Between The Rock And A Hard Place: Newfoundland, Great Big Sea, Alan Doyle, And Even Russell Crowe

"To Keep The Good Times Rolling" - Turning A Trick Into A Treat For Burlington

Still feeling somewhat uncharacteristically succinct and willing to let the music do the lion's share of my speaking for me. What I would most love to be able to put up here on Halloween is a video of Sean's unforgettable and hilarious  "Heinous Halloween song" from Halloween 2002 during the Sea Of No Cares Tour, the moral of which was "Don't go stabbing babies in the head". That was Peterborough, as I recall - second of two shows there. Even more memorable than Sean's song that Halloween was Alan's undisguised ambivalence toward Missus decked out in her Prom Queen costume, one of the earliest times when the Boy could be so clearly seen in the Man. And found dear.

Alas, no video of either unforgettable and revealing moment. What I do have, though, is a YouTube version of a video that wound up being too huge for most people to download (much bitching being the result of that problem), the two-song encore performance of Great Big Sea and Oysterband at the latter's Hugh's Room show in Toronto last April. I've felt bad for a long time about this video's large size (if you download it, it's a staggering 390 MB) putting it out of the reach of some who wanted to see it, a bit like I'd played a trick on them, and this is the best night of the year to turn a trick into a sweet treat.

When I'm Up/Bright Morning Star, Great Big Sea & Oysterband, Hugh's Room, Toronto, April 2008

Although my own eyes inevitably linger on the dearest one of all, there are quite a few Boys-In-The-Men to be seen in this one, especially in how excited they all look to be up on the stage together. They had some fun that night in Toronto. As I recall, they had some fun that night in Peterborough too. I can't think of much better to hope for them tonight in Burlington than more of the same.

"Many A Truest Word" - For Raleigh And New Jersey (& St. John's)

Sometimes, you just have to let great words speak their truths uninterrupted. Not my words - the words of the best of songwriters. Therefore, with as little preamble as possible, I'll go straight to the YouTube links, first to catch up with the video link for last night's Raleigh show:

Company Of Fools, Great Big Sea (w. Sex Cymbal Sean), Festival d'ete, Quebec City, July 2008

And then, directly inspired by the comments conversation on the preceding entry about desire and love and need and the question of what makes it all worth it, three videos from the 2006 ECMA Songwriters' Circle that say all that need be said in answer. Three videos for tonight...for South Orange, New Jersey, and for St. John's, Newfoundland.

Walk On The Moon, Alan Doyle (solo), ECMA Songwriters' Circle, Charlottetown PEI, February 2006

Raewyn, Alan Doyle (solo), ECMA Songwriters' Circle, Charlottetown PEI, February 2006

Ordinary Day, Alan Doyle (solo), ECMA Songwriters' Circle, Charlottetown PEI, February 2006

Every reason why.

"Knee-Deep In Shite" - Men Who Deserve Better

No video to go along with this one because no way to I want to sully any of their music by attaching it to this particular piece of ugly truth. I'll do one for Raleigh along with NJ later on. 

As a general rule, I try to keep a grip on my contempt for some of the most unappealing of those people who call themselves GBS fans, and lately especially I've tried not to go into too much detail about the incidents that cause that contempt to exist in the first place. Not out of any kind-hearted concern for the contemptible ones, but because it's not exactly the best PR for the band to be too public about some of the worst of the dregs of what they unfortunately attract.  But every now and then something comes along and it occurs to me that there are a few people who read here who might benefit from knowing just what kind of repellent assholes these men at times are stuck with, as well as explaining just why it is that contempt exists among some in the first place.

I'm in St. John's at present for medical reasons, nothing life- or longterm-health-threatening, but not something particularly pleasant either. Just one of those kind of things most everybody has to deal with at some point in their lives. But not many people in my circumstance also have to deal with the ugliness of those dregs who call themselves GBS fans spreading the idiotic lie that I am here because of legal charges in some GBS-related court case.  This is what a good portion - maybe better to call it a "bad portion" - of the most stupid and vicious (add "psychotic" in a few cases) among GBS's fans, a number of whom can be counted among the customary Front Row Denizens (you know who you are, and so do they), are really like beneath the Happy-Happy false face; this is how they act. This is why I, among others, have a deep and abiding contempt for a particular kind of fan, a type nowhere near as rare as they should be.

This particular lie isn't really anything new, simply a recent variant on what's repetitive in its stupidity and boring in its viciousness, though as always revealing in terms of those who choose to believe what they need to believe is true, perhaps most revealing of all to the people who know best just how much of a lie it truly is. Still old hat, though, a definite lack of any attempt at creative truth-twisting. But what finally made me decide to go ahead and deal with this one publicly is the email exchange I just had with one of the True Need-To-Believers, the one who said that she knows for sure I have to be lying about getting medical care here in St. John's because, "Nobody would ever go to Newfoundland to see a doctor, that's like going to the 3rd world."   

And there you have it...the wisdom and the insight, as well as the fundamental scorn for Newfoundland, of the far-too-common dreg of a GBS fan.  Bad PR indeed. This is what they have to deal with, the kind of ignorant hyena they have to see grinning avidly up at them, at every show in every town, for years and years on end. This is their world, neither brave nor new, the one that has such people in it.

And that is such a fucking shame because they deserve so much better.  I hope anyone and everyone who is not among the Company of Contemptible Assholes does all they can to be better and to give better to them.

As for myself, I think this would be a perfect evening for a careful totter down the hill to the Duke. A perfect evening for climbing out of this big stinking pile of shite. A perfect evening too for the counting of blessings, blessings of place and most of all blessings of people, some present and some in such far-off locales as Raleigh.

Wishes for a good show tonight, It's been awhile since that's happened in Raleigh and they are definitely overdue. I'll put up a Company of Fools video for Raleigh (the Sex Cymbal Sean one would work well) later on tonight, post-Duke. By then, the stench will surely have dissipated enough. I'll leave a window open when I go out, just to make sure.

"To Make Our Spirits Bright" - For Atlanta

Sliding in hasty and a bit breathless trying to get this finished semi-respectably pre-showtime, but then, I rather enjoy 'hasty and a bit breathless'. Speaking of semi-respectability.

The Variety Theatre in Atlanta is located in a wonderfully odd area - LIttle 5 Points, I believe it's called - where you can find just about anything (or anyone) you choose. Last time I was there, I watched a "God Hates Fags" anti-abortion demonstation get relentlessly heckled and then be interrupted by a semi-nude bagpiper, drank a deadly Hurricane in a biker bar while discussing Nietschze, politely turned down a friendly New Zealander's offer of even-friendlier companionship for the evening, sampled a local herbal offering, and then ate a not-so-surprisingly excellent slice of sweet-potato pizza for supper. After all that, I saw a very good Great Big Sea show, unintentionally accompanied by two Irish fellows whose accents were so thick when they got drunk that they sounded like they were speaking Martian, completely and hopelessly untelligible to everyone present, which wreaked havoc when they got their credit card jammed in the lobby ATM machine.  Variety Theatre shows are a rare treat indeed.

That was my second time seeing GBS at the Variety; the first time was my first time in Atlanta as well. That first time was during the chaos and wonder of the Uprooted shows (aka Uprotted...I still type it that way the first time, every time, and then have to "correct" it), just a few short months after the Sea Of No Cares CD came out. I intentionally skipped the Variety show last time around (reluctant concession to Middle Ground); this time the skipping it's totally and regretfully unintentional (not stopping me from claiming my Middle Ground again, regardless). Even with as eventful as GBS Variety Show #2 wound up being, it's still all of that chaos and wonder of #1 I recall first every time I think of the Variety. And I always smile, this time included.

Those shows were long before it occurred to me to video, but there are two songs I tend to think of most when I recall that show, the first being the title song of what was then a just-released CD. They didn't perform it this way back then, wouldn't begin performing it this way for another few years, but putting up a St. John's version of Sea Of No Cares in an entry about the Atlanta show while gazing out the window across the Narrows and wishing to be right there in Atlanta tonight makes a kind of semi-logical (goes well with semi-respectable) sense:

Sea Of No Cares (living-room version), Great Big Sea, Arts & Culture Centre, St. John's, Fall 2006

And this video is in honour of the single best moment of that Variety show, the moment when Darrell finally forgot his lyric during Excursion, and Alan celebrated with glee - sweet, hilarious, revealing, even a bit prophetic in hindsight. And so much fun. I don't think there's ever been a time Alan's since sung Excursion when I didn't remember that moment. And I always smile, this time included. Most of my Excursion videos are vertical - which means sideways on silly YouTube - but here's a good one from a place even farther away than Atlanta, the Tonder Festival in Denmark. It's always a blast listening to accents in such places when folks sing along...you can hear the Danish/German accents in this one, and I can still recall the Gawwwgia Deep South drawls singing along at the Variety show, good memories both, particularly good memories on a foggy night in St. John's.

Excursion, Great Big Sea, Tonder Festival, Denmark, Summer 2007

I hope the Variety is as much fun for them tonight as it has always been before.
.

ETA: I see the SoNC video is taking an awfully long time to process...if it turns out it won't YouTube properly (every now and then, some videos do not, for reasons I don't quite understand), I'll put up a different video instead. Later, though. If I wait any longer to put this up, I will definitely be shouting out too late, and it is so much more fun to shout out soon. And then to get busy on shouting-out again.

"And You Smash The Looking-Glass To Smithereens" - Image & Actuality: Alan's Journal Entry, Thoughts (& Videos) For A Day Off

Barely sneaking this one in on the "Day Off" - and only getting away with that by cheating and going by "blog time" instead of what time it really is here. YouTube was slooooooowwwww.

Normally TV Ads make celebrities seem larger than life and perfect, not more flawed.  I’m sure every hair care commercial has doctored the images to make the models look better, not worse.   I find it believable that Tiger Woods drives a Buick and I’ve seen him using Nike Golf balls, but I just can’t picture one of the supermodels noted slathering Proactiv on their perfect cheeks. 

Don’t get me wrong; I don’t blame them for taking the check if indeed they don’t use the stuff.  I’d certainly do the same.  I just find it interesting that the campaign relies on the viewer accepting that these women have had skin issues. - Alan Doyle,  October 26 journal entry

Negative image or positive image, it's all part and parcel of the product being packaged and sold, isn't it? The celebrity is merely the tabula rasa upon whose surface the advertising campaign is crafted. Photoshop the pimples in, Photoshop the pimples out; it all depends on what's being sold to whom and what needs to be seen to close the deal. Reality didn't get an invite to the photo shoot. But Reality always tags along, regardless, lurking beneath the nifty special effects and behind the cool camera angles, sometimes better and sometimes worse than Fantasy chooses to see it.

I really like this journal entry; I like it because it's honest. In it, Alan does a superb job of depicting the collision between Fantasy and Reality that is an inevitable, inescapable part of Life On The Road.  There's the fancy-schmancy tour bus, filled with its requisite Rock Stars...who are listening to the Cooking Channel drone on all afternoon, punctuated by the repetitive dubiety of those celebrity commercials. Pondering issues of image and actuality, show attendance seen through the lens of economic concerns, a jog past neatly-kept homes and well-manicured parks, scoping out an amphitheatre offering up a potential future stage. Hopes for that evening's crowd, anticipation of a day of rest, cautious optimism about the week to come. The stuff that LIfe - as well as Dreams - is made of.  The Reality of a Day In The Life, sometimes better and sometimes worse than Fantasy chooses to see it. I know some come to GBS looking more for Fantasy (or Escape or Respite or Happy Fix or Me Time or whatever the terminology of individual choice) than for Reality, and that's certainly their choice to make, but it's not what draws me. Frustrating or challenging, banal or sublime...I choose Real Life.

Same goes for choosing Real Alan. I really like him too, each and every precious glimpse he lets shine through, all that is better and all that is worse than Fantasy chooses to see it. Sometimes those revealing and endearing glimpses take place on stage too, perhaps most of all when he steps outside of his customary Great Big Sea Guy spotlight. As much as I love Alan's Rock Star image - and I do love it so very much - his Sweet Man actuality is the greatest treasure of all. A few videos that show a glimpse of that Sweet Man - not surprisingly, these are some of my favourites of all the videos - seem a good call for A Day (Off) In The Life of that man, for the Morning After that day off too.

Eager and excited; humble, but not letting that get it the way of being (quite understandably) proud:

No Kathleen, Alan Doyle & Ron Hynes, Artists' Emergency Fund Concert, Arts & Culture Centre, St., John's, November 2006

Sonny's Dream, Alan Doyle and Ron Hynes, Artists'  Emergency Fund Concert, Arts & Culture Centre, St. John's, November 2006

Utterly impossible not to love:

Berry Picking Time,  Alan Doyle & Tom Doyle, Evening Of Doyles, Masonic Hall, St. John's, Newfoundland, Spring 2006

And debuting one of the best (and one of the most Real) songs ever written by a Master Songsmith:

Young Triffie's Been Made Away With, Alan Doyle, Evening Of Doyles, Masonic Hall, St. John's, Newfoundland, Spring 2006     Unavoidably sideways but still irresistibly charming on YouTube - if you want to see it upright in all of its glory, you have to download it from Megaupload (120 MB)

Absolutely, definitely, not a bit doubt about it:  Real Alan, First Choice  Always.
.

"Far From The Shores" - Charlotte and Truths Of Choice

I remember being very lonely in Charlotte N.C. I missed my family at home and thought how tragic it would be if something bad were to happen and I never got to see them again. I was overwhelmed. I realized how the first immigrants to Newfoundland must have felt centuries ago, never knowing if they would ever get to say goodbye. "England" is my family. - Sean McCann, Fortune's Favour track notes

This is one of my favourite versions of all the times I've seen GBS do England thus far: It took place at the Gander 50th Anniversary show and Sean had just looked out into the crowd and dedicated the song to his wife, who was present, before beginning to sing to a crowd comprised of thousands of Newfoundlanders.

England (YouTube version), Great Big Sea, Gander, Newfoundland, August 2008

It doesn't surprise me at all that Sean found himself missing his family so badly while in Charlotte. I like the city, especially like some of the locals I have met there, most of all the wonderful locals-of-colour I have been lucky enough to encounter in what is still a fundamentally racially divided city. It can be a lovely city too, particularly in the right season. I remember one very long bus ride down to Charlotte from somewhere in either the Northeast US or Canada in early March, a ride during which I slept soundly as my bus traversed hundreds of miles and drove straight out of bleak and chilly Winter directly into gloriously beautiful Spring. 

I've stayed some tweaky places in Charlotte and had a good time in each of them - once the only guest who was not part of a contingent of truck-driving-school students (who all had a penchant for skinny-dipping in the motel pool) and once as the sole guest-of-non-colour at a motel where that statistic earned me my 15 minutes of local wonder. Charlotte is where a grandmotherly cafe owner once pulled me over to a table, sat me down, and proceeded to feed me a free meal of fried chicken, cornbread, dressing and sweet-potato pie because, as she said, I was too scrawny to be carrying such big bags and eating like a sick bird.

I've seen some good Great Big Sea shows in Charlotte too, again, maybe best of all in terms of the crowds who showed up there. The Neighbourhood Theatre shows were a blast, and that gorgeous church they played in last time was filled with more of the same kind of enthusiastic people. I met more nice (and delightfully odd) folks when they played with the Push Stars in that strange little club somewhere on the other side of town.

Still, with all that truly has been good in Charlotte, I have no trouble at all understanding why loneliness could be overwhelming there, surely not the only place such loneliness might happen, but still likely enough for it to happen there. Many "regular" stops along the GBS Tour Road have their own cast of characters who claim the local stage and their own customary ambience that rules the day (and the evening), all of that working to impact the men who linger briefly within that influence, to impact their shows as well. It's not all that difficult to see how this could be one of those stops that might wind up feeling very far from the shores.

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Every now and then, someone says something that stops me dead in my tracks, struck silent and still by the truth in their words, even sometimes when perhaps the other person doesn't quite fully realise just how much truth is in those words. It happened to me not very long ago after a show; I was being my usual pesky intrusive nuisance self and trying to warn someone I really like about someone I really dislike, someone I believe is a ruthless predator out to use and abuse the person I really like. Person I Really Like responded with a smile and a shrug, and this comment: "It doesn't matter. I'll be back at home soon and none of this will mean anything."

I have a theory about Truth. I believe we can persuade ourselves that all kinds of lies are True without too much effort, but once we hear something that is genuinely True, we (most of us, at least), recognise that Truth for what it is. We may or may not like it or want to embrace it or rush to attack it or feel a need to deny it, but we do recognise it. I recognised the Truth of what Person I Really Like was saying. And now I can't get that Truth out of my thoughts.

I can understand feeling that way, understand it better now than I ever thought I could. Understand it better than I ever wanted to. I can accept why it is a person gets to feeling that way, and I can agree that it is an excellent coping strategy for dealing with an endless stream of people who are out to do exactly what I was trying to warn Person I Really Like about.  Accepting that point of view as your Truth Of Choice makes a certain kind of logical sense, given this set of circumstances. If it doesn't mean anything, it can't ever hurt you or damage you, right?

But understanding is not necessarily agreeing. And every now and then, even logical sense is overrated, or at least that logical sense comes with too high of a price tag for the protection it purchases. Life is short and desperately sweet...far too short and much too desperately sweet to waste any more of it on "meaningless" than is absolutely necessary. Denying the reality of the monsters might offer some protection from hurt and damage, but it causes its own hurt and damage in turn because that denial renders the angels equally unreal.  No pain, no joy...no risk, no love. None of this will mean anything.

No, understanding is not necessarily agreeing.  Then again, we all know how much value I put on logical sense.

And with that, one video seems most appropriate, the heart of the matter and the matter of the heart, of this one heart. This one from Gander too, and with what has been the very most impressive curtain drop thus far.

Love Me Tonight, Great Big Sea, Gander, Newfoundland, August 2008

To each his or her own Truth Of Choice.

"Far Away To A Foreign Land" - For Great Big Sea, In Baltimore

Baltimore

Beat-up little seagull
On a marble stair
Tryin’ to find the ocean
Lookin’ everywhere

Hard times in the city
In a hard town by the sea
Ain’t nowhere to run to
There ain’t nothin’ here for free

Hooker on the corner
Waitin’ for a train
Drunk lyin’ on the sidewalk
Sleepin’ in the rain

And they hide their faces
And they hide their eyes
’cause the city’s dyin’
And they don’t know why

Oh, baltimore
Man, it’s hard just to live
Oh, baltimore
Man, it’s hard just to live, just to live

Get my sister sandy
And my little brother ray
Buy a big old wagon
Gonna haul us all away

Livin’ in the country
Where the mountain’s high
Never comin’ back here
’til the day I die

Oh, baltimore
Man, it’s hard just to live
Oh, baltimore
Man, it’s hard just to live, just to live - Randy Newman

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As best as I can recall, I've never seen GBS in Baltimore, not in the city proper, that is. I've seen them play in nearby Towson and I've seen them play in a-bit-less-nearby Annapolis - at the Naval Academy, as a matter of fact, a thoroughly unsettling show with Cowboy Mouth and Hootie and the Blowfish that was a harbinger of a whole lot of hellishness yet to come on the upcoming joint GBS/CM tour - but I don't remember ever having seen them do or be done by Baltimore.

My chief memory of Baltimore is a bit more personal, perhaps somewhat unfair to the city itself too, or at least unfair to what Baltimore is in the Here and Now as compared to what is was in the There and Then of the latter '90s. We very nearly moved to Baltimore about ten years ago, part of a job-promotion offer that was almost too good to turn down...almost. We talked it through, went on the scouting-it-out trip, pondered all the options. We were just about ready to take the plunge and start packing. Trouble is, every single time I tried to face actually making the move, Randy Newman's song kept playing peristently, hauntingly, in my mind.

Turn it down, we did. Again, perhaps unfair to the city, but we decided that we'd just be going back to everything we did not miss about LA  - its own version of a "hard town by the sea," with no shortage of those beat-up little seagulls (the image that always gets to me the most in that song) - without getting back what we did still miss.

So I chose to remain in Seattle, most of the time. Where one fine Spring day (which means it was raining, of course, that being the proper definition of a "fine Spring day" in Seattle) a few years later I came across a show on a Canadian television station that had recently been added by my local cable company...and there he was, the most impressive songwriter I'd ever heard, just about the best guitar-pounder as well, certainly the most gorgeous, singing songs that were completely familiar and completely new - singing songs that were completely true. Sometimes you never know what rare and priceless treasure is right there for the discovering, right there in your own living room, right there in your own gentle town kind of/sort of by the sea.  

Here and now finds me in yet another town by the sea, called by some the City of Legends, but I tend to think of it more as the City Of Take-It-Or-Leave-It Truth, hard and gentle by both circumstance and choice...unyielding precipice and icy concrete, caressing breeze and friendly laughter. The place where even a beat-up little seagull can fly with grace above the sun-kissed rocks and the storm-tossed waves.

I don't have any Baltimore-specific videos to put up on YouTube, but it did seem high time to show a bit of Bob strutting his own considerable stuff, so I put up his Good Girls Don't encore from the recent Gander 50th Anniversary show. Be sure to notice that cute smile on his face at the start...it makes him look about 17.  Best part of all are those "Whoo!"s of his. You can tell a whole lot about the measure a man from the vigour with which he "Whoo!"s.

Good Girls Don't. Bob Hallett/Great Big Sea, Gander's 50th Anniversary Show, Cobbs Pond Rotary Park, Gander, Newfoundland, August 2008

The video is a little frenetic on the part of the would-be videographer; my apologies, sometimes it's very hard not to get carried away by all the excitement.

And because of the passion and delight that continue to abide for that rare and priceless treasure so serendipitously discovered in a town far, far away from the here and now, I'll add on a very sweet Rant & Roar video, this of the closing song to what was a spectacular performance in a stubborn little town quite some distance from the sea:

Rant & Roar, Great Big Sea, Gander's 50th Anniversary Show, Cobbs Pond Rotary Park, Gander, Newfoundland, August 2008

Wishing them the best of all possible shows tonight in Baltimore.

"Tell Me What You Want..." - For Alan, In Boston

Out of all the videos I have of Boston & St. John's, this one - made while Alan was serving as the Host of the 2006 Junos Songwriters' Circle - seems the best one to offer up in honour of Great Big Sea's return-engagement at the Orpheum tonight:

Boston & St. John's, Alan Doyle (solo from the Host/Lubricant), Junos Songwriters' Circle, Rebecca Cohn Audiorium, Halifax, April 2006 (YouTube version)

Alan was absolutely wonderful on that day, in all of the ways only he can be absolutely wonderful, as I am sure he will be again on this day. I hope they all have a grand show at the Orpheum and a great Friday in a city they love nearly as much as it loves them.

Just to play catch-up with myself (and to be fair to myself, a mind-stunning drug or two over the past day or so has been adding to my usual tendency toward disorganisation - I am definitely a "goes down fast and comes up slow" sort of gal), here are the other YouTubes I've gotten up in response to this tour leg:

You're Beautful, Part One, (really and truly video this time, albeit sideways video), Sean McCann (solo), Aladdin Theatre, Portland OR, October 2008

You're Beautiful, Part Two (still really and truly video)

I'd wanted to put Sean's Portland solo up as a fitting close to the prior tour leg, but after that admirably honest and deeply moving entry he just posted in his blog, it seems a proper opener to this tour leg as well.

Finally, so far, this unmitigated delight is in honour of the whole crazy, wild ride from St. John's to Toronto to Rochester to Boston to Keene:

Straight To Hell, Great Big Sea, Gander's 50th Anniversary Show, Cobbs Pond Rotary Park, Gander, Newfoundland, August 2008

I'm still planning on doing the Portland show photos next, along with seeing if a fitting video is YouTube-able for each of these next shows to come as this tour leg pogresses, all of which is going to go way more efficiently with a head that's just a wee bit clearer.

"Walk A Little Further" - Sean's Tale

From Tosh (Tells No) Tails, Oct.23

 

Revelation

“the hardest part of life......”

My entire life has been a spectator sport. While I have been physically present for the storyboard of events, I have never been a full participant. Always behind the camera, picking angles and manipulating the light. Never in the frame. So concerned about getting it just right that the real point is lost. So worried I might screw up or get hurt that I    have emotionally detached myself from what I can’t control...... Life...... I feel like I have missed everything.

My last month has been extraordinary. I feel like a bear rising from its wintersleep, hungry and happy to be alive. A fish in a frozen lake who finally feels the warmth of spring. A desert flower reborn in life giving rain. For the first time in many years, I feel like I am really here. And that is as frightening as it is exhilarating.

I don’t know where this is going. Not even sure why I’m writing this down. Perhaps it's because I don’t ever want to forget it. Maybe I just opened myself up for a world of pain. Maybe I won’t even survive this day. At least now I might actually show up for my own demise. That’s only gonna happen once. Be a shame to miss it.

Maybe I should start listening to the songs.

 

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Wow.

"To Live While You're Alive" - Portland Aladdin Theatre Show (Sean Solo Video & Photos) & Western US Tour Leg Thoughts

You're Beautiful, Sean McCann (an Unrepentant Pansy solo), Aladdin Theatre, Portland OR, October 2008 (260 MB)

(With thanks to friends for the video file - sorry, no YouTube version of this, maybe when I get to St. John's)

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After the end of the most-excellent (and sold out to the doors) Portland show, after stopping by the local Kell's for chocolate Guinness cake and a pint, after dropping a local GBS fan off at her home on the far side of the Big River...I fell asleep in the front seat of our minivan and slept all the rest of the way home. Soundly. Perhaps not the most desirable culmination of Date Night, but probably not an unexpected one either. This was a rough tour leg - miles and miles and shows and shows, with scant time for such luxuries as sleep. I'd managed to acquire a pesky flu bug along the road too, really shitty timimg for what I've got awaiting me in St. John's next week. Rest and recuperation were called for, and that's just what I've been doing...mostly sleeping (with periodic caffeine-consumption interludes), and it's felt pretty frigging good, I must say. Even better when each time you wake up, there's a cat snuggled up against your belly - warm fur is a purely sensual delight that carries its own recuperative powers.

But today started out bright and early, with eyes wide open and brain on overdrive, full of restless thoughts about all the stuff I need to get done before I go and all the stuff that's going to be done once I get there. I seem to be awake again, perhaps moderately coherent too. Even the pesky flu bug appears to have been bested by all that healing sleep and warm fur. Sometimes we really do dream to live.

Lots of thoughts about this past tour leg overall, but first a word or two about the last show of the run,the Portland Aladdin Theatre show, followed by as many photos as my patience will permit me to get edited on my struggling old laptop (the brandly new laptop is presently in the shop with a dead DVD/CD drive). Only a few words, with much beauty to follow, and even more beauty to follow after that in subsequent entries since I've decided to do the Portland show photos next: Sometimes you wind up with bad photos from a great show, sometimes good photos from a not-so-great show. Occasionally there's the match-made-in-Hell of sucky photos and sucky show. But every now and then, the photos are nearly good enough to do justice to an excellent show. Definitely Portland next.

I loved the Portland show - no other way to put it, it was absolute and total love. There was no shortage of really good shows on this tour leg - Seattle and Los Angeles were spectacular Rock Shows (with the added delight of Russell at the latter); San Luis Obispo and Tucson and Albuquerque were charming and endearing and, best of all, new-fan-winning; Santa Barbara was stubbornly victorious; Denver was polished and poised - and Portland can take its rightful place among them, right up at the very head of the pack, special and unique and successful in its own right. Portland was confident and assured and filled with satisfaction over having run a difficult course well; Portland crackled with the complementary and contradictory energies of Alan's burning determination to play this last night on stage for all it was worth (and he made it worth so very much) and Sean's giddy joy over his next destination being the best one of all. Bob seemed relieved, as if he were finally able to let down his guard and relax a bit, maybe have some fun on the final night of a tour leg that had been different from any that had gone before it. They all seemed real and genuine and inescapably easy to care about up there on the Aladdin's stage. I loved the Portland show.

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Enough words for now, time for beauty. I have no videos from this show - the Aladdin staff seemed rather serious about their no-video rule, even to the point of getting repeatedly perturbed by how bloody long it takes my camera to focus in low light and then by how much longer I take to decide on a shot...buddy kept thinking I was videoing instead of photographing - but there are lots of pictures, a few of which I've managed to get edited and uploaded.

It wasn't the direct topic of conversation at the moment, but for those who read Body Language, this shouts "I'm Going Home!" loud and clear. All night long, Sean looked like he was dancing even when he was standing still.

Speaking of "You're beautiful, it's true," this is from River Driver. There is something about the way Alan wears clothes that creates a longing for those clothes to be swiftly removed.

Bob and his Blue Balls, looking downright relaxed during Gideon Brown.

During Scolding Wife, Sean decided to become an accordian player and handed off his bodhran to a quite-competent Kris.

From When I'm Up - the kisses and the bruises.

Two from Tunes.

More and more when I see Kris back at the drum kit/laptop station, I think of him as the Great Big Anchor.

Sean said he'd asked Alan for input about what song to sing for his solo, and Alan had said to sing anything other than the one he wound up singing. "I guess this makes me a pansy."

And ending this set of photos with two gorgeous views of the sexiest man, on stage and off. The first is from Dream To Live, the second from Hard Case.

More Portland photos to come later - I am soon going to have all kinds of time on my hands, plenty of free time to edit photos - in order, with set list, etc. For now, back to words for a bit.

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I've been thinking about this past tour leg - actually, I've been thinking about it all the way along the road, at each of the shows and during the long treks in-between; this has been a ground-breaking run for them in several respects - something new in terms of the music and the places and the people, but most of all something new in terms of how they they go about doing what they've done for so many years now. When they first brought Hawksley in to produce Fortune's Favour, they said they wanted to do things differently. They've gotten their wish for Change, in spades...in more ways than they likely imagined at the time.

Some measure of success are objective. There are the "hard" numbers: How many butts in the seats, how many CDs sold, that sort of thing. Then there are all the subjective measures. How do you quantify the measure of success achieved in an awed hush that falls over a crowd of people when Dream To Live soars to its climax, especially when you've been talking to some of those same now-hushed folks pre-show about their trepidation over the "newness" of Fortune's Favour? Is there a reliable way to chart success based on seeing the same people who'd been yelling for Mari Mac or General Taylor get blown away by Gallow's Pole or Ferryland Sealer? Watching the family who'd just told you no GBS show should ever begin with anything other than Donkey Riding as they grin with acquiescent delight in response to Love Me Tonight? Listening to the self-professed diehard folkie singing along by the second chorus of Hard Case? Ceasing to hear anyone at all wishing they'd heard Excursion instead of Straight To Hell?

It's all subjective, this feeling you can get from within a crowd, from within crowd after crowd after crowd, a feeling of when and where the energy is connecting and the response is flowing back up to the stage, synergies born in ephemeral moments. From the vantage point of that subjectivity, I'd say the new music isn't just working...it's kicking ass. That includes the new arrangements - Bad As I Am is getting stronger all the time, Ferryland Sealer is deadly, and they have Gallows Pole nailed. What they're doing now doesn't just sound good and strong...it sounds natural. It sounds like Great Big Sea as they are in the Here and Now, a very good thing because Great Big Sea (Here and Now) is all about power and growth and change. Consistently, the newer material sounds more like Great Big Sea (Here and Now) than does some of their expected-at-most-every-show material.

Again, subjective. I love this new music (the new arrangements of the older tunes too). I see it as the natural progression from Turn to Sea Of No Cares to Something Beautiful and now to Fortune's Favour. Even The Hard & The Easy belongs in that progression because of its willingness to take risks, to do and to be the Unexpected, growth in its own right. Growth, strong and healthy and full of the promise and potential for more of the same yet to come (frankly, what I'm hoping comes next is the marriage of the bold power of FF to the hearfelt sincerity of SB). They're even already growing beyond the CD version of some of the FF tunes: Listen to Dream To Live performed live to see how they've taken a good song and turned it into something truly spectacular. And the addition of the rotating solo spots has a potential that is pretty much umlimited - it can be whatever they choose to make of it; hopes are high that they are going to make it something fresh and alive and truly unforgettable, for themselves as much (or more) as for their audiences.

I'm not saying this past tour leg was all a perfect and untrammelled success. I would have probably said it a few years ago, but I got slapped for that, deservedly so, and have since learned my lesson. There were times this tour leg when it was clear they were not as sure of themselves or their music as they might have been, which usually resulted in a folk-heavy set list. Sometimes that worked - San Luis Obispo is a great example...the right call for a university-series show filled largely with an audience that was going to respond way more to the folk than to the pop-rock. Other times, I questioned the call. Tucson is not a folkie town in general, nor is the Rialto a venue that focuses on that kind of crowd/music. Perhaps there's an even-larger issue of whether some of their customary and expected tunes fit all that well anymore on a set list with the larger, more powerful new tunes and new arrangements, though some of the older tunes - Process Man in particular, River Driver too, along with the equally great choices of Ferryland Sealer and Bad As I Am - seem a perfect fit with the new songs, perhaps because they too are large and impassioned in their own unique ways.

I won't turn the continuing absence of Oh Yeah into a perceived fault, because I'm still not sure if that absence might be because singing with that heart-pounding growl strains Alan's pipes more than is safe during such a demanding schedule. If that's true, then protect those precious pipes at all costs. If that's not the reason for the absence of one of their strongest, most powerful and impressive new songs...then all I'll say is that I would dearly love to hear it and definitely believe it belongs on the set list.

Technically, their sound keeps on getting better all the time, quite the praiseworthy accomplishment since their music is growing ever-more-complicated at the same time. It took a while, but I can hear Bob's harmonica on Here and Now and it sounds very good. Alan's guitar work on Dream To Live is gorgeous, and all of the many things Kris is doing are getting heard for how excellent they are. England is balanced with beauty and precision. Their harmonies sound spectacular. Murray's bass is no longer so loud and pounding that it resequences my DNA. Really good work at the sound board, at a time when that good work is badly needed. I wish I could say the same thing about the lights, but I can't. Still subjective, but to me the players spend half the show looking like they are performing from the inside of a Tequila Sunrise glass. The colours are indeed pretty, but it begins to look silly after several songs go by, more of a distraction than an enhancement. It's overdone and unrelenting to the point where it ceases to look professional, and maybe that doesn't matter all that much at these small-venue shows in the States, but it needs to get better before the big Canadian shows.

The performances have been compelling, all the more impressive considering the fundamental foolishness of a gruelling tour schedule. Eleven shows in twelve nights across the wide expanse of the U.S. West was not a wise plan, regardless of the worthiness of the motivation. I'm willing to wager that's the last time they try to do San Fran the night after Seattle, at least the last time they try to drive it overnight. That they played every show as well as they did in spite of the many miles between each of them, in spite of Alan's being as sick as a dog for a substantial part of the tour leg, and in spite of all the changes Sean (and the rest of them as well) had to be dealing with...it's a testament to such virtues as strength, conviction, and sheer stubborn-headed determination. Or just call it courage, patience, and grit, though I'm not overly persuaded about the "patience" part of that equation. But not a single, solitary quibble from me when it comes to their courage and their grit.

In response to yet more comments I am not going to post here, yes, I read Sean's latest Tail. No, I don't know for sure what to make of it, and, no, I don't believe that just because he chooses to talk publicly about his own life it has to mean that life is fair game for everyone else to discuss publicly. I got called a "hypocrite" for that attitude, but I think perhaps "coward" might be more apt, and without apology. I'd much rather err on the side of caution, especially when that caution is prompted by kindness. What I will say is that when I read his latest blog entry, all I could think of was how happy he looked in Portland to be headed home. To where the love is.

Out of all the outtakes that were posted online from the FF recording-sessions filming, my second favourite (anyone who knows me at all has to know Alan's shirt-ripping is my number-one favourite) is the moment when Bob casually mentions to Hawksley that Banks Of Newfoundland is a "celebratory" song. Hawksley's voice goes up an octave or two as he squeaks in total surprise, "It's celebratory?" Bob gives him that look Newfoundlanders always give to stunned Outsiders. "Well, they survived," Bob explains, shrugging. Somewhere between the Squeak and the Shrug lies the truth of the interaction between Newfoundland and Everywhere Else. Five years ago, three years ago, maybe even two years ago, I would have been squeaking right along with Hawksley. But not today. I might not share Bob's shrug, not quite yet, but I expected it - and I understand it. They Survived. Cause for celebration in and of itself, the first and fundamental and forever foremost measure of Success. Anything above and beyond that is gravy.

They survived. And they did very well. True success and genuine cause for celebration. With a bucket of gravy on the side.

"Meet Me In The Village" - Boise, Egyptian Theatre

Some days start of rough and get better. Some days start off rough and don't get better. Still not quite sure which today is going to be. Rude awakening this morning when I opened a bleary eye and realised either the alarm never went off or I simply shut it off - I had 25 minutes to get out the door and over to the bus station. After a frenzied scramble and mad dash. I made it to the station two minutes before my bus to Portland was due...and three hours later, there we all were, still waiting for it to arrive. Snow along the highway north of Salt Lake City apparently caused big troubles overnight.

Since this bus wasn't scheduled to get into Portland till after 4 pm at its timely (re: fictive) best, a three-hour plus delay was not going to cut it. My date for the sold-out show tonight (and of course I have both of our tickets) - who had already driven down from Seattle to Portland the night before - was still fast asleep and his cell phone battery was stone cold dead. There was no reliable wireless connection in the bus station, no way to even check to see if a flight might be a reasonable alternative. So I called my favourite doctor-turned-travel-agent in St. John's and got rescued via a sluggish Janeway computer connection and last-minute fare sale. Here I sit, back at the Boise airport, waiting for an afternoon flight into Portland. Now my show date might even include a bit of lunch before lineup time. And I am earnestly hoping this marks the start of the "getting better" part of this rough-start day.

From the silver-lined-clouds point of view, at least now I'm able to upload a few videos from last night's show while waiting here at the airport. I tried and tried at the hotel last night, but the signal was too sketchy. Not sure how much I will have time for before flight time, but I'll do all I can because after this, I go back home to Dial-Up Land for a week. Anything I don't get around to doing now will have to wait till I go back to St. John's after the week at home.

But for sure I am going to get last night's brightest highlight uploaded to both Megaupload and YouTube while I can. It was Kris's turn again for the solo spot and he was deadly, turning in a rousing version of Stompin' Tom's Bud The Spud. If you listen to this and then compare the audio track of him singing Dimming of the Day during his first solo turn, you can get a glimpse of some impressive vocal versatility. He played it well and the crowd - I'd think that the majority of them had never heard this song before and I'm not at all sure many even got the PEI/Boise potato connection - clearly loved his performance in and of itself. Really interesting point in his intro, too, about the potential significance of Alan's suggestion of a Potato Song.

Kris seems to have swiftly made the adjustment to coming out from behind the drum kit and taking a place in the spotlight; he was a paragon of poise this time around, so much so that I felt no guilt at all subjecting him to the lens:

Bud The Spud, Kris MacFarlane (solo), Great Big Sea @ the Egyptian Theatre, Boise, October 2008  (205 MB)

YouTube version of Kris's Bud The Spud

Alright, that's what I wanted most of all to be sure to put up here, and what I'll do is edit in the rest as (if) they upload, for as long as I have the time to do so. Oh yes, maybe a word or two about the rest of the Boise show too.

Maybe. Truth be told, I'm not sure what to say about Boise...not if the truth really is going to be told. Kris's song truly was delightful - again, I'm impressed with his vocal versatility and he showed a lot of stage presence this time too - and I did love seeing Alan take a turn at the drum kit during that little bit of Another Saturday Night. I enjoyed the view of Bob managing his Instrument World with a graceful intensity. I got sincere pleasure from the initially innocent enthusiasm of the "dancers" over on the left side of the stage, up to the point where it got twisted into the I'm Getting Noticed! formula by a few too many over there, enough to make me start to think again about those little poodles dancing up on their hind legs for treats, and that's when I usually have to look away to keep a straight face. 

I was distracted enough by the Usual Suspect to completely miss the Sapphic Liplock Floor Show going on over there - though I did notice the effects of that show on the players on stage (and, to be fair, if I had noticed what was going on, I might have oriented my own share of attention that direction too) - but was told about it afterwards, told too how it happens with the same pair at other shows as well. Another successful formula for Getting Noticed, I suppose. It was certainly successful last night. 

With the goal of not really wanting to wind up knee deep in shite in regard to this show, I think I'll try to tread somewhat carefully on the slippery slope and just say that I would assume that most of the people who were on the left side of the theatre, particularly up close, wound up totally delighted with the show they saw. I feel a bit sorry for those over on the right side, especially those for whom this was their only - and/or their first - live GBS show until God knows when, but I am sure many of them also went home thoroughly pleased with the show they saw. At the end of the day...

The only enduring sympathy from me in regard to this show is for Sean. Shout "Speculation!" from the rooftops if you wish, but I'll still be saying he looked like a man whose heart was elsewhere. Wanting to be there for your child on his birthday and not being able to has to suck badly, probably even worse when it's over Thanksgiving too.  Here's hoping for a really great delayed family celebration as soon as he gets back home. I hope being in a town he likes so much really did help a little; Boise's a good place with some of the best folks in the Northwest, and even if it was far too cold to play in the river, a run along the river trails had to give some small solace to a lonely heart. Not as good as being home for a while, but at least that happens sooner rather than later.

For some reason, Megaupload is being slow and pissy and YouTube is being easy and free (so easy and free that it seems to be uploading everything twice), so for now I am just going to edit in whatever type of link I have and try to get it all finished at some future point in time.

I love this song so much that I tend to get swept up into it and forget all about videoing it.

Love Me Tonight, GBS @ the Egyptian Theatre, Boise, October 2008 (240 MB)

YouTube version of Love Me Tonight

I think this is going to be it for now, unless maybe I get something more done after I check in for the flight. There's still the Saturday Night snippet, a gorgeously up-close Penelope, and a McCannish Old Brown's Daughter left to go. But I'm glad there was enough time to get this one up too, at least on YouTube. For a man who left his heart in St. John's, he still sings a beautiful song.

YouTube version of Captain Wedderburn

Just enough time for the snippet. Be sure to notice the multi-instrumentalist fellow back there on the drum kit.

YouTube version of Another Saturday night snippet (Alan on drums)

Time for me to go check in - I am not going to miss this flight. Not only is this date night, it could also be my last GBS show till Kingston (yes, I know, cry me a river...I fully understand any lack of sympathy, but that lack does not mean I won't still wish I could see the next tour leg's shows), and I do not want to miss it. Sean solo tonight, I do believe - always a fascinating proposition. Maybe he will sing a song about Home. I'll see if I can get Penelope and OBD done after check-in.

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I still don't like horizontal videos for close-up views very much, but I've been trying to learn how to do it better as a concession to YouTube. What better place to try to see how close it's possible to get while horizontal than with Alan's every-charming guitar work on Penelope?

YouTube version of Penelope, charmingly up close.

"What Do You Say To Someone When They've Heard You Say It All?" - Alan's Solo, Denver Paramount Show

What you say is that they are wonderful, even more wonderful than you already thought they were. Truth bears repeating.

How Did We Get From Saying I Love You, Alan Doyle (solo, with intro), Great Big Sea @ the Paramount Theatre, Denver, October 2008 (325 MB)

YouTube Version Of How Did We Get From Saying I Love You

I love this song - love it the way GBS did it, love it the way Russell Crowe's TOFOG did it, and love it the way Russell and Alan did it together with the new TOFOG. I love it most of all like this, just Alan and his bouzouki and his heart in his hand. This song alone would have made the ridiculous 16-hour bus ride from Albuquerque to Denver worth every single minute and mile, even if it had not been a part of an overall great show - it would have been worth my while all on its own. Alan was wonderful, and so is his song.  It's a song filled with truth about how love can slip out of our reach sometimes before we even realise it's gone, but from the first time I heard this song, it's also made me think about those times when what is best - what is right and what is true - is to continue on saying "I love you". Truth bears repeating.

More Denver stuff in a little while; I just couldn't wait for all the rest to put this one up. The remaining files are in the upload queue and I'm still thoroughly occupied in arguing with myself about going to see Murray at the Murray in Murray...either that or actually doing what I said I would do. I think I need to sleep on this one. I'll edit in the rest of the links when I wake up.

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I knew when I typed the words "actually doing what I said I would" that the decision had already been made; I just needed a bit of time to accept it. I suppose it really doesn't count much as capitulation or compromise or even as Middle Ground if it's easy to do. Skipping a 3M night (Murray at the Murray in Murray) is definitely the hard instead of the easy, but I'm going to do what I said I would do to a person who matters to me, for absolutely no other reason than that mattering. I'm going to climb onto the leisurely bus to Boise later this morning, probably still bemused by this uncharacteristic notion of obedience and definitely with hope for a great Utah show for them and also that Glenn really does get a chance to video Murray's solo spot.

They've got something very special on the go now with these rotating solo spots - something that could become even more special as time and shows go on and they hit the full stride of their creativity with them, special not only for the pleasure they give their audiences but maybe also something that keeps the shows exciting and fresh for them too - and I sure hope they realise how difficult they're making it for anyone to choose to miss seeing a given night's unique magic. But it seems a much better attitude to be grateful and glad for any and all unique magice that comes our way, and I am still grateful enough and glad enough for last night to keep me content all the way along the slow road to Boise.

And there are distinct advantages to the later, less-hurried departure schedule. For once, I've actually managed to avail myself of the free hotel breakfast instead of having to scurry out before its even set up. I've also had time to upload and YouTube the rest of the videos from the Denver Paramount show.

Bad As I Am, GBS @ the Paramount Theatre, Denver, October 2008 (160 MB)

YouTube version of Bad As I Am

Something Beautiful (special request), GBS @ the Paramount Theatre, Denver, October 2008 (185 MB)

YouTube Version of Something Beautiful

Way too long since I videoed this one.
When I Am King, GBS @ the Paramount Theatre, Denver, October 2008 (160 MB)

YouTube Version of WIAK

Straight To Hell, GBS @ the Paramount Theatre, Denver, October 2008 (225 MB)

YouTube Version of Straight To Hell

Denver Impromptu Song, GBS @ the Paramount Theatre, October 2008 (150 MB)

YouTube Version of Denver Impromptu Song

You're very welcome to the people who've said thanks for the YouTube video versions, though I have to add that I'm still not happy with YouTube's video quality or the necessity of the horizontal format. Because I wanted as many people to see it as possible, I made the concession to YouTube with Alan's solo, which I'd normally have videoed vertically (especially having to make the video while sitting down - vertical is so much easier to hold steady), which allows for a closer view that doesn't chop his body off halfway down. Far too lovely a body not to be showing all of, but I'm still not fond of the horizontal format for solo views. I may get irked enough with YouTube in general to back off from using it altogether, or I might just go back to the vertical/sideways videos for closeup views despite how much some have complained that those are difficult to watch as unflipped YouTube videos and they can't download the right-side-up Megaupload versions.

Time will tell...for now, the primary point of the YouTube-ing has been to try to get the word/view out as much as possible about how great these guys are and how impressive the shows on the Fortunate Tour are - the Come see this magic for yourself! approach. That much YouTube really is good for.

Now I still have enough time before my slow bus departs to take a leisurely stroll around downtown Denver, a bit of an unaccustomed pleasure during which I am going to try very hard not to think about Murray, in any context. I know - I'll think instead about that person who matters enough to manage to wrest some feeble attempt at obedience from me. I'll be the one wandering the 16th Street Mall with the bemused smile across my face.  Ooh, and I could go back to that fresh foods market and get those chocolate peanut butter cups I only barely resisted last night.  There's got to be some reward for frigging obedience.

Very much looking forward to the great town of Boise and to Kris's next solo spot. Hope Murray is great, in all contexts.

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So much for the best-laid plans...turns out the Slow Bus is sold out  and now I've got a big delay before heading out to Boise. High gas prices are making for very crowded buses, though there are still very cheap last-minute flights to be found if you're willing to travel at really shitty times. So what if I don't get into Boise until tomorrow morning? As long as I'm there for the show tomorrow night, it's all good.

Yes, I edited something here - a bit of uncharacteristic self-discipline to go along with the equally uncharacteristic obedience. Not a matter of changing my mnid about the truth of what was here before, only about the need for it to be here. I decided I'd rather just go with that part of the truth which is about being wonderful and loved and creating such great music because it is what really matters. Now out into the snow(!) in Boise.

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One final note to add as I have finally managed to get onto DIA's shitty WiFi: Some really good photos from last night that I hope to put up someday soon. I was especially entranced by that gorgeous red rose Sean stuck on his mic - I have Sean on bodhran with rose, Sean on whistle with rose, Sean emoting a cappella with rose...and they are all quite lovely. The best photo of the night will need explaoining: It happened when Kris came in and swooped up the shot of whiskey someone had put up on stage in front of Sean. That was a Best Moment that goes beyond the limits of any show. I do not have a photo of the look on Sean's face when the shot was put there, not one that exists outside of my memory, that is. I won't be forgetting that anytime soon.

"What Will You Sing Me?" - Coming In First In Albuquerque

Lots of times our first time in a city really sucks. - Alan Doyle

And sometimes that first time is better than anyone could have hoped it might be. You could say those are the times it sucks in the really good way.

Such is the case with Albuquerque, where a suprisingly good-sized crowd (for it being GBS's first time there, and mid-week too) gave them one of the most enthusiastic receptions of the Fortunate Tour so far. What that supportive crowd got given back to them in appreciative return was one heck of a good show.

My travel plans have been topsy-turvy because I keep trying to match shows to solo spots. It's a no-brainer that I'd want to be sure to catch Alan's solo numbers (and his spot was due up last night in Albuquerque), and Sean is always interesting with this sort of thing too - as evidenced by his solo choices thus far - he was equally and pleasurably unpredictable when they did this same solo routine during the Sea Of No Cares Tour. I was pretty sure Bob would do his Portuguese Waltz accordion piece each time his solo number came up - it is very beautiful and I love to see and hear him do it, but I figured I've seen him play it a few times already, so if I am going to try to skip shows and maintain some semblance of obedient complance with the Middle Ground edict, Bob's solo-spot shows would be excellent brownie-point opportunities.

Then they threw a wicked curve ball by bringing Murray and Kris onto the solo schedule; it's a fantastic idea, but it did wreak a bit of havoc with my travel plans and capitulation options, since there was no way I was going to miss either one of them taking his very first GBS-spotlight bows.

I thought I had it all figured out by the time I got to Albuquerque. Alan was due up next - really good timing since I'd already found out that the folks at the El Rey had no problem at all with photos or videos - which would put Bob up for his next solo in Denver. Then, perfect timing of all perfect timings, Murray Foster would play the Murray Theatre in Murray, Utah, a triune match made in a Heaven that has quite the sly sense of humour. I was going to skip Denver altogether, collect my meager brownie points for my belated attempt at obedience, and then proceed directly to Salt Lake City from Albuquerque. I shifted my reservations and timetables and had it all worked out before I left the hotel for the El Rey. Or so I thought.

Then another wicked curve ball caught the outside corner when I looked at the set list before the first set began at the El Rey, I saw "Bob Solo" typed in the solo spot. I sighed and thought that as lovely as it would be to hear the Portuguese Waltz again, I had some more travel adjustements to make as soon as I scurried back to my room post-show. It would appear that Denver was now a "Go".

And they still managed to slip one more curve across the plate, this one an especially delightful one. As Bob explained in his solo intro - speaking with great poise and considerable charm, and he really needs to take that role more often if he is going to be this good at it - it was "too hot" to sit and play the accordion, so he would instead do a singalong song, the kind of song that only works if the audience is willing to take a very active part in that singing along. Bob had picked the perfect audience for this endeavour, and between him and them, the result was one of the very best versions of Come & I Will Sing You - a song I had just told a friend I doubted I'd be hearing GBS do live again anytime soon - I have ever seen.

Come & I Will Sing You, Bob Hallett (solo, with audience assist), El Rey Theatre, Albuquerque, October 2008 (190 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version of Bob's Solo

You can hear how well the crowd takes on their part of the song in the video file, but not nearly so well as it actually sounded live. They were great and Bob was great. Alan walked out after, shaking his head with mock ruefulness as the crowd was still cheering and applauding Bob. "I knew it would happen eventually," he said, heaving a huge (and hugely charming) sigh. "I knew you'd eventually no longer need us." Bob answered with a sly grin as the crowd kept right on cheering.

Travel plans and good intentions and obedience needs aside, I am so glad I did not miss this show. It was one of the very best "first times" I have ever seen them do. It was such a good show overall, one of those shows where the overall feeling in the crowd is predominantly one of excitement and gratitude, not expectation and demand. It felt like this show was first and foremost about the men up there on the stage, and I like those kind of shows the most of all because that's what I think all of the shows should be first and foremost about. Every now and then, it actually happens and that is very, very good, whether it happens on the fist time or the tenth time or the hundredth time.

And I am sure hoping that Alan finally takes his own solo turn come Denver. To which I am now headed.

The usual more to come later.

ETA: Still not ready to put up comments (though still reading and appreciating them), but this note to the person who will know to whom it is I'm responding: We all make our own choices in this life, even when we tell ourselves we have no other choice. That is a choice too. By our choices shall we be known and - if we are very fortunate - loved...both "anyway" and "because". Which is also a choice. I'm sorry I can't be more profound about it than that - it's the best that I can do.

"Tea In The Sahara With You" - Tucson, The Rialto Theatre Show

As much as I've been able to get done before time to head to Albuquerque.

The Wayward Shirt was once again the cause of much distraction and more pleasure.

Sean's solo was a Song Of The Desert, this one a now-seldom-heard Police tune from one of the best albums of all time, Synchronicity.

Tea In The Sahara, Sean McCann (solo), GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (250 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Sean's Tea In The Sahara

This song is always and forever a delight - the first lead solo of Alan's I ever saw, the first glimpse of what he could do, how much delight he would do it with, and how much pleasure he would give.

Penelope, GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (150 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Penelope

Taking what is starting to feel like its rightful positon in place of Mari Mac;

Ferryland Sealer, GBS @ the  Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (160 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Ferryland Sealer

It was a small crowd at the Rialto, but very enthusiastic right up front. It wasn't quite what I'd expected for their first show after the day off - I was thinking it would be more of a high-intensity Rock Show, but it was very good to see them seeming so relaxed and comfortable - although I was so helplessly bemused all night long by the gorgeous shirt on the more-gorgeous man that any attempt at objective or even coherent opinion from me is likely somewhat suspect. The companionship post-show was definitely excellent and greatly appreciated (I particularly have come to appreciate Tucson for what it has as well as for what it lacks). Good folks before and during too - that first-timer family was lovely...why in the world did I never meet that sweet of a teenage boy when I was a teenage girl?

Time for me to go. More later, unless I decide to sleep instead.

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This is sure to  be an "in-progress" entry:  Editing in a few more video links.

Walk On The Moon, GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008  (180 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Walk On The Moon

Feel It Turn, GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (220 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Feel It Turn

I have really missed hearing this next one the past few shows. And it was one of the songs the sweet little teenage boy next to me wanted the most to hear too, he and his Dad both. I have to agree...any night and every night. Bookending the show with Love Me Tonight and Straight To Hell is perfect, Perfectly Alan as well.

Straight To Hell, GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (235 MB)

ETA: YouTube version of Straight To Hell

Last of the Tucson video links, a somewhat abbreviated Impromptu Tune, quite interesting in its own way as such.

Tucson Impromptu Song, GBS @ the Rialto Theatre, Tucson AZ, October 2008 (55 MB)

ETA: YouTube Version Of Tucson Impromptu Song

"With Our Hearts As Big As Sails"- Much To Hope For

This is one of the most beautiful of all GBS lyric lines - for that matter, no need to limit it to GBS - so beautiful that I wanted to save it for some special occasion-type blog entry. What I read a few minutes ago in Sean's latest Tosh's Tails is very special.

And since no one is going to say it better or more fully than Sean himself:

Beautiful World

still this emptiness persists,  perhaps this is as good as it gets

when you’ve given up the drink and those nasty cigarettes

now i leave the party early at least with no regrets

i watch the sun come up and i watch it as it sets

yes this is as good as it gets 

                                                                                 Colin Hay

Well here i am 47 days dry save for some sweat and a few drops of tear..... apparently no worse for wear. I lost some weight at first but then my taste buds grew back and now i want chocolate.....all day long. One vice for another i spose..... but I’d rather work off a piece of cake than a tequila hangover any day. 

I do often find myself alone on the bus which is sometimes difficult. We beagles are pack animals and are quite lost without our peeps. But they never stray farther than the nearest pub and always come back much happier than they left. I usu
ally spend these solitary sessions writing or indulging my latest bad habit.....purchasing iTunes.

I have spent the past 3 years carefully burning only the favourite tracks from my own CD collection. While the process was painstaking, the result is a personal playlist that has grown to some 7000 paw picked tracks. Now I am free to raid the itunes store in good conscience.....and i love it (I have a 10$ a day habit). How can they make music this good and sell it for so cheap?

 Oh Yeah.......they can’t.

So my nites r not wild anymore but my days are all the better. I always wake up early and drink enuf coffee to give a cat a coronary. Then I exercise and go to work. And if that’s as good as it gets.....then that’s pretty friggin good.

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Alright, that one just generated more than a few drops of tears. There was a time not very long ago when I was convinced that Sean would not see the far side of 50, and the thought of how great the pain of that loss would be to those who love him was a constant ache. Today, I am in agreement with what Alan recently wrote in his own journal:  Much to hope for, isn't there?. Much to be glad about as well. 

Eat chocolate, and prosper. Enjoy hearing England sung up and down George Street in the years to come.  Your grandchildren will love to hear you sing Sweet Forget Me Not.

"At The Dimming Of The Day" - San Luis (Looey) Obispo Show & Kris's First GBS Solo

Sean to Alan:  Focus, man!

Alan, shrugs and grins:  It's like our 5,555th straight show.  I'm goin' to the pub tonight!

Today is officially A Day Off, the sole and single Day Off of this tour leg.  Since the next show is something like 750 miles away, that means it's really only a partial day off (my bus leaves town today at 5 pm, or at least it's supposed to), but right now "partial" feels pretty frigging good. It felt even better last night, probably even more so for others than it did for me. Which is not to say it didn't feel good for me as well; I (just barely) managed to overcome one of my most foolish and longstanding reluctances last night - I had to push and prod and (literally) argue myself every step of the way, but I finally persuaded myself to go to the pub alone. I am very glad I did - Keith and Chas from the Dubs were there too and it was great to see them again. And I always enjoy it when Alan holds court from his bar-stool throne. It was a very good step forward, no longer a "game I never played in" sort of feeling.  Still feeling a bit in need of apologising to my Dad this morning (along with wanting to give him a swift kick for so thoroughly ingraining that foolish "Good girls don't go to pubs by themselves" rule in my head in the first place), but I can always deal with a bit of morning guilt when the night before was well worth it.

Speaking of the night before and being worth it, it really was a good show in San Luis Obispo (as Alan was told, it is pronounced by most as San "Looey" Obispo...though some of us do stick with the proper Spanish pronunciation, as Alan himself had been doing - nearly a full house in a first-time-there town, which is always a great thing. Beautiful sound in the venue, which worked perfectly because this was a night for playing the songs really well. The absolutle highlight from last night's show: Kris Macfarlane performs his first solo with GBS, and he does it spectacularly well. Audio only this time, because this venue seemed to take the rules pretty seriously so no sense looking like a jerk, and also because Kris was so nervous at the start I was afraid having a camera aimed straight at him might make his knees buckle. But he got over that and sure did great, as can be heard here:

Dimming Of The Day, Kris Macfarlane (solo, audio only), Spanos Theatre, San Luis Obispo CA, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 2 MB)

Kris and Murray have done so well with these solos, it's seems likely that we'll be hearing them do it again, or at least that's what I am hoping, even thought it's making it kind of difficult to use the solo schedule as a contributing factor for which shows to go see.

It seemed a good idea to keep right on with not looking like too much of a jerk and sticking with getting a few more audio files, especially since the acoustics in this venue were superb.

Hard Case (audio only), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 1.5 MB)

Tunes (audio only), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 1.5 MB)p>

Captain Wedderburn (audio only), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 1.75 MB)

Dream To Live (audio only), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 2.5 MB)

Old Brown's Daughter (audio only), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 1 MB)

And this is a bit of an "inadvertent" video file. While we were being gifted with an utterly gorgeous OBD just a few feet away, I held the camera up at chest level while recording the audio for OBD and let it video whatever it was that it was aimed at, trying my best to point that aim toward the loveliest view of all. Turns out the "tits'-eye view" worked out pretty darn well.

Old Brown's Daughter (tits'-eye-view), GBS @ the Spanos Theatre, SLO, October 2008 (112 MB - audio & video...of sorts)

My sole surrender to photos was my usual and perpetual point of absolutely no resistance whatsover. Still trying really hard to be on my Best Behaviour, I took these WIAK lead-solo shots while holding the camera down in my lap and kind of guessing on the focus. Again, it turned out better than I'd expected, this time from yet another viewpoint. I am beginning to wonder if perhaps my whole body is turning into a camera lens.

I don't have time for much more right now; I've got about another half hour in the room and need to get packed up and ready to check out. Then I get to spend a few afternoon hours wandering the shops downtown SLO before bus time, not at all a bad way to spend a Partial Day Off. In response to a few who've asked (still reading and appreciating comments and just about ready to begin posting them here again), I am for sure going to Tucson. There's a cool historic hotel right across the street from the venue that I am really looking forward to staying in; I'm also kind of hoping Alan decides to go with Tucson for his next solo turn too, though technically it's Sean's spot next. That's good too, though it would mean I'd wind up heading to Albuquerque too.  I'm still trying to figure out which shows to skip on the second half of this tour leg but haven't decided yet. All I can say for now is "Yes" to Tucson (well, and Portland too, but that's a given) and we'll see how it goes from there.

Here's hoping that all enjoy their Day Off as much as they deserve that enjoyment - certainly hoping that Sean and Glenn use sunscreen on all their tender parts just in case they really do find the nude beaches here (there used to be two - not saying how it is I happen to be in possession of that information - but I was told yesterday there are now three of them).  Hoping most of all that Alan has a chance to do whatever helps him relax the most and feel the best. They've done really well on Part One of this tour leg, gotten through the challenges and put on some excellent shows, caught the attention and interest of lots of new folks too. Part Two is going to have its own challenges, to be sure. And I am even more sure of there being more excellent shows to come as well.

To pack, and then to shop.

ETA: Slipping back off Best Behaviour one more time before I go...this violates my own self-imposed privacy rule, but I am saying it anyway: I was really proud of Sean last night. I hope he gets a real eyeful today as a reward.

"I'd Rather Live A Lifetime..." Part Two - Finding A Way To Be Splendid: An Impressive Group Effort, A Bastard In The Spotlight, & The Best Story Of All (Lobero Theatre, Santa Barbara)

You can only do something for the first time once. - Alan Doyle

It may have taken more than 5 years for it to happen, but there are always some great things that are worth whatever the wait:  Murray finally gets to sing a song on his own with GBS.

Seven Curses, Murray Foster (solo), Great Big Sea @ the Lobero Theatre, Santa Barbara, October 2008 (220 MB)

Murray's Seven Curses video can now be seen on YouTube, though it's another one of those sideways vertical videos. Sorry - I had to video between the heads of the peopol in front of me; if I'd tried to lift the camera above their heads, chances are good I'd have been told not to video at all.

As can be seen in the video, Murray did quite well performing the Dylan tune, just the perfect amount of nervousness to make him completely charming. Tonight in San Luis Obispp, it's apparently going to be Kris's turn to, as he put it, "Die a thousand deaths." No clue what Kris will do or even if his and Murray's solo spots will continue on this tour (as great as it was that this happened in SB, I suppose it would have been too-perfect-to-get-by-any-editor if it had happened at the Murray Theater in Murray, Utah) though if they do I'm hoping Murray will consider doing Bittersweet next time around, wherever and whenever that might be.

And another version of Tunes, the second-set-opening group jam at the drum riser, this particularly appropriate to an evening that was all about mutual aid and support:

Tunes, GBS @ the Lobero Theatre, Santa Barbara, October 2008 (140 MB)

A big part of what makes live performance so fascinating is all the different ways in which shows can come together (or fall apart, depending on the show). You can take the same songs and the which shows can come together (or fall apart, depending on the show); live performance is a continuing act of creation (again, or destruction, depending on the show). You can take the same songs and the same performers and on any given night, the end result can vary across a very wide spectrum, from Utterly Splendid to Abysmally Sucked. An even bigger part of what makes Great Big Sea's live performances so fascinating is how wide their spectrum of success so often is - how many different ways they have of creating the splendid, staking claim to more points along that particular stretch of the spectrum than I ever knew existed, let alone ever saw anyone else achieve.

It's one thing to put on a spectacular show - to have, as Sean put it in his post-LA Twitter entry, "a red carpet night" (and his most-recent "Even happy" Twitter comment was certainly great to see) - when every member of the  band is playing at the top of his game in a packed venue pulsing with eager and excited diehard fans. Toss in an Academy-Award-winning Bonafide Rock Star for your encore and call that one Fucking Splendidly Well Done Show, and rightly so. If you can't be Splendid on such a night, it might be time to consider career alternatives.  Then there comes the night when you are playing to a tiny crowd in an undersold venue your first time in a new city and your incomparable front man is so weary that the very sight of him makes a tender heart ache.  It's what gets made of such nights - the way in which all of the band members come together to aid and support and engage and encourage -  that tells the most important part of the story. Finding a way to be Splendid on such a night...this is the heart and soul and great strength of this band.

I've got another pissy hotel wireless connection (I grow increasingly weary of wireless...I want to plug in) and I'm also supposed to be packing up as I work on this, so this will be another work-in-progress entry.  I'll keep putting up new pictures and comments as I get them edited/written and (I hope) posted and we'll see how far I get before I have to go catch the bus to San Luis Obispo. But while I for sure have both time and connection, I want to say this much: They put on such a good show at the Lobero Theatre, all of them, together.  Sean's unabashed affection for Santa Barbara, Bob's beaming smiles, Kris's steady support, Murray's spotlight moment...all of it working together to draw in that little crowd, to turn "small" into "intimate" and forge and strengthen the bond.

I'm not sure if it's possible to persuade him of this, but Alan was amazing last night. On a evening when he was achingly hoarse and endearingly coarse - an evening when he looked to be a man in very serious need of being put and/or taken straight to bed - his guard down and his face a testament to truth being beauty and beauty truth, he was Splendid.  It is one thing to be Splendid on those top-of-your-game Rock Star nights - and an excellent thing it is, to be sure - but to be that way on the night when you have to dig down deep again and again, the night when you have to work as hard as you can, the night when you badly need and deeply appreciate the support you are getting from all of your friends...is the best story of all. There is nothing that impresses me more than that does.

Though I am still going to hope he finally gets a little rest. I could deal with being a wee bit less impressed.

Alright, I am off to get some breakfast (never, ever, ever skip out on free food...Traveller's Rule Number One), and if I still have a connection when I get back, then I will see how many more photos I can get up here before bus time. I might add some in after I get to SLO too.  Then again, I might not - it's looking like it's going to be a clear day and I like the Cal Poly campus. It's been a long while since I last wandered it.

"I'd Rather Live A Lifetime..." Part One - Great Big Sea @ the LA House Of Blues, with Russell Crowe

If I don't sleep at least an hour or two tonight I am going to utterly unravel tomorrow/today, so for now, here are the audio links for the two songs Russell Crowe did with GBS at the LA HOB tonight:

Folsom, Great Big Sea & Russell Crowe, LA House Of Blues, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 2.72 MB)

Molly Malone, Great Big Sea & Russell Crowe, LA House Of Blues, October 2008 (Quicktime audio file, 1.52 MB)

Some hot fiddle support from Bob on Folsom, and the blistering lead-guitar work is Alan, all Alan.

It was so great to see Russell and Alan side by side again. May it happen again very soon, and I hope that they're still all having a grand time together tonight post-show. Well, actually, that's not true...what I hope for the most is that he's getting some rest right now, but if he isn't, then I hope he's having a grand time with Russell.  

No photos or video from me this time (though I know others got both) because the LA HOB is death on cameras and I am kind of/sort of trying to behave myself. I suppose if I'd really wanted to behave myself all the way, I wouldn't have gotten the camera inside in the first place (not easy to get a camera past  being wanded...but not impossible either) so I could have it for that audio recording. I knew Russell was going to be there tonight, knew it from Alan's very first hint...that  journal mention of bringing on the clowns in reference to playing in LA. Then he mentioned  possible star-sightings in Hollywood; Hint #2 for sure. Always the bread-crumb trail with him, and he is always so worth the effort of paying attention and keeping up.

Really an inspired show tonight overall - fierce and intense from start to finish. It's been a while since there hasn't been a camera between me and the stage and it was delightful almost to the point of being overwhelming.  The words that keep coming to mind are "spectacular" and "breathtaking" - and, yes, "overwhelming" too, but in the sense of it being a keen pleasure to be so overwhelmed (I do not need video to keep the image of Folsom's lead guitarist in my mind) - and I think I will just go with those and go get that hour or two of sleep before I head out to my bus.

One of these days, I want to see Alan and Russell perform Where I Belong together. We live to dream.

ETA: So groggy I nearly forgot - be sure to check out Cathy-Anne McClintock. She and her very able band opened for GBS tonight, and on her new CD, she has quite the impressive guest artist singing a duet with her on one of the tunes: Alan Doyle.

"Where My Spirit Can Be Free" Part Five: Perspective

ETA the other two video links from the San Fran show:

Dream To Live (most of), GBS @ the Palace Of Fine Arts, SF, October 2008 (245 MB)

San Francisco Impromptu Song, GBS @ the Palace Of Fine Arts, SF, October 2008 (150 MB)

Last night at the Palace Of Fine Arts in San Francisco was one for interesting perspectives, a bit more perspective than I'd counted on in some ways. From my vantage point, I had one of the best views I've ever gotten of Kris's drumming/percussion/laptop wizardry and Bob's management of his Kingdom Of Instruments, all of which was utterly fascinating. I do believe Anne is going to love some of the photos I took from that perspective, though she might have to wait some time to see them. 

Not at all a bad view of crowd reaction from that vantage point, either, especially those moments when Alan came out and played at stage edge. I'm currently in the midst of uploading a few videos and hope to get it finished while waiting at the airport (still being a travel wuss and flying down to LA today...after that it's back on the bus for me), but  one of the two I have done so far gives a glimpse of that audience-interactive perspective.

Singalongs, Great Big Sea @ the Palace Of Fine Arts, San Francisco, October 2008, 155 MB

And the second is a different (for me, at least) POV of their current second-set opener.

Tunes (second set opener), Great Big Sea @ the Palace Of Fine Arts, San Francisco, October 2008, 180 MB

If I get the other few videos uploaded while waiting for my flight, I'll edit those in here too. Depends somewhat on whether I make it onto my earlier standy flight or if I wimd up waiting for my original flight a bit later in the day. After having gotten next to no sleep last night, I decided to shag it and come to SFO early to see if I could catch an Insomniac's Special flight instead. It's amusing how well United Airlines (in the Star Alliance Group with Air Canada) treats me and all my AC-accumulated miles - Gold Status and Red Carpet and "Yes, Ma'am" all the way. Too bad AC doesn't see things the same way. I have a feeling my chances are good for winding  up on the early flight; AC would likely tell me they could get me to LAX by Sunday. Another different perspective.

Of course, there is perspective and then there is perspective. I got a rather unexpected and up-close view of another somewhat different way of seeing things last night, or maybe not all that much different so much as simply unsettling and undesirable, a vantage point I quite frankly would have rather not have gotten, but there you go.  There are times when the choice is a stark one: You can see or refuse to see, you can accept or run, run away. Deal or no deal, as it were. 

I choose "see" and "accept," though there are times when I wonder if I will ever get tough enough for some things not to bother me as much as they sometimes do. It's one thing seeing and accepting and dealing with darker side of that voracious fan disease Notice Me (And Then Notice Me Even More!)  -the sadly self-defeating affliction that devours any genuine pleasure and sours all honest sweetness in its relentless insistence on getting More, More, MORE. I have gotten tough enough (slowly and labouriously and often quite painfully) over the past few years to see and accept and deal with the selfish, the greedy, the needy, the thoughtless, the clueless, the heartless, the obsessed, the neurotic, the vicious, the cruel, and on occasion the frigging unhinged. I can pretty much see and accept and deal with all these things without so much as batting an eyelash anymore...practice making, if not perfect, at least fairly competent.

But not when it's a child  being any of these ways, especially not when it's an otherwise-sweet child with a Mom who's trying her best to keep things on an even keel. That is something that still really gets to me, still disturbs and still rattles me.  That is something I still lack the ablity to shrug off as par for this particular course of play.

And, at the end of the day, maybe it's better that way. I'm not sure I ever want to become the person who accepts seeing such things happen in the mind and heart of a child, let alone become the person who expects it.  There are worse things to be in this world than disturbed and rattled.

Perspective.

"Where My Spirit Can Be Free" Part Four: A Great GBS Interview, The Poignant Troubadour & The Heart Of The Matter Of The Heart

A wonderful KMTT radio interview with Alan and Sean recorded and broadcasted yesterday, pure heaven hearing Alan start it off with a achingly beautiful bit of Ron Hynes'  River Of No Return, followed by an acoustic duet version of Here & Now, considerably different feel to the song when done this way, much more wistful and poignant than the full-band version (lovely harmonies from Sean too). Then a sweetly tender acoustic duo Love Me Tonight. How could the answer possibly be anything other than "Yes"?  For every reason why. Quite the thoughtful interview in this one too - especially Alan's comments about Hawksley's over-the-topness and how well that approach goes with Great Big Sea's own performance dynamic - mixed in with the customary cheerful foolishness.

Really good CD-promo spots highlight as much of the new music as possible, something The Mountain's Music Lounge is always good at. England sounds exquisite, Alan's turn to impress with the harmonies and guitar work too.  Next up is a heart-in-hand Walk On The Moon that takes me straight back tgo a rainy New Orleans night again and everything and anything seems possible. Five years later, the memory can still make me cry.

Then they wrap it all with a gorgeous Sea Of No Cares, Sean's-living-room style. If I'd never heard of GBS before I'd heard this spot yesterday afternoon, I'd have found a way to get to the Moore last night. And if I had, I'd have been blown away. A simple surrender just in time.

As good as it is to see them getting the air time anywhere they can in the States, it still makes me shudder a bit to think that even with the brutal travel schedule on this tour leg (as I type this from my hotel room around the corner from the Palace Of Fine Arts, they are probably still a hundred or so miles north of here), they're still going to do the media promo spots too. One way for an already long road to wind up feeling longer still. At least the next drive is nowhere near as demanding as this one had to be.

Pretty cushy for me, comparatively speaking: I was sound asleep before we took off and the lady next to me had to nudge me awake after we landed. I awoke with a smile across my face, wayward shirt dreams going perfectly with what I'm told was a fair bit of turbulence.  I took a serious gamble on my hotel room here - a disconcertingly cheap room in an independent hotel I'd never heard of before, but which is located maybe 5 minutes' walk from the venue - and won big this time (unlike Harrisburg, where that cheap rate should have been shared by the pointy-nosed, four-legged inhabitants of the room)...great room, excellent location, phenomenal DSL connection, and I have just come back from a stroll around the POFA (gorgeous venue, spectacular setting) and then I followed my nose to a great little taqueria for lunch, some of the best Mexican food I've gotten outside of LA. There's even a decent-looking pub around the corner, right across the street from the Presido entrance (and if they want to stretch bus-cramped legs, they've got the wide expanse of the Presdio grounds for a walk or run). All the comforts of the road at my fingertips...well, most of them, anyway.

I keep thinking about last night's show, still sorting out thoughts and impressions. My own response to this show is definitely impacted by how good it was to see the fellow who can't get away to see many shows these days so thoroughly enjoying this one, singing himself hoarse and making himself dizzy trying to watch all the great performances taking place at each mic at the same time. He even had an adventure with a clingy and outrageously inebriated woman who declared her love for him during Old Bllack Rum. For sure a memorable show. Beyond that, there is how impressively the music was played -  with force and authority, passion married to focus, and desire coupled with direction. It was a genuine and an honest performance, one that made no self-deprecating (and arse-covering) apologies for their pride in what they are presenting to their audience. It takes real balls to show that kind of pride with boldess and conviction, even more so to insist on the response the music deserves. When they play it this way, this is GBS at their best, a glimpse into the future of what they could be if they choose it. And it plays so frigging well with American audiences, most of all the ones out here in the Wide West.

I keep thinking about those indvidual great performances too: Kris's compelling percussion work on Process Man, Murray's deft guitar hands on England, Bob's amazingly nimble bouzouki fingers (it only seemed like I was entranced all night long by Alan's Rock God-dom and his wayward shirt...well, yes, I was so entranced, but I can multi-task my attention and managed to have a great time watching Bob play The Everything with sparkle and aplomb, right along with being entranced by the Flame burning to my left. I was also fascinated with, and often moved by, Sean's performance. I have to be wary of watching Sean too much...he gets to me, even more so these days; there's a vulnerability there that inevitably gets me worrying about his welfare. But that same vulnerability can give a touching tenderness to his performance, the perfect counterbalance to the focus and intensity he showed last night. Sean played it real last night. I like Sean's real.

While sitting in the airport shuttle waiting for the other riders, I was thinking that if Alan is the Rock God (and Alan is so very much the Rock God, part of his triple treat of beingThe Petty Harbour Boy and The Dear Man too), then perhaps Sean is at least partly the Troubadour Of The Tender Heart, the Prince Of Poignancy in Alan's If-I-Were-KIngdom.

Last thought for now, since I need to decide whether to go for another walk or take another nap, centres on just one picture out of a whole slew of photos I took last night. Photos were fine and dandy with the powers that be at the Moore, but video was apparently a no-no this time around (the rules change at the Moore with every show...I think the staff spins their own Wheel of Fortune before each show and whatever pops up is the way it gets played that night), and I tend to take a lot of photos when not videoing (Alan's Tickle Cove Pond solo and his Seattle Impromptu Tune were all I videoed, and that had to be done on the sly, so I mostly obeyed, and "mostly obedient" is about as good as I can ever be). Add in the Wayward Shirt Variable and that results in even more photos of Alan than the abundant usual for me. Looking back over those photos today, there are some breathlessly beautiful ones (lots of blurry ones too because of how the temp orchestra pit floor was  moving beneath my feet as people stomped and jumped all around), but out of all of them, there is one photo - the final shot of the evening, not all that surpisingly - that goes straight to the heart of the matter of my own heart, as it were.

Always risky to fall in love with your own photo, but love itself is a risky proposition and sometimes there is no other option to that Fall, especially with a photo that is beautiful and moving on multiple levels, from the lascivious to the sublime, and in one image from a single moment in time tells the entire story  that is taking me forever to write. 

Still can't decide between the nap and the stroll. Too bad I don't sleepwalk.  At least I can still dream doing either.

"Where My Spirit Can Be Free" Part Three - Rock Gods, Wayward Shirts, And Starting Off On The Right Foot (Seattle Moore Theatre Show)

I feel like a Rock God! - Alan Doyle, Moore Theatre, Seattle

As it should be.

Doing quite well on the Folk God front too:

Tickle Cove Pond, w. Intro, Alan Doyle (solo), GBS @ the Moore Theatre, Seattle, September 2008 (285 MB)

And if there were Gods of Endearing Charm, kinship with them could be claimed as well.

Seattle Impromptu Song, GBS, Moore Theatre, Seattle, September 2008 (145 MB)

Great Big Sea rocked the house tonight in Seattle, one of their best shows of the Fortunate Tour so far, perhaps the best Seattle show I've ever seen them play. I'd really love to say more about it right now, but since I just had to struggle to recall which city tonight's show took place in - not at all good when it happens to be your home city - I think it is definitely high time for a nap on the flight I am waiting to take off on. A nap that lasts all the way to San Francisco. A godsend indeed.

Hopes are high for a pleasant dream about a lovely shirt that spent entire the evening providing the most tantalising views while behaving as if it wanted badly to slip off the even-lovelier body around which it was wrapped. As Alan himself has noted in his most recent journal entry, there is much to hope for.  

They really did do well tonight, all of them - absolutely awesome at some junctures, such as with Dream To Live. A rousing success from beginning to end and the best possible way to begin a challenging run of shows. That's one down...and 10 to go. I hope they're getting more sleep tonight than I am.

Time for just one more: