"Just Like Every Night Has Its Dawn" - The Before And The After Of Lowell

When I look into this face, I can see the boy Alan is describing in his most recent journal entry - clearly and distinctly, with no need for illusions. Some realities are written well enough to require no editing. I really like that boy. Alongside the boy, I can see the man who wrote the self-revelatory description. I really like that man too.

In my pre, and early teen years, Uncle Ronnie’s band was the coolest thing in my world.  By the time I was fifteen, I had basically memorized the entire bands repertoire on as many instruments as I could.  All designed to be ready when the call came.   Shortly after my fifteenth birth day, one of the guitar players in the band, could not make the Sunday Matinee after the band had played a rollicking Friday and Saturday night at the San Juan in Cape Broyle, a few towns down the shore from Petty Harbour.  Uncle Ron called Dad, I suppose, and got the OK to ask me to sit in on rhythm guitar for the 2-6pm afternoon set.  When Dad past me the phone I nearly fainted with excitement, but tried to sound seasoned and cool about the fill in gig.  I tried to sound as if I were doing Uncle Ron and the band a favour by getting them out this jam.  Anything for a fellow professional musician.  I suspect that I was not very convincing and my true desperation and enthusiasm very plain for all to see as I jumped at the chance to play the gig.

We drove down the shore in a beat up station wagon.  In the band van with the band.  Oh yeah. The club was a beaten up nightclub halfway up a long hill on the way out of Cape Broyle.  The club would have been packed for the two previous nights, but the Sunday Matinees were long out of style.  Everybody knew it except the club owner, I guess.   We played for about an hour to six people and one German Sheppard.  I may as well have been at Madison Square Gardens.  I played every song like it was my last.  After the gig, Uncle Ron gave me $50, same as the other guys got for the gig.  That was the first time I had ever been paid to play music.  I’ll never forget it. - Alan's August 9 journal entry

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It's a beautiful day here in St. John's, so beautiful that I think I'm going to find it hard to fly out of here this evening. As much as I'm looking forward to the jaunt across the Pond, maybe I should have planned things differently so that I'd have more than one fleeting day here before heading out again. But then, if I had done it that  way, I would have missed the show at Lowell, as well as missed all that took place before and after that show. And that simply would not do, not at all. Thus I will content myself with being able to spend most of September here when we get back, and I will remain deeply grateful for not having missed Lowell.

Because the show at Boarding House Park was so good - one of those near-perfect combinations of a cool venue, an enthusiastic-but-mostly-non-assholish crowd, and a band who comes out both cheerful and focused - I could go on and on right now all about that good show, about what I saw as a progression from a rough start in Ridgefield to the determination of Hyannis and then to this pure delight of a show in Lowell. I could also go on for at least a bit about differences between how GBS did their Spring Tour shows and what's been on the go so far for the Summer Tour; I've been thinking about that one quite a bit over these past few shows. That's a Big Topic, but even a Small Topic would be of great interest for the writing about: the differences in the way Alan sang just one song - in this case, Boston - on two consecutive nights (Hyannis and Lowell) are fascinating; I could certainly go on for quite some time about how and why I found Alan's Insistently Demanding Boston of Lowell more moving and compelling than was his Sweetly Pleading Boston of Hyannis, though the conclusion of loving them both in their own ways is probably a foregone and predictable one, coming from me.

Lots and lots I could write about, and if I had unlimited time today, maybe I would, not to mention plenty of pictures too go along with it all, especially since this might be the last entry here for a bit of time, depending on how things go in the hotel rooms in Newcastle and Inverness; if those wi-fi connections turn out to be sketchy, then there won't be much happening here till the several days' stay in London for the Borderline show - that hotel I trust to have a working connection. But for today, I wanted to put something up - both words and pictures - that was an equally clear indication of my own current frame of mind. For all of the brevity of this recent Northeastern U.S. run (and my going to just three of those five shows), it wound up being quite the illuminating experience, which is a fancy-schmancy way of saying a much-needed lesson or two somehow wound up finding a pathway through my own thick skull.

I've headed out the door - headed out of many doors - on trips before, but this is one of those times for going to a place for the very first time. So I thought I'd be consistent with the theme of doing something new and, instead of my usual writing about/putting up pictures from a Great Big Sea show, in particular about and from this most excellent Lowell GBS show, I'm going to focus on what went on before the show in the soundcheck (photos and videos) and a bit of what went on after the show at the pub (no photos, but likely lots of words).

Fairness in forewarning: While there's at least a bit to see or hear about all of the band members (except Sean, who was at neither soundcheck nor pub - his having, I suspect, far better ways to spend his GBS-free moments in Lowell - although he did do a great job during the show itself, of which there will be ample evidence some weeks hence when I finally do actually write about this show and put up those pictures...though, come to think of it, there will be at least one brief Glimpse of McCann here, although not of Sean), including a truly cool video bit of Bob playing a lovely tune, still, this is going to be very much about Alan. I began with that photo and quote from his journal for good reason, the same good reason which can be found at the heart of all the rest that follows here.

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First up is soundcheck for the Lowell show. As a general rule, I love soundchecks, especially GBS soundchecks, and whenever there's even the slightest hope of being able to see or hear one, I try always to be wherever and whenever soundcheck is taking place. You never know what you might hear being sung or played at a GBS soundcheck - the list heard so far is a fascinating one, but too long for the amount of time I've got right now - and even more captivating is that what does get sung or played is done without all of the Pressure To Be Great Big Sea Guys being put on the band members, either by fans or self-inflicted.

Who they are and how they act on a soundcheck stage is often even more endearing than it is illuminating; I have discovered over the years that I really like who they are in soundcheck, the pissy soundchecks as well as the cheery ones. I especially like who Alan is in soundchecks: I love the sudden shifts from dry wit to goofy sweetness to earnest seriousness, restless motion all too often underscored by peristent weariness and stubborn determination. Who Alan is in soundcheck makes who he is on the GBS performance stage seem like a bare glimpse of depths and riches that can only be dimly perceived in the stagelights' glare and the fans' avid gaze, "through a glass darkly" to be sure. Maybe most interesting is that it wasn't until I saw Alan performing with Russell Crowe that the man I've seen on the stage before the GBS show began to stick around till the end of those Australian evenings, one of the many reasons why I loved those shows so much. 

More often than not, most of what's new or different that gets played in GBS soundchecks happens between Alan, Kris, and Murray, but sometimes Bob gets into the act too, as he did on this day at Boarding House Park. Very rarely does Sean join in on the soundchecks that are accessible to the public, but he has been known to make some pretty darn amazing contributions on occasion.

In spite of the deficit of any McCann of the Seannish variety, the Lowell soundcheck was a delight. HIghlights included a bouzouki duet by Alan and Brit, the aforementioned fiddle tune from Bob, some Police tunes to rock out to, Kris flashing his sticks on Wipeout, even a full run-through of Shines Right Through Me Without Sean. Nearest and dearest to my own heart was the brief verse Alan sang of Poison's classic tune, Every Rose Has Its Thorn. A very good tune, as Alan said, and an even better moment, even if Alan did stumble a bit over one line of that verse. Or perhaps because he did.

I don't often take photos or make videos of soundcheck, the theory being that it usually pisses at least some of them off when they find themselves in the kinds of venues where audience members are permitted to see and hear their pre-show efforts to get things set up right. I do make exceptions, though, and when  Alan walked out onto that Lowell stage wearing his glasses, that alone qualified as time for just such an exception (although those Made Especially For Alan Doyle jeans sure sealed the deal). I've said for a long time now that Alan's one of those people who look right in their glasses, people whose glasses somehow seem to reveal more of the truth of who they are than to obscure that truth.  Alan coming out in his glasses was perfect timing for how I'd already been thinking about that clear and true desciption of himself he had just crafted in his most recent journal entry; it was a bit like a tangible manifestation of an intangible truth.  And, never the least of it, he looked spectacular.

All through this sound check, I kept on thinking about that journal entry, looking for and finding both the writer and that writer's subject - the man and the boy - on a small stage in a park in Lowell, Massachusetts. Lowell was inarguably a great show, but I think I very well may have left my heart at soundcheck. And then again, perhaps at the pub, but that comes after.

Video Clips From Lowell Soundcheck (These are all fairly small clips and snippets, all in the .MOV format you need Quicktime to play):

Sweet Soundcheck Riffs, Lowell 07     (19 MB)    

Alan & Brit Do A Bouzouki Duet, Lowell 07     (25 MB)

Kris Wipesout With Alan & Murray, Lowell 07     (46 MB)

Alan, Murray, and Kris Do The Police 1 (Roxanne), Lowell 07     (48 MB)

Alan, Murray, and Kris Play Police 2 (Message In A Bottle)     (57 MB)

Alan Shines Right Through, Lowell 07     (103 MB)

Bob Fiddles About, Soundcheck, Lowell 2007     (100 MB)

And the one I like best of all:

Alan Does Every Rose Has Its Thorn     (24 MB)

A few closeup views of the Writer, the Rock Star, the once and future Lion King, the sweet and sometimes piercing man within whom that bonnet-standing eager young boy still resides.

 

Full views, mostly of Alan still, but with a few of Murray and Kris as well, of Brit too, along with a lone "Hallett/McCann" shot, of sorts.

Alan and Brit get a duelling duet on the go.

This was taken the second time the trolley ran right behind the stage while Alan was there. The first time it happened, there was not quite as much composure as can be seen this time.

I love the look of concentration in this one.

A bit of the Police as this trio plays Roxanne.

An example of an Aesthetically Self-evident Shot.

I knew if I did not take at least one picture of Bob, Anne would hunt me down and exact retribution. Imagine my surprise when he began to play his fiddle and I actually got a nice little video of him too.

All through this sound check, Alan's journal entry remained on my mind as I watched the expressions come and go... looking for and finding both the writer and that writer's subject - the man and the boy - each present and accounted for on that small stage. Every now and then, a piece of writing comes along with enough of the impact of Truth to make a lasting impression on me, and this has been one of those times. It's not something that happens all that often - this feeling of being almost blindsided by something I read or hear that demands a response of Yes, this is something true.

One of the last times this happened - at a club in Sydney, Australia, while listening to the opening act for one of the final Russell Crowe/The Ordinary Fear Of God shows of what had been a long tour - was during a song performed by a Canadian artist I was seeing for the first time, Serena Ryder. Her song hit me with that same staggering power of hearing something that is founded upon Truth, so much so that I went over to ask her between sets if she'd recorded it yet; standing on a stairway in a little club halfway around the world while Russell Crowe and his entourage swept past us up the stairs, all the while trying to achieve an encore encounter with Truth...an odd and unforgettable moment in many ways. In one of life's continuing ironies, by the time we got to the pub after the show in Lowell, this same song would be on my mind once again over here on this side of the world.

I don't usually upload recorded tunes for sharing, but this has been an entry of exceptions, so I'll do it this one time, but I'll add that the CD this song comes from is well worth the acquiring. The song that had hit me with sledgehammer force on a hot January night in Sydney a few years back was not recorded at that time, but it can now be heard on this latest CD, along with a number of other very good tunes.

Weak In The Knees   from If Your Memory Serves You Well, Serena Ryder  (4 Mb)

And with that, it's time to talk about the pub.

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Something else I've almost never done is talk very much about whatever I've seen go on at pubs after GBS shows. Exceptions once again, just this once.

I used to enjoy the Post-GBS-Show Pub Experience. Even on those occasions when no one from the band showed up at a particular pub, there were almost always interesting people to meet and talk to. When band members did show up, things invariably got even more interesting.  On those latter occasions, I have always taken great pleasure in watching how Alan handles the typically endless line of people who come up to him, his Show After The Show, as it were. There have been times when it has been a performance equally as splendid as the one which preceded it. Even from the opposite side of a room, it is possible to read the messages sent out by body language and facial expression, both usually stark and apparent in those coming up to him but far more subtly tantalising in the object of their attention. Watching Alan's flicker of expression change as he is in turn irritated, flattered, amused, bored, touched, or pissed off by those attentions - seeing how deftly he can extricate himself from the situation that had grown untenable and how summarily he can end the encounter that had gone past its acceptable limits - was always utterly fascinating.

It never stopped being fascinating. But other things happened during those times that were much less fascinating - disturbing, unpleasant, perturbing, sometimes simply painful things accumulated to the point where I began to avoid the Post-GBS-Show Pub Experience with increasing diligence, skipping the outing altogether or going someplace unlikely for show people to be at, sometimes going to the usual place - no way I am ever going to feel like Kells in my own town is off limits - but slipping out early, before the night's Games get underway.

I made an exception (continuing with that theme) in Lowell. A friend I was travelling with had made two new out-of-town friends who wanted to go out after, and both of us had re-connected with local friend we hadn't seen in a few years. Off to the pub it was, even though it seemed a likely enough pub to wind up as the centre of post-show festivities.

Sure enough. After we'd been there for awhile having a very good time - and I am guessing after the venue security finally got rid of the people who were waiting demandingly outside of their tour bus - Alan and Murray sauntered into the pub.

What I have grown accustomed to, part of what has kept me wanting to avoid this kind of thing altogether, is the eager, greedy feeling that often overwhelms so many people in such a circumstance, the reaction that I can't help but think of as a predator scenting prey.  I know there's a certain amount of cyncism and being jaded in feeling that way, but cyncism and being jaded come from having seen it be that way far too many times. I expect even decent people to behave badly when the band members are around; the people who come into fandom already being jerks and assholes I expect to behave abominably.

What I have forgotten about in all of this is that there are still sweet people who can be grateful and gracious and generous. My first clue that there were at least some of those folks at the pub on this night was the round of spontaneous applause that rang out when Alan and Murray walked inside, and maybe even more significant was the distinct lack of any instant surge toward them.

For the next 45 minutes or so, I watched a rather sweet procession coming steadily up to them, mostly young men and few couples, conversations short and friendly more than grasping and greedy. Most of all, I watched Alan's face as the people comprising his informal receiving line came up to him each in their turns. I watched his face those same subtle flickers of emotion, the dancing eyebrows, that little twitch of his lips that so clearly says "Fool" to anyone with eyes to see it, an occasional flash in his eyes and even a genuine laugh or two. As time passed and pints were emptied, Alan's face became more sharply defined and distinctly expressive - exactly the opposite of nearly every other person I have known who drinks - reminding me of how the receding tide reveals all of the jagged-edged rocks that have been directing the currents unseen when the tide was high. 

It has been a very long time; I had forgotten just how fascinating the Show After The Show truly is, right along with forgetting about the people who do not behave badly, at least not on this one night.

Now comes the part I have been debating about writing, the part I probably would have decided not to write if I were not going away on a long trip in a few hours and not coming back for weeks. There is something about venturing out - particularly about venturing out to a place that is brand new and waiting to be discovered - that increases the temptation toward honesty. Adventure seems to require the casting aside of unnecessary baggage. And I have been affected by the Truths told by others.

Again, for the first time in a long time, I wanted to go over and talk to Alan in that pub. But I hesitated, held back by a laundry list of reasons that feel as ridiculous by the light of a St. John's sun as they seemed daunting in that small Massachusetts pub. There is something I have been wanting to ask Alan to do for a long time now, and now that I have finally figured out the most persuasive way possible to ask in the hopes of getting "Yes" as his answer, I should have simply gone over and asked him.  I should have gone over and told him how beautifully he wrote his last journal entry, But I hesitated, tangled up in worry about how the other people at my table might decide to follow along and do God knows what, reluctant to interfere with what looked like a blessedly innocent and harmless procession of non-predatory well-wishers, and struggling with a feeling of trepidation about how something as simple as a hello might be twisted by others who are themselves twisted.

And, out of the blue, I was back in Sydney, at a little night club, listening to a small woman with a big voice belt out a song. Truth from halfway around the world, finding its way back home again.

I took a deep breath and decided to trust my instincts and follow my heart. I looked up...and saw Alan engaged in conversation with a person who reeks of predatory intent. Not an act I wanted to follow. Very soon after that encounter ended, Alan and Murray left the pub.

For a moment or two, I felt a a pang of sadness, like something precious had slipped through my fingers. And then I thought again of a wonderfully well-written line about playing every song like it was your last...each and every time you play that song, over and over, again and again, as long you have the strength and the desire and the love of playing. I thought about standing even when your knees are wobbly, about letting them say what they want, and about how every night has its dawn. With that last thought, I was back to laughing again and looking forward to having a bit more sense next time and next chance, especially since I didn't have any trouble at all recalling how the lyrics to that Good Song went.