people may show up, because they’ll think they’d be missing something if they didn’t (which is true). A prerequisite, though, is a lead player. We are not doing this as a trio. I’ve got a message into music teacher Mike Simpson (lead guitar), and hit up the music store (again) to interest one of their guitar teachers—emphasizing this is a benefit for the Garibaldi Food Pantry and we’re all doing this for free (the last guitar teacher I talked to insisted on being paid, and I had to tell him we just weren’t going to be able to do business). Haven’t talked to “Doc” Wagner (blues harp) yet. Started work on the “Me and Rufus, and Burning Down the House” video. I have, I think, just enough movie footage of Rufus for the song. (For the Rap—it’s a short Rap—I can use still photos. I wanted to add text overlays, anyway.) I need to re-record the song, however; the only recording I have is the live one from when we performed the song for librarian Sara at the Tillamook Library, and I stumbled over some of the lyrics back then. Music Friday night (with the Friday Night Group) and Saturday (at the library) this week. Another local job to apply for; it’s part-time, managing a downtown public market thing, but it turns out one of the people doing the hiring remembers me from when I was the local city manager. It’d be nice if that would help. Joe

Had to do a quick reality check on how well I was doing as a writer this year. The answer is I’ve written eight new songs in ten months. (I’d have preferred ten, or an average of one a month.) I only count “keepers”; unless they’ve been played for, and requested by, audiences, they’re “forgetters,” and I don’t count them at all. Some on the list are better than others, of course. The Dog’s Song (pretty fast rock ‘n’ roll) Crosses by the Roadside (mod. slow two-step) Love Trails of the Zombie Snails (folk-rock) Me and Rufus, and Burnin’ Down the House (mod. fast country) Always Pet the Dogs (mod. fast two-step) 50 Ways to Cure the Depression (fast Gospel) I Broke My Girlfriend (slow & sleazy) The Taboo Song (also slow & sleazy) Of those, “Crosses” and “The Dog’s Song” are by far the best, and are album material. “Rufus” is going to become a music video (starring Rufus—I got some good footage of him Sunday), “Taboo” is already a “French style” music video, and the zombie snails will go on Southern Pigfish’s album—it’s more their style (politically charged Arkansas bluegrass hip-hop sea chanties) than mine. “Always Pet the Dogs” was for my wife, for her birthday, and the only thing that mattered was whether she liked it (she did); and “I Broke My Girlfriend” was for Beth Williams’ album of songs about broken things produced earlier this year. “50 Ways” was deliberately written for the Failed Economy Show the band did last May. They’ve all been performed, though, and came across okay. Then there are the collabs. I’ve done ten of those, over the past ten months (I was surprised), and in all cases, they’re “collaborations” where I’ve simply musicated someone else’s lyrics. Six of the ten are Stan Good songs. That doesn’t necessarily mean that’s turning into one of those classic writing partnerships, like Rodgers & Hammerstein or Taupin & John; I’m just on the lookout for good writing wherever I can find it, and Stan has done a lot of good writing. “Un-Easy Street” is some of the best I’ve ever run across, and the band’s been doing that song every show. I’m still not sure what’s going to happen with the Failed Economy Sequel. I have a call in (not returned as of this writing) to “Doc” Wagner (blues harp); Wayne (lead guitar) doesn’t want to commit, again (I think that means he really doesn’t want to play with us); Mike Simpson (lead guitar) will be out of town that day, but may know somebody. I think our cutoff date has to be Wednesday; if I know by Wednesday we’re going to do it, I can mention it in my column for the newspaper (which a lot of people apparently read), which will come out the Wednesday before the concert. If I don’t have a lead player by Wednesday morning, we’ll have to shine it on. And since I don’t know, I think I have to act like it’s going to happen. That means finishing the setlist, and seeing if I can get the one new song that’s not recorded—Al David’s “Poverty Blues”—recorded in acceptable form so it can go on a CD for the band. (If I can’t sing it, we can’t perform it.) Need to design a poster, too, even though I don’t know whose names are going on it. If I take the original soup-kitchen photo I used for the last Failed Economy Show poster, and just flip it 180 degrees, it’ll look new, but still recall the “old” photo. I can do that. Elsewhere, I found another job to apply for (another fun job—I’ve applied for lots of jobs that are not fun). This one’d be to be city finance officer in Rockaway Beach, five miles from Garibaldi. (I wouldn’t have to move, in other words.) I am trying hard to not be too hopeful. I’m sure there are tons of people with armloads of college degrees in this stuff, and all I’ve got to offer is 15 years’ experience—and the tendency these days is to value education as paramount and dismiss experience altogether. Joe

Judging a high-school speech tournament is a lot like critiquing performers at an open mike (except one doesn’t usually get to critique the performers at an open mike). Whether it’s a prose or poetry recitation, dramatic interpretation, radio commentary, or after-dinner speech, it’s all performance, and I probably know enough about performance to give kids pointers about how to work a crowd. This will be the sixth year I’ve judged speech tournaments for my daughter’s high school (now her former high school—she’s in college) And you learn new things… One of the “expository” (informative, with posters) speeches was by a girl with a guitar (good prop—and she could even play it a little), about a new genre of music prompted by the J.K. Rowling novels; it’s called “Wizard Rock,” and the genre was begun by a duo calling themselves Harry and the Potters. Now, apparently, there’s a bunch of such bands, and there are tours, and albums. All duly ignored by the “mainstream” music industry, which presumably has no interest in anything not generated within their own closed circle. It does make one wonder, though: why Harry Potter, and not one of the other kid-obsession “literature” series? Why not the Twilight series, for instance? Is one forced back to simply saying that “the world is a very strange place,” and “there ain’t no accounting for taste”? Or are there really such genres out there, and I just haven’t heard them? What’s outside the tightly-controlled “core” of the music industry is so diverse (and unheard) that almost anything is possible. Played “The Dog’s Song” for the Friday Night Group (we had a good rock ‘n’ roll guitarist and bass player on hand), and the crowd did like it; songwriter Ricki Bellos was right—people’s interest is grabbed at the Rap, with “There are very few love songs, country or otherwise, written from the point of view of the dog.” Sounds good with a band; I think our band should do it. I played it again today, at the Forestry Center’s bluegrass jam session—a couple of people requested it, who’d heard it Friday night. (The Friday Night Group got “Vampire Roumanian Babies,” too, of course—it being Hallowe’en and all. That’s the only Hallowe’en song I’ve performed this Hallowe’en.) I have another Stan Good song musicated—a bouncy, Bob Wills-style lost-love song hight “Don’t Remind Me You’re On My Mind.” A lot of the stuff I’ve done lately has had more of a rock ‘n’ roll beat (undoubtedly the result of playing with heavfy-metal musicians), and it was nice to do something that was openly traditional country. Folks who heard it suggested it be faster, and—surprise!—I could do that: “Alice” the ‘puter’s Audacity program has the ability to change the tempo of a piece without changing the key (I tried it out on one of Scott Garriott’s songs, “Marilee”). So I didn’t have to re-record it to make it faster. Stan’s got another one I’d really like to put to music, called “When the Blues Got You,” but he says he’s promised the musication to someone else. I just hope they do a good job. I would like to include “When the Blues Got You” in the Failed Economy Sequel (if we do it), provided the song is uptempo enough. It would be uptempo enough if I musicated it, but I don’t know about anybody else. Good crowd of musicians at the Forestry Center (for a change); it’ll be the last session for a while—the state is closing the Forestry Center for the winter because of the money shortage. All but two of the Center’s employees are being laid off or transferred. One keeps hearing news items saying the recession is over; I’d like to know where that is. If I could afford it, I might try to move there. Joe

The suit and the truck have gotten a workout this week. Job interviews Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, in Portland (90 miles away), Pendleton (150 miles further east), and Milwaukie (90 miles again). All state jobs; easiest (and poorest-paying) is Wednesday’s job, a lowly permit tech/secretary for the state liquor-control agency, and the most challenging (and most fun) is Tuesday’s, managing a state child-support office with a staff of 22 covering nine counties. Thursday, I get to have lunch with the local newspaper publisher (his idea—I don’t know what he has in mind). “The Dog’s Song” has gotten a lot of good attention; so, belately, has “Crosses by the Roadside,” which I dedicated to Sharma Kay. “Crosses” was panned by a Nashville publisher—one reason I hadn’t played it much until recently—but I get the opposite reaction from audiences. I am forced to go with the audiences, and guess the “Nashville experts” just don’t have a very good handle on what the public wants to listen to. Both “The Dog’s Song” and “Crosses by the Roadside” would be good album inclusions—but not this time, I think: the setlist for the upcoming album is set, and I don’t really want to change it. I want the upcoming album to include Stan Good’s “Un-Easy Street,” too, and it and “Crosses” are both two-steps, and just a little too similar in tempo—they shouldn’t be on the same record. Next time. (Yes, I’m already organizing the next album, and I haven’t finished this one yet.) “The Dog’s Song” is probably one for the next album, too. I would like the band to tackle it—it is definitely rock ‘n’ roll, and they like that stuff. “The Dog’s Song” is one that’s unlikely to get performed for many live audiences, but it is good (one time—and there aren’t many—where I agree with the reviewers), and I know I can sing it okay, even though it’s in an awful key. It might be possible to pad the setlist for the second Failed Economy Show with a couple more of my tunes. “The Strange Saga of Quoth, the Parrot” is a possibility, because it is political, and does have an upbeat message of determination, and “Hey, Little Chicken” is openly about acquiring food. Could do “Rotten Candy,” too; it is, after all, about me getting fired from my city manager job in Union (I just ratcheted up the lost-love imagery to the point where you’d never guess it was about a guy losing his job). Add Stan Good’s “Gimme Couple Billion of Them Bailout Bucks,” which we didn’t do last time, and Al David’s new “Poverty Blues,” and we’d be okay, I think. Those would replace Z. Mulls’ “The Emperor,” my “Oil in the Cornfield,” Stan Good’s “WD-40 the Economy,” and Stan Bolton’s “Glad That you’re Here,” none of which I can sing very well. (On the other hand, if we get “Doc” Wagner playing blues harp, “Glad That You’re Here” should be an inclusion; it’s a great blues number and ideal for the harmonica.) Of course, I don’t know if there will be a show yet. I haven’t contacted my potential lead players to see if any (or all) of them are available, and that’s a prerequisite. I guess my excuse is I needed to recover from my generally depressing showing at Insomnia Coffee. I think I have now. I’m ready to perform again. I still might avoid soliciting any more solo shows in Portland; that has not worked out, and has pretty much been a waste of time and money. I may have the time, but I sure don’t have the money. UPCOMING: Music Friday with the Friday Night Group; it’ll be the Hallowe’en show, and my excuse to give ‘em “Vampire Roumanian Babies” and “Love Trails of the Zombie Snails,” as well as Bobby Bare’s famous blues about voodoo queen Marie Laveau, which I don’t do any other time of year. Sunday there should be music at the Forestry Center. Joe

Well, it has been a week (almost) of rejections. The fish hatchery in Trail hired someone else; so did a bunch of other state agencies that interviewed me. The newspaper’s auditors told them they should hire a business manager with an accounting degree, not accounting experience—not me, in other words. The last several city-manager jobs I applied for all went to people with degrees but no prior experience, too—it’s why I mostly don’t bother to apply for those jobs any more. And then there was the Insomnia Coffee gig. No, it wasn’t good. I believe I did my part right: the setlist was good (and timed perfectly), I remembered everything (even the Rap, which I’d just finished that day), and the delivery, even of songs I hadn’t done before or hadn’t done in a long time, was good, too. And both my voice and my fingers lasted the whole two hours (though they did hurt by the time I was done—making one’s self heard unamplified in a big room is not easy). I just don’t think the audience listened. At all. I realize that happens a lot to musicians, and suppose I shouldn’t be bothered by it—but I am. I am used to being paid attention (I have been accused of having an overdeveloped sense of self-importance). I can deal with people not paying attention—I consider that a challenge—but in this case, the crowd seemed to be deliberately treating me as a distraction, and acting pointedly like they really would have preferred it if I hadn’t been there. If I increased my volume (which I had limited ability to do, being unamplified), they increased theirs. They mostly didn’t applaud. And every person who left the place (and they mostly left in groups) did so in the middle of a song. (Some of them smiled as they left. I’m not sure what the smiles meant.) I think, though, that if there’s fault to be found (and I’m not sure there is—but as noted above, I’m pretty sure I did everything right), it’s with the venue, not the audience. I don’t think Insomnia Coffee has done a good job of communicating to their customers that they consider the live music important—and (my opinion) until they do, it’s not going to be. In my opinion, having solicited somebody to come play there, the venue should act like what they did was a Good Thing: posters help (I gave them posters, but I don’t think they ever put any up), but generally you want to create the proverbial “buzz” that something special’s going to happen. And they should shush the crowd, both in advance and on-site. “We are having Live Music, and it’s going to be Neat. If you don’t want to hear live music, you should come at a time when we don’t have live music, which is most of the time.” In other words, give the performer—who is playing for free—a little courtesy. I think courtesy was notably lacking here. I won’t actively solicit my going back. If Insomnia Coffee contacts me to ask me back—and I doubt they will—I will have to ask them why they’re bothering. It cost me twenty bucks in gas and roughly seven hours of my time (including two spent performing, and four spent traveling) to play at a bunch of people who pretty obviously preferred I wasn’t there. I am tempted to accede to their wishes. Just a coincidence, but I could have gone to Jim Nelson’s open mike at the Bay City Arts Center that night. Yes, that was also unpaid, and I would have been on stage for only 15-20 minutes, but it was only four miles away, and the audience would have been respectful and attentive (and a lot of them probably would have been fans). Guess where I’d rather have been? On the plus side, “The Dog’s Song” is done. URL is http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songinfo.cfm?bandID=183557&songID=8251748. In keeping with the original mandate to do it in the style of the Ramones, it’s rock ‘n’ roll. Not much feedback on the song, so I have to rely on my own gut feeling, which is that it’s okay. I was trying to capture the “Bubbaness” of an old dog, and still make it understandable to people, and I think I did that. Job interviews next two days; I still have April’s “Family Photo” to re-record, and a Stan Good song to musicate, too. And a lead player to enlist for the second Failed Economy Show. Not going to do the show if I can’t find a lead player. Joe

As this is written, I am waiting for the Oregon Justice Dept. to tell me whether they want to have my job interview in Salem (where their headquarters is) or in Pendleton, 200-plus miles away (where the job would be). Don’t know when the interview will be, but I have another one Monday in Portland. And a job test in Portland tomorrow—I’ll drop off more posters for the Insomnia Coffee Co. gig in Hillsboro while I’m at it. All part of re-inventing myself, I guess. I think city management is probably out as a career now—the only interviews I’ve gotten for those jobs have been where a city manager who knew me was picking the folks to be interviewed, and abovementioned city managers are never the ones doing the actual hiring. I think I won’t have one of those jobs again unless I have that all-important college degree, I can’t get the degree without going back to school, and I have to—I think—have a decent-paying job to afford the classes. (Unemployment just changed their rules—again—to allow one to go to school while still drawing unemployment benefits. They used to prohibit that. I wonder if I can take advantage of it?) The plus side is I can expect to have more time to play music. I want to push that as far as it will go, and until recently there never was the time. I will have to put into practice everything I’ve learned about economizing, because there will still not be enough money to do anything fancy. Post-mortem on the Burlesque Show was Sunday. I think everybody’s committed to doing another show, but it will have to be done a bit differently, because the last show didn’t make any money. It wasn’t that we didn’t have a good crowd (and I don’t think anyone was turned off by the $8 gate fee), but the rent the Hawthorne Theater charged was pretty astronomical, and that alone ate up all the money, and then some. We will do the next show in a different (and cheaper) place. We need a venue that can accommodate Lanolin’s fire-dancing stripper act—the Portland Fire Marshal doesn’t allow that sort of thing just anywhere. Ideally, the venue should be free; as a trade-off, we’d have to do it on a weeknight, but that might not be bad—there’s a lot of competition for the entertainment dollar on Friday and Saturday nights, and not many places to go the rest of the week. We could actually get a bigger crowd on a weeknight. My suggestion that the show-long plot tying all the acts loosely together was good (and also unique), but that the dialogue needed to get sparser the more inebriated the audience got, was echoed by some others. They’d also like more acts (i.e., some additional performers), and some of them will go hunting and see what they can find and rope in. I didn’t make my pitch to have a full band perform some of my songs (though I still think it’s a good idea), but did tell Mary-Suzanne, who runs a comedy showcase at a club downtown, that I was interested in being part of one of her shows if she thought I’d fit in, and I reminded “ringmeistro” Whitney that I’d sent her the two “Joe Show” videos. One “sideways” approach to breaking into the Portland market is through the comedy clubs; a lot of what I do is classifiable as comedy (it’s even classifiable as standup comedy, since I’m standing up when I do it). I’m not sure how long before our next meeting. I am going to be busy for the next few weeks, and not just with job interviews; Chris is in for a Failed Economy Show sequel, so I need to find us a lead player and we need to practice. Need a couple more songs, too. I’ve got Al David’s “Poverty Blues,” and maybe we can use Stan Good’s “Gimme Couple Billion of Them Bailout Bucks”—I don’t think we had that in the last show. Maybe there’s a couple more of mine that can be stretched to fit a Failed Economy Show theme. Joe

Setlist for the Jade lounge audition was: Hey, Little Chicken (sleazy quasi-blues) Dead Things in the Shower (mod. fast two-step) Sam & Melinda (slow & sleazy) Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus (mod. fast Gospel) Crosses by the Roadside (mod. slow two-step) The Termite Song (fast bluegrass) I’m Giving Mom a Dead Dog for Christmas (slow & sleazy) Almost exactly 30 minutes—and it showcased (in order, of all things) all the things I told the folks at Songstuff I wrote about: death (“Hey, Little Chicken”), lost love (“Dead Things”), betrayal (“Sam & Melinda”), religion (“Bungee Jumpin’ Jesus”), and dead animals (“Dead Dog”). Plus one serious song (“Crosses”) and one addressing a burning social issue (“The Termite Song”). Not a bad list, and I might use it again. The Jade Lounge has good acoustics for a small place. They have a PA system I didn’t bother to use, but might next time—not because amplification is necessary, but because (like at the Burgerville gig) it’s good props. One looks more official, I think, standing behind a microphone, even if it’s not on. When I was in there, there were six people in the bar, not counting the staff—two couples eating, and one couple drinking. I think two of the couples were mostly paying attention. I have a definite fan in one of the staff. I’m not sure how well their Sunday night open mike is working. (They’ve had one on Monday nights for a while, and it may be better.) Assigning people half-hour time slots is good, but I noticed the person before me and the one after me didn’t show up. (If it were my place, those two would be out of the running for the paying gig right there. I don’t hire people who don’t show up.) If I were running it, I think I’d have the PA already set up and running, and would plug people in and set their sound levels, and introduce them—basically what Little Thom and his clones have done at the Wild Goose for years, and what Chris Parreira (and later Delonde Bell) did at NW Pizza. Doesn’t matter that there’s only six people in the joint. If things are going slow, I’d slip some musician $50 a week and say, “You run it—and be prepared to play three hours yourself if nobody shows up.” (Would I be willing to do that? Sure. It’d be an interesting experiment.) It’s always possible the Jade Lounge turns into a more jumpin’ joint later in the evening (I wasn’t there much past 8 p.m.); I’d have to be there at a later time to see what the crowd (if there is one) was like. They (the staffperson fan, that is) do want me back, but all they were asking for starters is for me to come to another open mike next Sunday. I won’t be doing that; it’d be okay if I had a reason to be in Portland next Sunday, but I don’t—the Burlesque Troupe won’t be meeting. TO-DOS: Lots of them—I have April Johns’ “Family Photo” to re-record, two Stan Good songs to musicate (his “Real Good Coffee and a Real Good Wife” is blatantly chauvinist, but a real fun Cajun-style romp), the Rap to write for the Insomnia Coffee Co. gig (I think I’ll actually have some people I know in the audience for that one), and the Failed Economy Show Sequel to organize. (Still need three more songs for that, to substitute for the ones I can’t sing very well.) Music Friday night at City Hall, and Saturday at the Library. Joe

Well, I wanted to have stuff to do, didn’t I? I think I will be busy for a while. I have an audition at the Jade Lounge in Portland on Sunday (timed it so it’d be just after our Burlesque Troupe post-mortem, if it happens), the Insomnia Coffee Co. gig the following Saturday, a “proofreading test” to take for a state job Wednesday (yes, I’m driving 2-1/2 hours into Portland to take a test I know I’ll pass with 100-plus other people—times are hard). And, I think, another Failed Economy Show to organize and promote. And that’s just this week. Iit looks like the “Failed Economy Show Sequel” is going to fly—drummer Chris is excited, and just wants to make sure he’s got the day/evening free. As soon as I get confirmation from him, I’ll contact lead players; I have two who said they really wanted to play with us, but just weren’t available on Rocktoberfest Saturday. With luck, one or both will be free November 14. I promised Chris and John we wouldn’t try to practice until after Nov. 1, to accommodate their work schedules. (And I already got one donation for the Food Pantry in the mail.) We can keep most of the setlist from the last Failed Economy Show, so it won’t entail a lot of practice. There are maybe four songs I’d like to change out, because we couldn’t do them very well (hard for me to sing). I asked the writers at Just Plain Folks for material, and had one from Al David by the next morning—a bouncy, 1940s-country thing I think the band could do without any trouble. New lyrics from Stan Good, too; his “Let’s Party in 2012” is a good rock ‘n’ roll dance number, and would make a great companion to the late Jeff Tanzer’s waltz, “The Day the Earth Stood Still.” A couple folks cooked up the idea of flying Polly Hager out from Cincinnati to sing with us, and I would really, really like that—and they’d even started soliciting money for the plane fare. I asked them to hold off, because three weeks’ notice is too premature (and short-notice plane tickets are way too expensive); if we could do this in the spring—or any time next year, really—and I could have about two months to work on publicity, we could put on a heck of a show. “Polly Hager and Deathgrass” could be the biggest event this area has seen in years, and could raise tons for the Food Bank. I can use the setlist from my Burgerville solo performance 25 August for the Insomnia Coffee Co. show on Oct. 24. I will rearrange things a little bit; the band have gotten into the habit of starting shows with “Dead Things in the Shower,” and I think I’ll do that here, too. The show is a week before Hallowe’en, and the setlist even includes both my “Hallowe’en-friendly” songs, “Vampire Roumanian Babies” and “Love Trails of the Zombie Snails.” The “Joe Show” videos are getting some—belated—attention, encouraging me to do more. (I haven’t done one in a while—“French video” is a big time-consumer.) I do have a couple of tricks I want to try, using the digital camera as a video camera, but I’ll take it slow. I want to film Rufus the dog (for “Me & Rufus, and Burnin’ Down the House”), but for practice, I think I’ll film a little travelogue of the garage studio. (That won’t take long—the studio meansures 5-by-7 feet, and the most interesting thing in it may be the plastic flowers.) Since I don’t want to waste anything I do, it’d be nice to match that up to a soundtrack. I wonder what would work? There may be a potential outlet for exposure of the videos, too: Whitney (of the “Life’s SubtleTease” burlesque troupe) does a monthly showcase of standup comedy that includes some comedy videos. I sent her the two “Joe Show” videos; I don’t know if she’ll be interested. I think I figured out how to film myself singing, too—I just have to have somebody else operate the camera. (I can think of a couple of people who might do that.) The digital camera can’t record a soundtrack, of course; it’d have to be matched up to a soundtrack recorded separately. How to do that? Record the audio first, I think, and then play it back through either headphones or speakers while the filming’s going on, so I can match my hand and mouth movements to the soundtrack. Could record leads separately the same way. Hey, is this how the big boys do it? Joe

April’s other song is done—“Family Photo.” A good old cheatin’-heart kind of song, but one where the woman leaves the cheater dude (and takes the kids and dog, too). One reason I like musicating other people’s songs is I get to address serious issues without having to write about them myself. I get to preserve my image as the guy who probably can’t take anything seriously (and then when I do write something serious—which I’ve done all of five times in 30-odd years—it has greater impact because it comes as such a surprise). I gave “Family Photo” more of a rock beat, both to accommodate April’s Mary Milleresque voice and because I wanted to make sure it sounded different. I had one person complain (well, comment) that a lot of my music sounds the same, and I want to avoid that; it is a danger in country music, where one is dealing with a limited number of chords and progressions—and a particular danger for me, since I have to deal additionally with my one-octave voice range and limited guitar-playing ability. And in this case, I knew the music was coming in large part from two songs I’d done before, one for Stan Good and one for me, and I didn’t want it to be too obvious. So “Family Photo” is in a different key (also accommodating April’s voice) and has the bass doing 12-bar blues runs in the background rather than “country stuff.”. So now, both “Family Photo” and “Sometimes Country Boys Get the Blues” are up on April’s OMDs, with her vocals, and she’s happy with them. And I’m glad. I find myself still listening more to my renditions of both songs, even though they’re not for public consumption (and April has a much better voice); it’s partly because I think I can learn from what I did. I do like my phrasing better—I was told once that it was possible to spot a Joe Song because the phrasing tended to be unique, though I’m not sure if that’s a good thing—but I’m not about to tell someone what they should do (and I am definitely not going to say they should do what I do). Poster for the Insomnia Coffee Co. gig is done, and sent out to the “joelist”; notice on Facebook, too. I’ll take posters with me when I go to Portland Sunday, and distribute them to the Usual Outlets, plus give some to the Burlesque Troupe when we meet for our post-mortem (maybe I should say “If”—it’s been postponed twice), and leave some at the coffeehouse. I’d like to find an inoffensive way of getting posters to both the Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce (who were kind enough to give me directions when I was trying to find the coffeehouse the first time) and to the city manager in Hillsboro (whom I know); maybe there isn’t an easy way to do it. Got the disturbing news that last Friday, the Garibaldi Food Bank ran out of food. Yes, they should have gotten a big pile of food two days later courtesy of the “Rocktoberfest” concert, but that’s still operating awfully close to the wire for these troubled times—and Thanksgiving is coming up, too. I have suggested it is maybe time to put on another Failed Economy Show concert. The City Hall Dance Floor is available Saturday, 14 November, because the square dancers cancelled. (And that’s the only Saturday the Dance Floor will be free before Thanksgiving, too.) A few to-dos before that can happen: John (bass) is up for it, but I still have to talk to Chris (drums). We’ll need a lead player, and I have two to contact who said they were interested—I just don’t know if they’re available for that date. There are three (I think) songs from the original 2-hour setlist that I’d change out, because they were difficult to sing and the audience wasn’t all that entranced by them, anyway—but I’ll have to figure out what to substitute. And hey, I know a local radio station DJ now, courtesy of the “Rocktoberfest.” I bet he’d be tappable to help with promotion. Joe

I spent most of the day following our performance at the “Rocktoberfest” unable to get the songs on our setlist out of my head. I did hit on a solution, though. With nothing musical on the immediate horizon, and no immediate commitments except applying for more jobs I probably won’t get, now was the time to musicate something—fill my brain with a different melody, as it were. So April Johns’ “Sometimes Country Boys Get the Blues” finally got its music. It didn’t come out exactly like I expected: I’d envisioned something rather slow and mournful, something one would put a wailing fiddle to—but what I got instead was a definite swing beat, with marginally (but noticeably) increasing tempo and volume. By the end of the song, it rocks—and hopefully, people would be out on the dance floor. If a fiddle were playing along with this, it wouldn’t—and couldn’t—be mournful at all. (I don’t have a fiddle, of course. All I have to work with is a lead guitar. But April has a band. I don’t know what they could do with this.) Myself, I think I like it—when I keep hitting the “replay” button on the computer, it’s usually a good sign. Of course, I like the contrast between relatively mournful lyrics and upbeat music; I’ve done that a few times now (and need to watch out it doesn’t become a trademark). But it panders a little, too, to the predilections of the Music Industry as I understand them: they reportedly don’t want ”power ballads,” because the industry has a plethora of them—every artist has written ‘em, and they’ll perform their own, no matter how bad, rather than somebody else’s. The Music Industry says they want upbeat, uptempo songs, which are supposedly harder to write (I hadn’t noticed—most of my songs are uptempo). So April’s song is more marketable this way. (April did like it—said it grows on you (I agree)—and recorded her own vocal to it. She has a growly, wide-range voice ideal for blues—reminiscent of Mary Miller, who was singing when I first moved to Garibaldi, nine years ago. She should sing more. I’m glad she’s working with a band.) One more April Johns song to musicate, “Family Portrait,” a heartrending lost love song. Now that I know what April sounds like, we’ll see what I can do with that. I think the band are excited about doing more gigs, now that our “Rocktoberfest” performance came off so well (and we got such good reviews). I’ve advised John and Chris I’ll stick to their original request, though, and not book anything until after the end of October; that’ll give John time to get work out of the way at City Hall, and accommodate Chris’s work at the Port—with fishing so good, this fall is likely to be the busiest season of the year on the waterfront. They, like me, are anxious to hear how organizer (and music teacher) Mike Simpson’s recording of our live performance came out. Gave John the recording I have of “Test Tube Baby,” the old (1977?) Dodson Drifters hit recorded two years ago with Gem Watson on drums, bass, and lead guitar. With Southern Pigfish’s “For Their own Ends” a bona fide (if incomprehensible) hit with audiences, I think we should do more rock ‘n’ roll songs. And “Test Tube Baby” is a classic. Elsewhere: No word from Insomnia Coffee about what time I’m playing (and I need that for the posters)—I’ll have to call them. Music this Friday and Saturday, and hopefully the Burlesque Show post-mortem on Sunday (it’s been postponed twice); I’ll go in early and distribute Insomnia gig posters. I don’t know if I’ll try any more Portland open mikes. Joe

The “Rocktoberfest” show went good. (I attribute it primarily to our being practiced.) No flubs (at least not any noticeable ones), and the few special tidbits—the stops for the bass runs in “Tillamook Railroad Blues” and the deliberately slowing-down last line in “No Good Songs About the War”—came off without a hitch, and made us seem uber-professional. Small audience, of course—one shouldn’t expect otherwise at 10:00 on a Saturday morning—but it included some folks I recognized, that I’m pretty sure were there just to see us. And we had the captive audience, of course—the vendors, “Rocktoberfest” staff, and the schoolkids who’d been enlisted to do everything from man the gates to be roadies for the bands’ equipment. The stage was a hollowed-out semi trailer provided (I think) by the radio station, wired for electricity; I think they got that trick from the first “Moograss” bluegrass festival in Tillamook (on a cold, windy and rainy Labor Day weekend), when we retreated from the outdoor stage and found a dairy barn with a flatbed semi trailer parked in it, and said “Aha! Instant stage!” The sound inside the metal trailer was awful (of course), even with monitors, but folks in the audience said we sounded great. We started late (also de rigeur for opening acts), because the sound crew hadn’t finished stringing up lights; that meant we did a 40-minute set (like all the bands after us were going to do), rather than a full hour, but it was okay—we knew everything, and it was easy to cut stuff to fit. For some reason, “Dead Things in the Shower” appeals primarily to women, and “Bluebird on My Windshield” mostly to guys; we’ve been playing both every show, and it’s probably important to keep it that way. Stan Good’s “Un-Easy Street” is a never-ending hit, and so is Gene Burnett’s “Things Are Getting Better Now That Things Are Getting Worse.” And the band does a tremendous job on both. The one new one (for us) that we did was “When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You.” Very fast bluegrass; we did all nine verses with no breaks (not having a lead player), and I think it actually comes across better that way. The song follows a suicide, stage by stage, from jumping off the cliff to finally being buried—with increasingly caustic comments about the girl he’s leaving behind—and not having any breaks makes the whole thing feel more manic. Tried a trick, too, to cover for the absence of a lead player. We have to have a break in the middle of “For Their own Ends,” the Southern Pigfish song, so I can rest my voice; the song’s got seven verses, and is in a key that’s hard for me to sing in—but I can’t do much on the guitar besides the rhythm rock progression I’m already doing. When we were practicing Wednesday night, John tried some bass “fills” in the break that sounded really good (I’d never thought of a bass lead)—so on Friday, he tried doing the same thing to some of the more country songs, and that sounded good, too. So in concert, “Armadillo on the Interstate,” “No Good Songs About the War,” “Tillamook Railroad Blues” and “For Their Own Ends” all got bass leads. It worked well. When Dick comes back from vacation, we are going to be SO good… We were followed on stage by an acoustic folk duo (perfect—we won’t be compared to another band). And we were recorded! Mike Simpson (the music teacher, and organizer of the “Rocktoberfest”) brought equipment from his recording studio, and caught (I think) our entire performance on—well, it’s not tape these days, but whatever they use instead of tape. He said we came across great, and I can’t wait to listen. UPCOMING for the band is more recording for the album, though not until after the end of the month; no immediate shows on the horizon, but I don’t know what business might result from our “Rocktoberfest” performance. For myself, I’ve got the solo Insomnia Coffee Co. gig in Hillsboro Oct. 24—and the burlesque troupe is going to do a post-mortem Oct. 11 (which, as this is written, is tomorrow). Joe

Back from southern Oregon… Almost an 11-hour trip, what with stops at the towing company to pick up the Big Yellow Tip Bucket (retrieved from the T-bird before they destroyed it) and buy a couple of spare tires (because I had a blowout on the way), and the audition at the Capitol Coffee House in Portland. It was a “no” from Capitol Coffee, and I probably should have expected that was going to happen. The reason the owner hadn’t been answering my e-mails was he really wasn’t interested in my playing there; he hadn’t scheduled me for an audition, did give me a perfunctory one because I showed up (and he knew I was from way out of town), but was obviously distracted while I was doing it, and told me after hearing a verse and chorus of three songs that I was a pretty good guitarist (duh) but not what he wanted in his restaurant. I am not sure what he wanted—probably soft rock or jazz (Portlanders like that stuff), and a duo or trio would probably work best in the space he had. So I thanked him for listening to me (having figured out I was really wasting his time, and he was being nice about it), and wished luck to the duo that had been scheduled to audition. The owner’s goal is to have live music there seven nights a week—paid live music, in fact—and one has to encourage that (and I did). Even if it’s not me. I was just overly excited about the prospect because I have friends who live in the neighborhood, and I was pretty sure they’d come to see me if I was playing there. The lesson (there are always lessons) is to not be so full of myself that I can’t recognize rejection before it happens. There is plenty to do. The band practices tonight (Wednesday) for Saturday’s “Rocktoberfest” gig; music Friday night (of course), and there will be a cast meeting of the burlesque troupe Sunday to do a post-mortem on the Sept. 26 show (the post-mortem was rescheduled from last Sunday because a lot of the cast couldn’t make it). I do have the Insomnia Coffee Co. gig two weeks from now, on Sat. Oct. 24 (so being rejected by one coffeehouse isn’t a confidence-destroying thing). Rap to work out for the “Rocktoberfest,” and also for Insomnia. Setlist for the “Rocktoberfest” currently looks like this: Dead Things in the Shower (fast two-step, no break) Armadillo on the Interstate (slow & sleazy, half the breaks) Bluebird on My Windshield (fast bluegrass, maybe keep the break) Tillamook Railroad Blues (deliberate blues, one break) Things Are Getting Better Now That Things Are Getting Worse (mod. fast two-step, maybe keep the break) No Good Songs About the War (slow two-step, maybe keep the break) When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You (fast bluegrass, no breaks) For Their Own Ends (folk-rock, keep the break) Duct Tape (mod. fast two-step, one break) Welcome to Hebo Waltz (fast waltz, no breaks) Rotten Candy (fast Gospel, keep the break—it’s simple) Eatin’ Cornflakes from a Hubcap Blues (mod. slow quasi-blues, no break) Free-Range Person (fast bluegrass, keep the breaks) Un-Easy Street (mod. two-step, no break) A fellow at the music store recommended a guitar player, but I don’t know him and haven’t contacted him. At this point, I think it’s too late to inject anything more new. We’ll do the show as a trio. Joe

On the laptop... The laptop (no name yet) travels with me wherever I go these days, just like the cell phone. I have become appallingly 21st Century. Perhaps the pleasure of owning a 23-year-old froofrooless truck is compensation. The Wild Goose was fun; the crowd there got “Crosses by the Roadside” (prefaced with apologies for playing ‘em a serious song), Derek Hines’ “I Want to Come Back as a Stripper Pole” and–as a surprise for Gene Burnett–his “Things Are Getting Better Now That Things Are Getting Worse,” which has become such a hit with our band. All with the incomparable George Clark on blues harp. Host Frankie Hernandez’ comment–“I’d like to write a song good enough for Joe Wrabek to cover it”–is, I think, one of the nicest compliments I’ve ever received. I seem to be getting a reputation as a writer. I don’t think it’s deserved–it’s tempting to echo one of the Roman “Silver Age” writers (I think it was Sallust) and say, “Look, if you think my stuff is good, it means the quality of Roman literature has really declined.” Still, it does feel good when somebody acts like a compliment from me on their writing is special, when people are anxious for me to musicate something they’ve written–heck, when they just miss my stuff when I’m not there. Of course, all that is mostly within a small circle of friends–but they are mostly good writers, and I highly respect their opinions. I would like to enlarge that “small” if I can. I don’t think commercial success as important as I did 20 years ago (maybe because I no longer respect the opinions of a lot of the people who control the music industry), but I would like to prove, I think, that I can play their game, too. (And reach more people, of course. That’s hard to do exclusively on one’s own.) Beyond that... I overheard one college student at the Wild Goose defending his choice of a career path–as a magician: “I don’t need to make a fortune at it. I just want to make a living at it.” Me too. “Crosses” is a sad song, but I noticed the audience listened to every word. Sunday was Sharma’s memorial service in Longview, roughly 400 miles away from where I am. I hope it went well. The fish hatchery job interview went well (most of my job interviews have); in this case, they’re only interviewing 11 people instead of the 50 to 100 that have become de rigeur for state jobs since the economy fell apart. I may know in a couple of weeks. I also heard about another city-manager job (also in southern Oregon) that might be going vacant because the city manager is being hired away. The gig at the Insomnia Coffee Co. is official–it’ll be Saturday, Oct. 24, time for me to do some promoting. Audition at another coffeehouse en route home, this one in southwest Portland (close to the home of a couple of friends of mine). They pay their musicians–not much, but it’s nice to see someone taking seriously the Biblical admonition: “The laborer is worth his hire.” That one’s a 3-hour show; it’ll use up just about everything good I’ve written. For the Insomnia gig, I will definitely need the Big Yellow Tip Bucket, which is still in the trunk of the Officially Totalled Thunderbird. (I talked to the towing company, and they’ll save it for me to pick up.) It’ll be a long trip home, with a lot of stops. Joe

A riddle. What’s new and 23 years old? My truck! Paid for it and picked it up a day after insurance advised the crashed Thunderbird was a total loss (mostly because of its age) and they were sending me a check. A small check, but it’s enough to buy the truck—a 1986 Toyota Nothing Special, with lockable canopy (good), standard transmission (real good), a little rust (not good), the little engine that Toyota made for years and years and years (real, real good). Even has fishing rod racks, rifle racks, and a moose sticker on the back window (all good). Definitely a country boy’s truck. And no frills at all. I am tired of electronic froo-froo that stops working. Here I have no electric windows, no electric doors, no electric seats, no automatic seatbelts, no power steering, no power brakes, no Oriental voices making Zen statements at you like “The Door Is A Jar.” It has a primitive radio, that I could care less about—I never turned the radio in the old van on once in three years. Not expecting the critter to last forever, but if I get a few good years out of it, I’ll be satisfied. That’s what’s taking me to southern Oregon Sunday for the job interview in Trail at the fish hatchery on Monday. Three mechanics (only one of whom works for the car dealer) have assured me it’ll do the trip without hassles. One said she wished she’d known the truck was for sale, ‘cause she would have bought it (and would have paid more money than I did). So I guess we’re as okay as we’re gonna get. Derek Hines has posted “I Wanna Come Back as a Stripper Pole” (music and recording by me); URL is http://www.soundclick.com/share?songID=8168331. This is one I’d like to submit to the Burlesque Show folks—I think it’d be a good addition to the show. It would even make a good dance number (with a pole, of course). Raw footage from the Sept. 26 Burlesque Show is online at the Pirate Satellite TV video gallery. There are three pieces, and the URLs are http://www.stickam.com/viewMedia.do?mId=185931960, http://www.stickam.com/viewMedia.do?mId=185932054, and http://www.stickam.com/viewMedia.do?mId=185932722. I haven’t watched the videos all the way through, so I don’t know if they incorporate the entire show, which was over two hours long. Edited video is reportedly coming, but it may take a while—I have done video, so I know how much time these things can take. I haven’t done a video myself in weeks; doing it “French style,” the way I’ve been doing it, is a time-consuming process, and hard even for the unemployed to find time for. I could wish for a usable Webcam, but like the new soundhole pickup I need for the guitar, that’s not in the cards. It’ll be another week, I think, before I can film Rufus again with the digital camera—I want more and better footage for the video of “Me and Rufus, and Burnin’ Down the House.” I have struck out about everywhere in the search for a lead player for the “Rocktoberfest.” The only good news is that “Doc” Wagner, my former dentist (and the best harmonica player I have ever met), is interested in playing with us—but he can’t do it Oct. 10 because he’ll be out of town. He wants to do future shows with us, though, and I sure will take advantage of that. One more person to try before I give up. John has suggested we might be able to pull the concert off as a trio, if both he and I can do extra fills in between the lyrics; I know that’s possible (I have done it myself), but I’ll have to be a lot better practiced. For me, that means playing a lot more, so I’m thoroughly familiar with the material. We’ll also need three additional songs for the set—ideally, ones that require little or no lead break. This’d be a good opportunity to try “When I Jump Off the Cliff I’ll Think of You”—nine verses, no chorus, and doesn’t need any lead breaks at all. Tentatively, we’re going to practice Saturday night. Music at the Tillamook Library Saturday afternoon, and at the Wild Goose in Ashland Sunday night. I’m off to a good start for playing a lot before the gig. Joe

I had a song recorded by Polly Hager! You can hear her rendition of “Rotten Candy” at http://www.soundclick.com/share?songID=8163332. She has a lovely Ronstadt-esque singing voice that was perfect for this song. Larry Hazelbaker in Nashville plays guitar and mandolin on this, and did the recording. No, it’s not the sort of thing that has any money in it—Polly’s an independent writer, like me (though a whole lot prettier)—but with a voice like that, she’s going places. It’d be nice to provide her a vehicle to go there with. Nine days till the “Rocktoberfest” gig, and I still have not found a lead player. (I mentioned it in my weekly column for the paper, too.) We will have, I think, one chance to practice before the gig, between John’s and Chris’s work and my round of job interviews (two this week, and one Monday that’ll take me out of town for three days). Of the two lead guitarists I contacted, one didn’t want to commit (that seems to be a standard feature of lead players) and the other told me we were too good and he was paranoid about doing it (I think that was a compliment). I posted “Crosses by the Roadside” online as a dedication to Sharma (I am not ready to call her “the late” Sharma, and may not be for a long time). It has gotten some good response, and is a song that probably needs to get played more, despite its having been panned by a Nashville music publisher. It is reminiscent of Sharma: relentlessly upbeat without really trying to be. (And that contrast, between pretty sad lyrics and pretty danceable music, is one of the things I like about the song.) It was written for—and from the viewpoint of—the person left behind when somebody dies; they’ve got the harder job, because they’re still around. And that seemed appropriate in this case, too. (And the reason the publisher wasn’t interested in the song? Because Randy Travis (I think it was him) had a song about crosses a couple of years ago, and is now presumed to have a corner of sorts on the crosses-song market, and any song by anybody else with crosses in it is going to be considered derivative. I don’t think that’s a reasonable attitude, but I’m not the one in the music-publishing business (at least not yet). At my end, I haven’t had a single person who’s heard “Crosses by the Roadside” mention Randy Travis—and besides, I think my song’s better’n his. I will continue playing it.) Sharma’s family is having a memorial service for her this coming Sunday, 4 October, in Longview, WA—and I can’t be there; I’ll be headed for southern Oregon, probably 400 miles from there, for a job interview the next day. I’ll plan on playing the song at the Wild Goose Sunday night. Settled things with insurance following the car accident; the old Thunderbird—16 years old—was a total loss. I will get enough out of the settlement to buy a small (and nowheres near as pretty) truck I’ve had my eye on (country boys should be driving trucks anyway, not Thunderbirds). The process went rather smoothly, in part because I gave the guy who crashed into me one of my CDs as a business card; he called me just a couple of days later to tell me how much he liked it. (I have yet to find anybody who doesn’t like the CD.) The lesson: if you’re ever in a car wreck, hand out CDs. You’ll be glad you did. I hadn’t heard from the Insomnia Coffee Co. in Hillsboro about whether they want me to play Oct. 10 or 24, so I stopped by on my way back from today’s job interview, and left them a CD. The owner wasn’t there, but I expect I’ll hear from him now. Nice place, with a cute little stage that might just barely hold two people (and would be ideal for one), and maybe good acoustics. Joe

The Burlesque Show was good. Very good. If you attended, you know this. If you didn’t, be patient—I’m sure now there will be another one. The troupe will be doing a post-mortem Sunday, 4 October; I won’t be able to be there—I’ll be en route to the next job interview in southern Oregon, the state Fish & Wildlife one in Trail. I’m anxious to see the video (I understand it was videotaped as well as podcast). One reason I want to see the videotape is I want to see the crowd’s reaction to the songs I did. I did “Electronic Love,” “The Termite Song,” and “Can I Have Your Car When the Rapture Comes?” and I’m not sure how they went over. I was doing the de-focus-my-eyes-because-the-crowd’s-big-and-scary trick, and consequently wasn’t seeing the audience. (I peeked a little during the last song.) But I also missed (being backstage most of the time) all but one of the dances, and judging from the crowd’s reaction (which I could hear) they were very, very good. (I did get to see one of Peggy/Lanolin’s fire dances, and it was impressive.) I myself liked that we had a plot, and that it carried all the way through the show; I think the dialogue needs to get sparser as the show goes on, though, because the audience is getting more bibulous over time, and more interested in music and the dancers, and not really paying attention to people speaking. That’s particularly the case after the intermission, during which the audience have taken the opportunity (as encouraged) to purchase additional brain cell destroying materials from the bar. The sound guy may have had the most difficult job: he had to cue not only the music for the dancers, but also the dialogue parts from “Alex,” the computer that’s officially the troupe’s manager, and “Jill,” the GPS unit he has the hots for, and the moderator from the “FBI This Week” show (which is a real show), and keep it all rapid-fire so the show doesn’t drag. He done good. So what’s next? Well, in the next show I should be doing different songs, I think—not because these weren’t good, but simply for the sake of variety. Among the “sleazies” that’d be possible inclusions are “The Taboo Song” (about the 15 things you’re not supposed to write songs about), “Sam & Melinda” (about VD, auto accidents, and killing your lover), and “The Cat with the Strat” (if we’re going to murder a poem—this show did e.e. cummings—why not Dr. Seuss?). Of those three, though, only “The Taboo Song” is short. Actually, “Dirty Deeds We Done to Sheep” would be perfect for this crew, but that one is really best done with a band to have the greatest impact. (One of the troupe is a bass player, though. She may well know others.) There are the non-sleazies, of course, but I think sleaziness is one of the purposes behind burlesque. I learned from one of the bouncers at the theater (lesson: always talk to the staff) about two more venues for solo acts; one is the Hawthorne Theatre Lounge, the small bar attached to (and owned by) the theater, and the other is a 24-hour coffeehouse in Beaverton. Both do solo, acoustic acts—people like me, in other words. I’ll contact both, and plan on stopping by on my next trip to Portland (which will be Wednesday, come to think of it—I have that job interview in Woodburn in the morning). And I have, I think, the perfect eulogy for Sharma—“Crosses by the Roadside.” It is about death by automobile, after all—and it is a song for those left behind. I’ll need to re-record it. Joe

JUST TWO DAYS till the Burlesque Show (I don’t count the day of the show—we’ll be doing a final dress rehearsal that day). In lieu of a program, we’re going to have a big 24x36 poster with our photos, Tarot cards, real and stage names, and functions in the show. I’m designing that. One more day to finish it in—Friday’s shot with a job interview in Salem, 90 miles away (and a 2-hour drive over bad roads). The good news on the job front is I got called for an interview at the Library. Not the most challenging of the jobs I’ve applied for, or the best-paying—but definitely Reinvention Central. It’d be fun. (Really, any job would be fun right now.) So next week has two interviews now—library on Tuesday, and Woodburn (for city recorder) on Wednesday. Then the following Sunday, I leave for southern Oregon again—music Sunday night, and the interview with state Fish & Wildlife Monday. (This job-hunting stuff is getting really busy. I need to get a job just so I can rest.) Talked with the school district, too, about being assistant speech coach. That’s a job that doesn’t pay squat (it’s relatively few hours, too), but it would be fun working with the kids. I like to think I have a few things I could teach about performance. The school district, though, doesn’t want to hire me because of the Uncertainty—they want me to guarantee that I’ll be around, and until I have a local job, I can’t. (They were nice and apologetic about it. And so was I.) Insomnia Coffee Co. in Hillsboro did contact me back, finally—they want me for either October 10 or October 24, both Saturdays. I can do either one. (Could I do both?) Oct. 10 is the day of the “Rocktoberfest,” but that’s in the morning. I just want enough notice of which day I’m performing so I can do a little promoting. I notice the coffee company doesn’t do any advertising of the music that I can see on their Website. If I go in early enough for the Burlesque Show, I can drop these guys off posters (if I know which date I’m playing) and a CD. And we still don’t have a lead player for the “Rocktoberfest” gig. I did have a Wild Idea that I’d really like to try—but I’d like to experiment with it before using it in a gig situation. Dick Ackerman, our blues harp player, is at the other end of the country now—but he has his cell phone with him, and wife Carol has hers. Would it be possible to mount a cell phone on a tripod, in front of a microphone, have Dick play harmonica long distance into his cell phone, and broadcast it to the audience? We could transmit the concert to him (so he could hear the music) through Carol’s cell phone, by stationing someone in front of one of the speakers. (And Dick’s got one of those remote-plug-into-the-ear things, so he could hear easily.) I don’t think anybody’s ever done something like that before. And if that worked, could we record that way? There are some songs for the album I would really like to have Dick’s blues harp on, but we didn’t manage to get them all recorded before he and Carol went away. Yes, the technology’s poor—the Japanese may have sophisticated cell phones, but us country folk don’t—but we do have a good sound engineer, and he’s got really good sound-management software on his computer. Could that make up for the primitive sound transmission over a cell phone? Or, alternatively, would the novelty of the blues harp player being able to do this from 2000-plus miles away be attractive enough to make up for the primitiveness of the sound? One may have to try it to know the answer. “Rocktoberfest” wants the band to start an hour earlier (they said it was a screwup in the printing of the posters), but as a trade-off, we’d get an hour instead of just 40 minutes. I’m game if the rest of the band is. We already have an hour-long set mapped out from the Museum gig, so it’d be easy. Joe