Post-Mortem

Date: Saturday 25 October 2003
Venue: Jitters Café, 4357 Buffalo Road, Chili, NY
Duration: two-and-a-half hours (two sets, one ten-minute break)
Proceeds: $16.75 (tips)

Wore
black jeans (with cuffs)
white socks
black lace-up shoes
black leather belt
cranberry-red button-down shirt over navy blue T-shirt
"wolf cross" pendant on black thong (borrowed from D)

Instrument: Ovation CC67
Amplification: Crate PA 4 (60 watts) with two 12" speaker cabs

The Crowd
Nearly nonexistent, again. The combination of heavy rain, the final World Series game, and zero promotion by the venue meant the room was mostly empty—just as when I played it last time. I figured on this going in, really—this was primarily for me, to keep myself limber and work out some new material.

The Rundown
Pretty much as originally listed: moved "Werewolves Of London" up to the first set to accommodate a request, shuffled second set slightly so as not to play "Purple Jesus" and "After the Axe" back-to-back.

Highlights

When Dan and I worked as a duo, "Couldn't Have Come" was our opener for about five years. It's a comfortable old shoe of a song. I'll admit, I do miss the vocal harmonies, but I'm very pleased with myself for working out a solo arrangement that allows me to play the refrain's mandolin melody in the bass strings while keeping the driving strum going on top. It really needs that countermelody to make it skip along.

Truncated "These Days" (F major, capo 3) from four verses to three when I realized there was no way I was going to make it through verse 3.

"Wish I Were In Love" was better than it had ever been: all the woodshedding's been paying off. I stumbled where I always stumble, though—coming out of the first refrain. This is one of Hart's funniest lyrics, and it's a struggle to keep from breaking up as I sing it; I can get through the bit about "the faint aroma of performing seals," but there's something about the word "ga-ga" that always causes me to snort.

"Spoonful" (drop D, slide) still needs some work. Oddly enough, I think part of the problem is that I sit when I practice at home, but stand when I play out; the change in the angle of the instrument throws my fingering and articulation out of whack, especially when I'm playing bottleneck. I'm shooting for something between the swagger of the classic Howlin' Wolf version and the spooked angularity of Chris Whitley's, but it's just not there yet.

"It's nearly Hallowe'en, and it wouldn't be Hallowe'en if I didn't play a sixteen-bar blues about vampires..." A friend of mine, upon hearing I was to play "Bloodletting," begged me not to. I couldn't imagine why—until I remembered that during the time of its original release he'd been going through a college Goth phase of his own. The song is probably tainted for him by horrible memories of dorm rooms full of clove smoke, and skinny kids in black all nodding earnestly; "So true, man. You were a vampire, and now I am the walking dead. . ."

After "Bloodletting," I'd announced offhandedly that I'd be singing one about werewolves later in the night. At the front table a little girl, no more'n a year or two older than Claire, sat with her parents: she begged me to play "the werewolf song" right away. Hell, I was cool with that. This one's always great fun to tear through, and it's even better when there's an eight-year-old bopping in her chair and singing Ahhh-wooooo along with you. She asked for it again about twenty minutes later, and again I was happy to oblige: I like to mess with the words, sometimes interpolating bits of the Black Velvet Band's version (especially the bit about Oscar Wilde), and enjoyed the opportunity.

"God Bless' The Child" into "Angel Of Harlem" looks unlikely on paper, but it worked really well—played them in the same key, fingerplucked swingin' it lightly into the last chord of the former, and with that Cma7 still ringing grab the plectrum and start a-stomping my foot: gone from cool to hot inside of ten seconds.

"Ring Of Fire" killed. It always does, through sheer force—I play in an open G, with a heavy strum, and it's a big, big, BIG sound.

Details of second set tomorrow. Stay close.