September 30th was my birthday so I decided to celebrate by releasing my first fiction novel Achilles in Heels and going on a bit of an adventure to find whatever remains of Alice’s Restaurant. It’s that time of year after all.
It was a two hour drive into the Berkshires at the height of the fall foliage season and I must admit just the colors alone made me super happy to be on this journey. My intention was to find the restaurant and church mentioned in the song Alice’s Restaurant heard below:
However while I was down there I might as well go for a little hike. My travel companion had found photos of a trail that looked gorgeous and seemed to end in a observation tower that looked out over the mountains from Stockbrdge’s highest point. Perfect.
And so we headed to Laura’s Tower. It was a trail at the end of a sweet little residential street that had a sign reading, “residents only.” After two hours of driving I wasn’t about to listen to it (sorry) and parked the car in the little parking lot at the head of the trail where there were other non-resident vehicles. At the beginning there was a sign describing the trails which neither one of us read until afterwards, much to the chagrin of our bodies…
I’d read reviews of this trail before coming out and one woman claimed to have brought her three year old which had an easy time of it. I’m currently sporting a quarantine bod and am pathetically out of shape but I figured if a three year old could do it I’d be OK.
And so we crossed this adorable little stone bridge and found ourselves on the most whimsical trail I’d ever seen. It was bordered by these windy fences and walked alongside the Housatonic river. Beautiful. Quaint. But we walked the whole loop in a matter of minutes and there was nothing in the shape of an observation tower anywhere to be seen. Hmmmm. I enjoyed this little jaunt but I was feeling a bit unsatisfied. This was indeed a scenic little walk but maybe a bit anticlimactic without the tower. There was a second path branching off this one at the very beginning that went over the train tracks just over the bridge. We decided to poke at it and hope that’s where the tower was.
Now I have to admit the day before we went to Sherri’s Castle again, somehow wound off the trail there, and I ended up in the indignant position of sliding on my butt down a deer path because wet leaves, a steep hill, and Converse sneakers are a terrible mix. I was hoping this wasn’t going to end the same way.
Still, we trekked into the woods, and began up this path which at first was a slow but steady incline. Even so it was becoming straining. About halfway up we stopped and took a rest on a rocky outcropping. We’d neglected to eat lunch before this and we were both hungry, tired, and unsure if we wanted to go on but according to my trail app we were already halfway up. I didn’t know if I could handle that much more hiking but we tried anyway.
This is when the path went from pleasant little incline to an absolutely punishing upward grapple that weaved in every direction like a mountain road with no ending in sight. Two thirds of the way up I thought I was going to die. My legs were not having anymore of this. I gasped and panted in a most unflattering way. I was taking breaks every 250 feet or so. My heart was trying to leap out of my chest. My resolve was dissolving. I seriously considered just accepting I was defeated and going back down but two thirds of the way up is almost there and after driving two hours to get here I was unlikely to come back. I’d always blame myself for being too much of a wuss to make it to the top. My travel companion was fairing a little better than me but not by much and felt the same.
So we took a lot of breaks. By now my legs had gone from sore to outright painful with every step. Sharp stabbing pains. I knew if I could keep going the endorphins would kick in and I’d eventually go numb. So I pushed forward, leaning on trees at every break, watching the people who took the trail at the same time as us make it to the top and then pass us on the way down. Embarrassing. They did claim it wasn’t far though and that it was worth it!
I braced myself on a tree to puke at one point and came very close to losing the precious little water I just swallowed. Puking is my body’s answer to every problem. Luckily it was really just around the corner that time and I made it to the observation tower. Our reward for taking this punishing hike came in the form of a steep terrifying stairway to the sky. Uuuuuuughhhh.
I took a breather as my travel companion braved the stairs. When he got to the top all I heard was, “Shit!”
I frowned and yelled upwards, “What?!” thinking he’d dropped something to the bottom or some other terrible thing was happening.
“It was worth it!” He yelled back.
Oh OK, I’ll take my sorry ass and see what’s up there. I grabbed ahold of the hand rails and slowly made my way up trying not to look anywhere because I’m not great with heights.
And when I got to the top – WOW. Brilliantly colored trees were in all directions. This was a bird’s eye view of Autumn and it was spectacular. I took a few snaps, made a few off handed comments on FaceBook and Twitter, and then we made our way back down which was actually even more terrifying than going up!
Of course the trail back was all going down hill so was way easier and we were back at the beginning just as the forest was going dark for the night. Perfect timing. Now to find that restaurant… only it apparently doesn’t exist anymore, even under a new name, and the church? It was somewhere beyond a closed bridge and my brain was too melted to want to figure that one out so someday I will have to come back…
It was still an awesome birthday. And it can be even better if anyone buys my book Achilles in Heels, wink wink, nod nod. (I’ll stop mentioning it after this, I promise. I am just so excited for it!)
In the meanwhile I’m sorry this entry is lacking in photos. My phone has been throwing temper tantrums about storage space and I accidentally deleted all the photos I took which were not backed up in trash in any way. So all I have are a handful I posted to FaceBook the day of and my travel companion’s snaps. All below.
As we were out looking for shoes my travel companion got all wide-eyed and excited by a sign reading “used books.”
“Can we go into the used book store??”
“Uhhh… I guess…” I didn’t really see what was so exciting about this even though I have frequented many used book stores in my day.
“All we have is Borders back home! Do you have any idea how long it’s been since I’ve been in a used book store?!”
“OK, OK, I’m pulling over!” I mean how many people could possibly be frequenting a place like this? It should be relatively safe in this era of epidemics.
It was just a little place with three parking spaces in a tiny terrifying parking lot (which you had to back out into a busy street to get out of.) I was paying more attention to this than anything else as we walked through the doors. Inside we found not the promised books on the sign but instead a little record shop. Oooooh, this could be dangerous. I had left most of my record collection behind during a bad break up four years ago and had always wanted to build it back up again.
As my companion wandered off to look at a few shelves of used books I got wide-eyed myself staring at one particular label – Phil Ochs – which seemed to have a bunch of records under it. Now, just to let you know, I have been looking everywhere for Phil Ochs vinyls since I got my record player some 10+ years ago. I’d been in shops in New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Maine. I’d sifted through hundreds of milk crates at yard sales, flea markets, and antique venues and had always come home empty handed. And here, in this quiet little practically hidden shop there had to be ten or so records, all different, from Phil Ochs. That was almost his whole discography for his intensely short life. I almost laid an egg. This was 1960’s folk heaven.
And it got better. They had a section for New Riders of the Purple Sage and had an album with Henry and Panama Red on it which I always found hilarious. Jefferson Airplane had a winner with all-too-relevant Volunteers, a replacement to one of the albums I left that I dearly loved, and then something unexpected. As I walked out to the back room there were sections for less well loved record genres but intensely interesting none-the-less even a whole section on international music. I’d never seen records from South America and other exotic locales. I wish I knew something about them but I just didn’t. And then there was a huge section devoted to comedy.
Should I? I already had an armful. But there could be some old George Carlin records in there… I started to sift through it, throwing Cosby aside with the proper amount of disdain. He was goddamn everywhere here but then I started finding gems. There was an old Carlin record. There was also a cache of Tom Lehrer records! I’d been listening to Tom Lehrer in the car on the way here! They had to go home with me. And then I found the most delightful random thing. It was a record by Lord Buckley. Who is Lord Buckley, you may ask, and well… he was a nudist and Beatnik in the 1950’s who had one of those waxed mustaches that made him look like he just got back from tying a woman to the train tracks. Totally bizarre human being and here was a record of his telling the story of Jesus in so much vibrant Beatnik slang as to make it nearly incomprehensible. It may not be everyone’s thing but I HAD TO HAVE THIS. I mean when would I ever see this again?!
And I wasn’t the only one finding treasures. Across the room my travel companion had a number of books and CDs including George Carlin for the car. Because you can’t beat George Carlin. And after we cashed out (with me parting with a painful $64) we realized there was a whole upstairs we hadn’t seen! So we headed up there. There were a lot more books up there and another room filled with dollar records. Helloooo Barry Manilow! We left before getting ourselves in further trouble but I shall be back! What a great find this store was!
For funsies here’s some YouTube clips of my finds. First up is Phil Ochs with the closest thing he ever had to a hit. A scathing ragtime commentary of the political climate sung with chilling sarcasm.
Next up New Riders of the Purple Sage also singing with cheeky sarcasm about driving certain illegal goods across the border.
And to continue with the spirit of protest is Volunteers – a powerful rock number from Jefferson Airplane.
And onto an older sort of humor that’s no less still quite political. Tom Lehrer’s My Home town always amused me because nothing’s changed…
And of course the weirdest thing you will probably ever listen to – a rambling recollection of Jesus’ story wheezed out in colorful Beatnik slang by Lord Buckley…
What did I learn from this collection of audio? Only that I am more political than I let on and comedy really is the other side of tragedy. I laugh so I don’t cry.
I was really excited to go to the mushroom festival today. It’s a two day event way up in the White Mountains that is gaining popularity. I found out about it through a FaceBook ad and decided I needed to go wherever my people are. Who are my people? Weird people. People who would find mushrooms far more interesting than flowers. People who would appreciate my favorite punderful T-shirt that reads, “Amateur mycologist with questionable morels” which I had no choice but to wear today.
Unfortunately I don’t live in the area so I missed the Early Bird Mushroom Walk which sounded like fun. However I did manage to get my sorry carcass up there in plenty of time to enjoy some other events and I had a great drive up listening to local artist Holly Brewer’s new album Medicine of Time Travel. As usual it was absolutely beautiful and put me into a spacey sort of mindset – perfect mushroom festival mood music.
When I drove in I was greeted by a young woman who tried to tell me where the parking was in the most alarming way possible, “HEY! So the parking is over there… see that row of cars out in the field? Like there’s tons of parking… but also a lot a holes! But we marked them with red flags so you don’t ruin your car!” Another woman in full steampunk regalia cantered up, “Why are you giving her a full song and dance?! Just go out and park! And avoid the holes!” I immediately regretted taking the Prius. It stands only two inches off the ground and is known for getting stuck in fields. But we did OK! The holes were very well marked!
And then I checked in. The festival is free but for a $10 donation I could get a cute mushroomy lapel pin or $15 I could get a glass and fill it with lemonade. I already have an odd fascination with pins so I figured why not.. and trotted off with something shiny.
I was happily surprised by everything here. The weather was GORGEOUS, there was a food truck and even a bar outside. Bathrooms were in a nearby restaurant. And unlike most of these weird little fairs and festivals I go to there was quite a few vendors and a delightful mix of things being sold – lots of jewelry, grow your own mushroom kits, some amazing sculpted art, incense and hippie things, some clothes, fresh honey, mushroom tea, and even a woman selling Fiore artisan vinegars and olive oils – three of which were mushroom varieties. She let me try them with a little bread. I asked her what her favorite was – she said lemon so I tried that first and I must say it was nice, bouncy, and fresh. Very lemony. But Obviously I was here for mushrooms so when in Rome… I requested the White Truffle because I have never eaten truffles and was curious to know what the fuss was about and HOLY SHIITAKE that was some AMAZING oil! I think I made a face because she gave a bit of a laugh. It was very strong but not at all unpleasant. I’m notoriously stingy when it comes to these things but I forked over $21 for a little bottle without a second thought. AND I WILL DEVOUR IT.
All the vendors here were super sweet and chatted pleasantly with me. They all seemed to be doing well. I learned this was the fifth such festival and it started with only four vendors that first year. It had grown so much that the farthest visitor to come by was from Washington DC! And I thought I drove the farthest! ha!
After this I stopped by the end of a cooking demonstration and was able to try mushroom “bacon bits.” Apparently if you marinate dry mushrooms in something you like, something bacony, you end up with these somewhat crunchy little chunks of flavor. I mean I wouldn’t mistake it for bacon buuuut it was closer than I thought a mushrooms could get and sure as hell beats the slimey canned mushrooms I was used to seeing on pizza – you know those rubbery gray bits that have the texture of a drool sopped dog toy? They were the reason I thought I didn’t like mushrooms all these years!!
Sculptures by Chakra Fairy
But hey, I had an hour to kill before the thing I came for so I decided to get a bite to eat. Today they were serving Black Truffle Bisque, Chicken of the Woods soup, and something else mushroomy I forgot. Seeing as I am really good at finding Chicken of the Woods that got my curiosity first but then the idea of bisque took my imagination… It was $8 a cup and yet another totally worth it thing. I sat at a picnic table in the sun and just enjoyed the day, eating this lovely earthy combination of flavors.
Eventually the mushroom dying demonstration started and that’s what I wanted to see… Here another young woman had an assortment of yarn and wool all dyed with mushrooms she found locally in the woods. She was displaying tie dye silk scarves in yellow, orange, green, and wine. I bought a little silk scarf for $15 so I could try dying one. WELL! This poor woman was having a day. Her entire set up with hot water and several heated dyes went flying over and drained on the ground at the beginning of the demo. And water has to be hot for dyes to take… So she went into the restaurant and hauled out some hot tap water and tried to heat it up further on her burner as quickly as she could. Four of us had scarves and a fistful of rubber bands to make it tie dyed. Two women wanted the wine color, I chose yellow as the orange had dumped on the ground, and the last girl went for the green. Well… it takes 30-45 minutes for the scarves to set and this poor woman did not have nearly enough material to keep us occupied that long and all of us had already visited the vendors and the food station so there was a half an hour awkward wait…
Scarves dying
I wandered off to check out their little information station. I flipped through their binders they had there and got to learn quite a bit about what mushrooms are around and what they’re used for. I guess those Chicken of the Woods were good for Cancer and Type 2 Diabetes in some studies. Interesting! And it went on to tell me about how mushrooms often have symbiotic relationships with trees, that they are some of the largest and oldest organisms on land, and that some of them even glow like jelly fish! Also there were recipes, most of which were to be expected, but three others made me really scratch my head: Chocolate and Toasted Shiitake Scones, Pear and Toasted Shiitake Jam, Blueberry and Black Trumpet Crisp.
Display table of local wild mushrooms.
So after learning all this and talking to more vendors I decided to check back in on the scarves. They weren’t doing too good… Mine, the yellow, was very very faint since the water didn’t start off hot enough and I had only been away 25 or 30 minutes… She actually wrapped up some dried mushrooms and alum to go home with me so I could try it again. And when I do I shall post pix! The women who chose the darkest color seemed to have made out pretty well though…
I had a wonderful day. So many strange and charming people – all super friendly. I’m glad I pushed myself to do it. Granted I was burping up soup for hours and had Black Trumpet flavored heart burn the entire way home. What can I expect with no gall bladder…. And of course my GPS thought it’d be hilarious to make me go on a pointless detour around the police station with a bag of dried mushrooms in my lap… Thank God I wasn’t pulled over. That would have been hard to explain… “No! They’re to die a scarf! I SWEAR!”
All and all I would definitely go again. This was 100% worth making my entire digestive system cry.
One of the things I have not been able to explore as much as I have wanted to is the local music scene – both what’s up in Boston as well as all the weird and unusual things going on in Vermont. Problem is I don’t like going to these shindigs alone (for reasons of safety) and none of my local friends are uh… as enthusiastic as I am about avant guard music. Soooo…. when I learned that a band I actually really adore out of Boston was showing up in Fitchburg for an open-air gig in the park I couldn’t say no.
If I’m honest it’d been a tough week for me but that made me all the more determined to get out there and enjoy this. Problem is there was pretty much no information anywhere. All I could find is it started at 4PM and tickets were $10 online (with no link to buy them) and $15 at the gates. Oooookaaaay. Right from the get-go I thought 4PM sounded weird as fuck for such a thing but whatever… I can still roll with it.
And I showed up at 4PM to a pretty empty park. In fact it was so empty that I wondered if I had the right park! Turns out I had accidentally bumbled into it from a rear entrance. And it was soooo Fitchburgy. To one side a plaque read about how this park was here because the river was soooo beautiful that it was determined it must be a park. And indeed there was some pretty impressive masonry holding up a flag whoosing over… a VERY overgrown and completely unkempt riverbank. Even hiking into the middle of nowhere I hadn’t seen a thicket of weeds so ferociously thick. I took a photo – and then was asked by a man if I was a volunteer. No? He told me to check in and pointed frantically towards the other side of the park. I shrugged and did as I was told.
Approaching the ticketmaster I asked what was up today, pretending to play dumb for a moment. She told me it was a Steampunk Festival and that there were vendors, food trucks, beer from a local brewery, and live music but they wouldn’t be starting for an hour. I knew 4PM had to be wrong! She didn’t even have tickets or anything so I bid her adieu and wandered the streets like a common urchin for a while. Until I got tired, found a bench, and just sat people watching. Problem is there seemed to be just as many people watching me, including a shuttle bus driver who kept passing and giving me the dirty eyeball. WHY? Is it the orange hair? It’s the orange hair.. or perhaps my general ne’er-do-well appearance. Two parked cop cars were also watching me sit idly by myself. I promise I wasn’t dealing. Seriously. Just minding my own!
Does this look like a face you’d trust? At least I had an excuse to wear the granny glasses again…
Eventually 5PM rolled around so I got off my duff and wandered back to the park, said hello again to the ticket master, and gave her exact change because she didn’t have a change box yet. I did however learn that this whole event was an attempt to raise money to buy the park a permanent stage. There’d been a folk festival the month before (which I wish I knew about) and next month they’re holding Fiesta Latina (Saturday 9/14/19 from 5-9) I could feel good about supporting such a cause. Music and art are a wonderful way to vitalize a community.
I wandered around looking at the vendors for as long as I could muster, said a happy hello to them, but really… there was one guy signing people up for a raffle, the beer guy, and two craft vendors. The food trucks were still amiss. I felt bad for the two crafters, this was the saddest turn out for such a thing I had ever seen. Obviously this meant I needed to shower one with praise for her art (which was actually nice, mind you!) and stop to get a Henna tattoo from the other. I’d always liked the idea of letting someone doodle on my skin… I mean this isn’t quite as involved as checking “volunteer sorry carcass to be full body painted” off my bucket list but it was close enough. Did you know Henna smells really weird? It smells like a head shop. I wasn’t real fond of it and kept smelling myself the rest of the day. SIGH. I did however listen intently to the care instructions – should last 24 hours before starting to fleck off leaving a stain. Don’t bash it against things. That last instruction may have been too much for me – someone who has consistently failed at being refined and dainty since birth. And yes, I saw the exasperated look the artist gave me as I then wandered off and sat on the ground in what I can only guess was the least feminine manner possible. Shockingly I did not smudge it in the grass! I did however pick it all off later that night because it was driving me nuts. Can’t win them all. TO NEW EXPERIENCES!
Honestly it looked better as a stain.
By now I wasn’t the only one in the audience but I was pretty damn close. A row of local older hippies sat in camping chairs up near the front. Damn! I had two of those in my car if only I had the audacity to lug them through Fitchburg and into the park. Nope, nevermind. I’m nutty enough a scene without a damn chair. I plopped my ass down a little behind them and off to the side.
AND SO THE SHOW BEGAN! First up was The Dirge Carolers. To me they had a typical steam punk sound mixed with a lot of murder ballad type lyrics. I relaxed. Gallows humor will always be a hit to me. By now some people were filing in and out and I was starting to enjoy the people watching. There were a lot of costumes, corsets, top hats, bustles, goggles, that sort of thing, and flashes of unnaturally colored hair abounded. I was home here. However this was not the feeling everyone got as I witnessed one old black dude just wandering aimlessly, staring wide-eyed at everyone with an unmistakable impression on his face, “Uh-oh, the crazy white people have taken over the park again.” He wasn’t wrong.
I was sitting directly in the sun which was glaring in my eyes bad. I couldn’t see a damn thing but I knew the stage was probably populated by oddly adorned individuals – how? Well by the amount of amateur photographers who seemed to be floating around taking snaps with great glee – captive bizarre human subjects!! I’ll admit, I had thought about doing the same but I didn’t bring my camera, just my phone. One particular photographer was college aged, seemed to think a lot about each capture. She kept circling me, taking photos of everything around me. And then she worked up the nerve to take a photo of me, just me. There was NO WAY she could hide this so I just looked up from my reclined position on the grass and smiled broadly. Sorry. Better luck next time getting a natural shot of me. She seemed embarrassed. I just laughed and nodded.
As the band continued to play the most Fitchburg-y thing happened. A train rumbled through right behind the stage completely blocking out all music for a good three minutes or so as it dragged car after car after car behind it. I thought it was a terrific piece of ambiance for a steampunk festival! The band played on like they were on the goddamn Titanic. That’s dedication there. They eventually left off with some song from a B-rated horror movie they wrote it for, sullenly leaving the stage with this odd lamentation, “Sorry, no Zombie Llama today.” Though I’d never heard of this band I suddenly wanted to hear Zombie Llama.
The first intermission was fun. The park was still pretty quiet. There were people around but it seemed like they were just here for the food truck (ouch.) I considered getting up and buying myself a nice shwarma but I’d been struggling with bad nausea all week and wasn’t really hungry. Maybe in a bit. In the meantime I was being kept well entertained by a human blockhead running around with a long nail and power drill – an act I have seen many times before but this one was way more fun because the audience he was playing to – those nice old hippie ladies- were WELL GROSSED OUT, turning their heads in abject horror and audibly gagging. Sorry bud, it’s just not your day. He wandered off a smidge sullen.
Once everyone settled back down with their assorted dinners the second band went up to bat. They were the Busted Jug Band a strange assortment of heavily costumed, utterly bizarre, peoples carrying rubber chickens. And some instruments…. which were very… DIY… They also introduced every one of the members, not by name, but by aggressively odd nicknames which I am not entirely certain weren’t made up on the spot. My favorite was Root Boy which just… brings up SO MANY QUESTIONS. Like what kind of root? And whhhy? Do you aspire to be a turnip? Because you’re giving me a root vegetable vibe. Even better one of the other band members was wearing translucent angel wings… which during the last intermission freaked me the hell out because all I could see through a halo of sun glare was a top-hatted silhouette and angel wings. For a second I thought I might have died. No such luck.
But anyway, the music from this band was… different for sure! And perhaps a bit familiar? I think I may have seen them before… This had a much more silly feel to it. No one up there was taking their life even the tiniest bit seriously. And of course that intense whimsy was all the more adorable to me. I was pretty happy on my little patch of grass though my knees and back weren’t so much. I contemplated lying on the ground and staring at the sky for a while. I could always tell people walking by I was on acid and watching the pretty clouds (there were no clouds) as I knew in this crowd that’d be a perfectly acceptable thing to say… I held it together.
By the time the second band finished up I was just really loving the vibe of everyone here. The old hippies were randomly getting up, wandering, and dancing, and hugging each other – I’m not going to lie, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were on acid. They were warm and lovely bunch. Most of the lookee-loos had wandered off but more and more steam-punky looking people were showing up and I’ll be damned if that old black dude didn’t pull up a chair behind me with his daughter and her friends. Shout out to all the cool dads out there who don’t get their kids hobbies at all but still support them! I can’t tell you how much I respect that. His daughter and her friends were in the maybe 12-14 age range. She was sporting a dark purple mohawk and was giving me some strong Aspie vibes but I couldn’t be happier with that. Be your weird self. She stuttered to me that she liked my hair. I told her I liked hers too and then she blurted out, “But it BURNS!” What? “Bleaching it! It burns so bad!” Ooooh, I don’t think you’re supposed to keep it in that long… “TWO HOURS! AND I CAN’T HAVE MY NAILS DONE EITHER!” Why? She held up her nails, two well done fake nails still remaining with all the others hacked the hell off. I grok that. I held up my own in solidarity and laughed. She asked if I liked music. I said all kinds and asked what she liked listening to. She listed a bunch of 90’s bands and I suddenly felt really old. I felt only somewhat better when I recognized the one modern band she did mention – Panic at the Disco – but if I am brutally honest I only have heard the name in passing. I haven’t the foggiest idea what they sing.
Meanwhile as this intermission dragged on the human block head came out with fire. Ah, fire eating. How dual purpose. But he wasn’t having a great time with it. No one here seemed impressed, the kids were vocally not entertained, and eventually when he couldn’t get his last trick to go right he gave this exasperated expression and wandered off, leaving the stage to a chick who worked at the local eatery across the street. Her fire came attached to hula hoops and she wasn’t fucking around. I was actually quite impressed! We’d see her intermittently for the rest of the night doing different acts – all with various things in flames. It was probably at this time one of the girls wandered off and cornered the blockhead/fire eater and somehow elicited his entire life story from him. I got to hear all about it a few minutes later and had to struggle really hard not to laugh. I’m not eavesdropping, no siree.
The last band up was the one I came for: Walter Sickert and the Army of Broken Toys. They were having some issues setting up with unwanted feedback loops and were taking awhile. I had already seen them perform two or three times before – never thought I’d see them again. That last time I went they didn’t come on stage until the establishment was nearly closed. The pamphlet said they were unpredictable and I had heard rumors that they were hard to work with because of these issues but even with all that they have to be one of the best experiences of my life. They really truly believe that art, love, and music can cure all the world’s ills and their audience is so vibrant, creative, and accepting that in each of those instances I got the hugest contact high just from all the warm fuzzies in the air. That’s what I came for! That and the music. This band… raw fucking talent. And this was obvious when they finally got to singing and the whole audience which had been fidgety and complaining behind me just went, “WOW!” And the grumpy old dad? “I guess this WAS worth waiting for them to set up!”
It had started with sweet sad violin music, not a note out of place, that lulled the audience before walloping them over the head with strong passionate vocals and more traditional instruments. Absolutely amazing. And some of the band members had young children whose birthday it was so they all got up on the stage and danced in a cloud of bubbles as a few songs were dedicated to them. That was certainly different than the body positive burlesque dancers and drag kings I was used to surrounding this act but it was so…. sweet. And seemed so right, all at the same time. Maybe with time everyone grows up – but the smartest among us clutch tightly to the passion and whimsy that brought us this far. I was overjoyed to get one short video of the madness, one of my favorite songs – a cover of I am Sam Hall (Best. Version. Ever.) which I will post below. As the music came to an end I slinked silently back into the night where I found comfort in the darkness and drove quietly home, a smile on my face.
So I admit I didn’t get out much this winter but I still have been busy figuring out what to do with spring once it gets here. I have scheduled myself to visit more ruins, castles, haunted places, light houses, quirky one-of-a-kind mom and pop shops, perhaps a few farms, as well as more nature trails and museums. Who knows, I might even indulge in another passion – food! And to add to the excitement I am expanding to my repertoire of photos and writing with my very first video! I am hoping future videos will include interviews with more interesting local personalities, or at least with more subject matter than just me blathering on! ENJOY!
If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider donating to my limited gas money fund so I can continue going on and sharing my adventures with you!
Tonight was a bit weird. I know, I haven’t been up to much to post on this blog. Truth be told I’m broke and busy with other things in life (but not unhappy!) Even so I still needed to get out… so I was more than happy to be a seat filler at the local theater when someone else couldn’t attend a show. What show was I seeing? I had no idea and didn’t bother looking it up. I felt it was more fun this way… ended up at the theater an hour early only to find we had an extra ticket after we got there. So I called the only person I knew in Keene… who turned me down… before looking on the streets to see if there was any soul out there looking like they needed a Pay It Forward moment. Alas, everyone was in couples or groups, no single stragglers about. A missed opportunity.
As it turns out I had shown up to see Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox. If you’ve never heard of them don’t feel bad, I was just as lost. I flipped through the theater’s brochure awing at the dinosaur puppets that are apparently coming to town and daydreaming about another gig coming up – Arlo Guthrie. SIGH.
For the past few days I have been blaring obscenely happy music. Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, the Squirrel Nut Zippers, and random selections of old favorites like Ducks on the Wall by the Kinks. You know – obnoxiously off-the-wall deliriously joyful or just blatantly bizarre songs. Maybe I was doing this in an unconscious effort to prepare myself for tonight.
Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox is apparently a swing (?) band that has a number of singers performing modern songs to the backdrop of… the 1920’s! Yep, can’t say I was expecting that… but you know how I have a soft spot in my heart for anything so totally random.
The thing is I haven’t paid any attention to modern music since about five years before my birth. I will always be a die hard Summer of Love hippie when it comes right down to it. Being such I never listened to modern music as it was coming off the radio, at least not intentionally. Only in the past year have I gotten around to listening to and enjoying a few random tidbits from the 90’s. Suffice to say because of this quirk I didn’t recognize almost any of their renditions. I could figure out the first – Call Me Maybe and the last, All About the Bass only because I hear them at the grocery store when I am shopping. One of the middle songs was Creep, probably the only song I actually knew… and it was sung by a brassy bluesy woman who belted it out in a most unusual fashion. Did it still creep me out? A little less. I must admit.
The ensemble was wildly enthusiastic, accompanied by an assortment of unlikely instruments, (though not enough brass, if I am to offer the smallest of critiques.) The singers were quite good at hitting those sultry depression-era chords and there was even an ecstatic tap dancer doing the Charleston through much of it. This left the entire theater in a positively vibrant glow of joyful energy… and I think I saw Dick Tracy!! He was dressed in a full on zoot suit, feathered hat to match, shuffling about with a cane in the front row. I think he was about 180 years old but absolutely darling. How long was that stunning outfit in his closet?! Was he waiting for this music to come back around?! BLESS. Just fucking bless! I love people like that. Seeing them just be themselves gives me faith in humanity… and since we’re talking about some guy who was clearly pimped out to the max I feel it’s appropriate to mention what I learned tonight from my dictionary. Jukebox originated from a bastardization of Juke House – apparently what a certain French tainted dialect of the deep south called a brothel at the time. And now you know!
Anyway, had a great time. The theater is also currently playing Loving Vincent so don’t miss it if you haven’t already gone! Peace, love, and music, everyone! I’m leaving a video here, though is not the singer who serenaded us tonight, I figured it didn’t matter that much. Enjoy it anyway!
If you are enjoying Catching Marbles please consider adding a dollar or two to my limited gas money fund so I may continue going on adventures and sharing them with you! Thank you!
For the past few days I have been blaring obscenely happy music. Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, the Squirrel Nut Zippers, and random selections of old favorites like Ducks on the Wall by the Kinks. You know – obnoxiously off-the-wall deliriously joyful or just blatantly bizarre songs. Maybe I was doing this in an unconscious effort to prepare myself for tonight.