tom spine

Concert Report: Spider John Koerner @ Studio 99, Nashua

2009-06-21T13:04:00.000-07:00

On the first of June I received the latest monthly email newsletter from Village Records, a wonderful place for finding new music. While scanning the newsletter during lunch, I noticed mention of a new live Koerner & Glover CD. "Oh," I thought, "I'll have to remember to check into that later, and also double check on whether Spider John is going to be playing on the east coast this summer." With that I returned my attention to work.

Around 8pm that night, Spider John Koerner just happened to pop into my head again. I thought I'd go to his web site to see what's up with the new CD. While doing that I looked at his concert calendar and, I'll be darned, but it says he is playing in Nashua, NH the very next night, June 2nd! Woah, if not for the Village Records newsletter, and if not for remembering it later in the day, I'd have missed this completely. Serendipity.

Any hey, what's this? A new music venue in Nashua? Who knew? Studio 99 is nestled in the fourth floor of one of the old mill buildings on the Nashua River. It isn't easy to find, and parking can best be described as, uhhh, creative, but it's just the kind of place I love. Unpretentious and welcoming. Old wooden floors and brick walls, with glimpses of the river out the window. The nice folks running the place appear to be having a good run at offering a full schedule of open mics, jam sessions (jazz, blues, folk/acoustic, and bluegrass), and concerts. I'll be keeping my eye on their calendar.

Spider John, if you are not familiar, is a traditional American folk and country blues musician. Based out of Minneapolis, Spider John was an early influence on Bob Dylan — back before he was, well, Bob Dylan. Oft quoted is this excerpt from Dylan's autobiography, Chronicles, Volume One:

"With my newly learned repertoire, I then went further up the street and dropped into the Ten O'Clock Scholar, a Beat coffeehouse. I was looking for players with kindred spirits. The first guy I met in Minneapolis like me was sitting around in there. It was John Koerner and he also had an acoustic guitar with him. Koerner was tall and thin with a look of perpetual amusement on his face. We hit it off right away. ... When he spoke he was soft spoken, but when he sang he became a field holler shouter. Koerner was an exciting singer, and we began playing a lot together."

Dylan correctly captured one essential aspect of Spider John - his now signature style. Part field holler, part ragtime, part country blues, part American roots, it's instantly recognizable as Spider John. I tried to find something on YouTube that would really showcase him, and this was the best I could come up with:

The show in Nashua turned out to be darn near a private concert. There were only fifteen of us in the room, and that included the event staff! Sixteen, if you count Spider John! I owe the poor turnout to the newness of the venue, its off-the-beaten-path location, perhaps a little lack of advertising, and it being a Tuesday night. While half of me wanted the room to be packed, the other half was thrilled at the intimacy.

Before the show I asked Spider John if he minded if I took some non-flash photos, and he said that was fine. So I also felt less self conscious than normal taking some shots. I have posted the six shots I am happiest with on a Flickr photo set.

Spider John played two sets plus an encore, for what must have been close to two hours of music (I seem to have not noted time in my notebook). We got a slew of traditional songs, his own songs, and a few by Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly (Huddie Ledbetter), and others. Two songs into the first set I was as happy as I could be, when we were treated to one of my favorites, Acres of Clams, a traditional song about the settling of Puget Sound; John sings what is known as the "Lay of the Old Settler" version of this song. When he finished and our applause died down I couldn't help but tell John that I loved that song!

We were treated to songs and stories of old British racehorses (Stewball), the California gold rush (The Days of Forty-nine), trains (Casey Jones), and love and war (When First Unto This Country). Prior to singing one of his own songs, Phoebe, Spider John spoke lovingly, if humorously, about the phoebe birds who have been making nests in and around his house for more than forty years, wondering about their migration every winter and return every spring.

Spider John is also known for what can only be described as corny humor. We were treated to a number of these "groaners" including the one about the two guys in the woods who came upon a grizzly bear. The one fellow says to the other, "I'm making a run for it." His friend replied, "Are you crazy? You can't outrun a grizzly bear!", to which the first guy replied, "True, but I reckon I don't have to outrun the bear. I just have to outrun you!"

At the set break I made a mental note of songs that I wanted to hear in the second set. More Pretty Women Than One and Sail Away Ladies were at the top of my list, so when John announced he had just three more songs to play in the second set, I went ahead and asked, "And will More Pretty Women Than One be one of them?" While he hadn't planned on it, his tuning was right, so John obliged me with his cover of this Woody Guthrie song. John did explain, though, that Woody used to sing "more pretty girls than one" but he thought it more appropriate and respectful to sing "more pretty women than one."

Spider John is nothing short of a national treasure. It's been too many years since Patti and I last saw him. If you get a chance, go see him. If you don't, go buy one of his CDs. Heck, go buy the new Koerner and Glover live CD from Village Records! Tell 'em I sent ya!

Spider John Koerner
Studio 99, Nashua, NH
Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Set 1:
Careless Love (W.C. Handy, Martha Koenig, Spencer Williams)
Acres of Clams (Francis D. Henry)
Stewball (Traditional)
The Wabash Cannonball (Traditional)
Dodger (Traditional)
Good Time Charlie (Traditional)
Don't Look Now (?)
Phoebe (Spider John Koerner)
When First Unto This Country (Traditional)
Red Apple Juice (Traditional)
Midnight Special (Traditional)

Set 2:
St. James Infirmary (Joe Primrose)
Danville Girl (Woody Guthrie)
The Ballad of Casey Jones (Traditional)
The Days of Forty-nine (Traditional)
Some People Say (Spider John Koerner)
The Summer of 88 (Spider John Koerner)
No Regrets (?)
Delt My Cards in England (?)
More Pretty Woman Than One (Woody Guthrie)
What's the Matter With The Mill (Minnie McCoy)
Goodnight Irene (Huddie Ledbetter, John Lomax)

Encore:
Black Dog Blues (Traditional)
Rattlesnake (?)

Concert Report: Steve Forbert @ Tupelo Music Hall

2009-05-28T16:45:00.000-07:00

Oh, hey. Before too much more time passes I ought to make a quick note about Steve Forbert's return to Tupelo on Sunday, May 17. Looking back at my previous concert reports, I see it was darn near exactly one year since Steve last took the Tupelo stage.

This year there was no battle over the house and stage lights, much to my camera's disappointment. Steve likes the house lights bright enough to see the audience, and the stage lights not so bright as to blind him. This worked great for Steve's interaction with the crowd, but made it extremely difficult for me to get good photos — simply not enough stage lighting, and I struggled with shutter speed all night long. I also spent the night battling the view around the vocal microphone — I was sitting more directly center stage than normal.

Steve's concerts are informal affairs, and he thrives on the audience. He encourages the audience to keep rhythm, and there are also always multiple opportunities for the audience to demonstrate its knowledge of his songs and lyrics. Audience requests are also a staple, and a number of tunes were audience suggestions.

No big surprises in the set, other than perhaps One After 909. How many in the audience knew this early Lennon/McCartney song? Hard to tell. Steve also flirted with The Beatles' Good Night before launching into Romeo's Tune.

The opening act was Diana Jones, a country-flavored singer songwriter with a clear Tennessee/Kentucky influence. Her voice reminded me a little of Kate Campbell, although her lyrics tended to be a bit more, ummm, serious or somber than Kate's. Nevertheless, an enjoyable opener.

Steve Forbert
Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry, NH
Sunday, May 17, 2009

Thinkin'
Trouble No More
Hang On Again Til The Sun Shines
My Stolen Identity
Rock While I Can Rock
One After 909 (Lennon/McCartney)
Complications
My Blue Eyed Jane (Lulu Belle White/Jimmie Rodgers)
Sing It Again My Friend
The Sweet Love That You Give
The American In Me
Write Me A Raincheck
Baby Don't
Song For Katrina
California Cotton Fields (Dallas Frazier)
It Sure Was Better Back Then
Simply Must Move On
Lonesome Cowboy Bill's Song
What Kinda Guy
Blackbird
Good Night/Romeo's Tune
Encore:
Middle Age
Good Planets Are Hard To Find

Opening Act, Diana Jones:
All God's Children
Cold Dark Mine
Cold Grey Ground
If I Had A Gun
Henry Russell's Last Words (aka, Oh How I Love You Mary)
Pony

Bacon - Not For Sale

2009-05-06T18:49:00.001-07:00

(There's nothing in here about swine flu, so if that's what you are looking for, move along. Nothing to see here.)

On our travels, on a side road off of a side road, we came upon a farm. I'm not sayin' exactly where, mind you.

Out at the roadside, this farm has a neatly lettered, hand painted sign. The sign says:

EGGS

BACON

Now farm fresh eggs, there's nothing much unusual there. But bacon, well, that caught our eye. A quick conversation ensued among the four of us in the car, and a U-turn followed in short order. Foodies that we are, we had to investigate.

The farm raises, slaughters, and sells ducks and pigs, and also sells duck and chicken eggs. There's no store, per se, but rather an upright side-by-side freezer-refrigerator stocked full of goodies. It's an honor system. Take what you want, write down what you take on a clipboard inside the fridge, and put your money or check in the coffee can in the fridge door.

There's a sign taped to the door of the freezer that explains all of this, and then also this sign that gives a little more detail:

What? The carefully vacuum-sealed 1 pound packages of bacon in the freezer are not for sale because the smokehouse is not federally inspected? Oh, but if it were for sale, it would be $14 a pound? All that is missing is the "wink, wink, nod, nod."

Disappointed as we were, we realized that we couldn't buy a pound of bacon. But we did leave a $14 donation in the coffee can. And we sure are looking forward to farm fresh bacon we're gonna have for breakfast this weekend. "Wink, wink, nod, nod."

I Ride for Paul

2009-04-11T07:34:00.000-07:00

I know a lot of people who really enjoy riding bicycles. I'm not one of them. Given the choice, I will choose to go for a run over a bicycle ride any day of the week. I know, you probably think I'm nuts. Maybe I am. When I run, I can zone out. I can be in the moment, and my mind can wander to all sorts of interesting places. I don't get that on a bicycle. There's too much to pay attention to. Too much that distracts me. The helmet. The funny cleat shoes. Changing gears. Watching out for pot holes and other road hazards. Not to mention watching out for cars. It's all too distracting.

But every spring I put in enough bicycle "seat time" training to participate in the 100-kilometer Ride the Vineyard bike ride to raise funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. This year's ride is on Saturday, May 2, 2009.

I ride for my friend Paul, and for thousands like him who are fighting MS every day of their lives. Imagine unpredictably having blurred vision, or losing your sense of balance, your ability to use your hands to grip everyday objects, or your ability to walk. Or worse. Paul has taught me what true courage is, and how to face adversity head on and with high spirits and thankfulness for every day. He is my inspiration, and I think of him often during long runs and bike rides.

The funds I raise will be used by the National MS Society to support research as well as programs to help address the needs of people living with MS, which remains an incurable disease today. Would you please consider sponsoring me via a tax-deductible donation? My goal this year is to raise $2000, and you can help by donating via my pledge page. Any amount will help. Thanks!

Please visit http://main.nationalmssociety.org/goto/tomspine to make a pledge.

Concert Report: Vance Gilbert @ Tupelo Music Hall

2009-04-05T07:48:00.000-07:00

The music keeps on coming, and on Friday night, April 3rd, Patti and I were back at Tupelo's Table 3 for one of the most gifted performers on the singer-songwriter circuit, Vance Gilbert. Where the heck was everyone else? Tupelo was nearly empty, with only about sixty tickets sold (capacity is just over 200). We've seen Vance fill the place before, so what gives? Competition from other shows? I know that the Cowboy Junkies were in Newburyport, and Susan Werner was back at Club Passim. Even still, I would have expected over a hundred people, not sixty.

Vance is so multi-talented. He can write a song that will make you cry. He's got guitar chops. He's got a voice to die for. He's got command of the stage. And he's got some serious funnies (now there's an oxymoron, eh?). The man could easily be a stand up comic, and he's worked with some of the best stand ups in the business in days gone by, including George Carlin and Bill Cosby. He puts all this to good use in his concerts.

The core of his current show is a handful of songs from his newest album, Up On Rockfield. This is a concept album in which Vance writes songs as inspired by other artists. Some of these are clearly "as if written by" efforts, while others are more "as inspired by." And others are just plain whacky.

Goodbye Pluto, an ode to the former planet, falls squarely in the whacky side; it is written as an inspirational combination of Shawn Colvin and Raffi! Old Man's Advice is written as if by Tom Waits. The line "never look for Friday's kiss with Thursday's broken heart" is clearly straight out of the Tom Waits inspiration book. Welcome to Lovetown combines John Hiatt and Prince! By far the most "as if written by" song is Judge's House, which was written as if it were an outtake from Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska album. Close your eyes and listen to the lyrics, and you can absolutely imagine that Bruce wrote this song during the Nebraska period:

It's 3:00 in the morning
On this side of town
A lonely dog barking
Is the only other sound
I'm sitting in my car
Outside this judge's house
Ten years to the day he brought
His gavel down

Ten years ago
But I recall it
Like it was yesterday
A man remembers when you take
Ten years of his life away

Round Midnight featured Vance channeling first Billie Holiday, then Louis Armstrong — both trumpet and vocals. Responding to a giggling child in the audience, Vance added both the Cookie Monster and Elmo to the vocal impersonations. It's likely that neither of those two Sesame Street characters ever sang the classic Thelonious Monk song before, nor shared a single song with Billie Holiday and Louie Armstrong! Vance had great fun with the giggling child, both during and after the song. It's likely she will remember the night for a long time.

Vance closed with an off microphone, acappella version of King of Rome, a not-infrequent closing song for Vance and clear crowd favorite. Vance has a powerful voice, and King of Rome is a perfect showcase:

In the West End of Derby lives a working man
He says "I can't fly but me pigeons can
And when I set them free
It's just like part of me
Gets lifted up on shining wings"

I was hoping to find a YouTube version of Vance singing King of Rome, but didn't have any luck. But here's a video of Vance singing Unfamiliar Moon from 2006 that nicely illustrates his songwriting, his vocals, and his guitar playing:

The opening act was twenty-year old Berklee College of Music student Emily Elbert.

She did a nice set of her own songs, and considering she's just a sophomore in college, she clearly has one heck of a career ahead of her. You can easily find videos of her doing her own tunes on YouTube, but I was most impressed with her closing cover of Paul McCartney's Oh! Darling, and so I'll leave you with a YouTube video of Emily singing that song:

Vance Gilbert
Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry, NH
Friday, April 3, 2009

It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference (Todd Rundgren)
Taking It All To Tennessee
Castles Made of Sand (Jimi Hendrix)
Goodbye Pluto
Unfamiliar Moon
Old Man's Advice
Welcome to Lovetown
I'm So Tired of Being Alone (Al Green)
Judge's House
Highrise
Save the Last Dance for Me (Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman)
Round Midnight (Thelonious Monk)
Some Great Thing
Encore: King of Rome (David Sudbury)

Opening act, Emily Elbert:
In the Summertime
Caught Up In Your Love
Silent Time
Thinking Hybrid Redirected
Easy to Love
Do Without
You Put the Good in Goodbye
Oh! Darling (Lennon/McCartney)

Concert Report: Susan Werner @ Club Passim

2009-04-04T16:17:00.000-07:00

Patti and I caught the first night of Susan Werner's two night stint at Club Passim this past Thursday, April 2. Susan is on a CD-release tour for her new project, Classics (more on this in a bit). This tour has Susan in a trio format, with Julia Biber on cello, and Trina Hamlin on vocals, harmonica, and a variety of percussive instruments.

The first portion of Susan's nearly two-hour set focused not on the new CD, but rather her previous project, The Gospel Truth. Notice how I say "project", as each of Susan's last three releases have been exactly that — projects with clearly identifiable themes. Susan variously describes The Gospel Truth as "agnostic gospel", "protest gospel", "music for the spiritually ambivalent", and "music from the religious left." Those are all apt descriptions of what to me is an innovative, honest, and profound body of music.

To be sure, The Gospel Truth denounces the hypocrisy of the religous right ("i know you'd damn me if you could, but my friend that's simply not your call"), and pokes particular fun at the catholic church ("and please allow for women in the catholic priesthood, and remind the pope he could have been a girl"), but it also quiets us with its moments of profound meaning, as in Did Trouble Me:

when i closed my eyes so i would not see
my lord did trouble me
when i let things stand that should not be
my lord did trouble me
when i held my head too high too proud
my lord did trouble me
when i raised my voice too little too loud
my lord did trouble me

After a half dozen Gospel Truth songs, Susan moved to the keyboards and songs from her 2004 project, I Can't Be New. That project consists of original Werner compositions in the style of the Great American Songbook, or as Susan puts it, songs written as if she were "Cole Porter's smart mouthed little sister." She performed "Give Me Chicago", her rousing ode to her adopted home town with its long list of praises for the windy city. I noticed that the verse mentioning Studs Terkel is gone, as Studs passed away last October. But a new verse has been added, ending in "music and drama, Barack Obama" in honor of the new president. We also got the plot-twisting romance, I Can't Be New, and the humorous self-effacing Movie of My Life.

The clear highlight of the mid-section of the set was Time Between Trains, which is now more than ten years old and was the only song of the night from Susan's earlier work. Trina Hamlin's harmonica playing takes this allegory about the interlude between relationships to a new level. Trina gets an extended harmonica solo during Time Between Trainsthat simply brings the house down.

Susan's delight was evident:

Another highlight prior to the new stuff was Susan's somber but uplifting hymn, May I Suggest. I never tire of this song, as it makes me want to cry and smile all at the same time. Here's a good version from YouTube, for any of you who are unfamiliar with either Susan or May I Suggest. Watch it and see if it gets to you too:

Which brings us to Classics, Susan's latest project. This project consists of reinterpretations of classic songs from the 1960s and 1970s with chamber orchestra arrangements. Don't wince, it's far better than you might imagine at first. No, it's not elevator music! It's new and fresh interpretations that make these songs sound all new &mdash and newly relevant.

For this section of the set, Trina left the stage, and Julia Biber's cello playing took on a stronger focus.

I'll admit, the first time I played the entire Classics CD it didn't grab me. I was hearing the contrast from the boldness of The Gospel Truth, and overlooking the subtle beauty of the string arrangements. But after two or three spins, I was hooked. And hearing America's Lonely People, Marvin Gaye's Mercy Mercy Me, Cat Stevens' The Wind, and Simon & Garfunkel's Hazy Shade of Winter performed live in this duet setting only solidified my feelings. All of these songs sound new again. And still so relevant.

Oh, mercy mercy me
Oh, things ain't what they used to be
No, no
Where did all the blue sky go?
Poison is the wind that blows
From the north, east, south, and sea
Oh, mercy mercy me
Oh, things ain't what they used to be
No, no

In a break after Julia's cello solo (a piece composed by German composer Paul Hindemith), Susan and Julia had the audience in stitches with their hilarious send up of classical musicians. Julia played the perfect visual impersonation of Susan's verbal descriptions of the body movements of modern cellists — the flying hair, the swooning, the angry faces. This was followed by an on-the-spot modern (discordant) improvisation called Marshmallow Peeps, a theme solicited from the audience.

Yes, it was all a big fun poke at modern classical music, but Susan noticed a women in one or the front tables who must have had some telling look on her face. Susan asked her if she was a musician, and the audience member said she was. Susan said, "Oh no, you're not a classical musician, are you?", to which we learned that yes, she was a classical pianist. Not missing a beat, Susan invited her to come up and play for us, and Susan led the audience in cheering until our audience heroine complied. The moment of truth arrived, and audience member Amy blew us away with a fine version of Chopin's Minute Waltz:

We gave Amy a thunderous applause!

Oh! One other twist to the night. Monday is Susan's birthday, so road manager Jane brought a birthday cake up to the stage at the start of the encore, and the audience sang Happy Birthday to Susan:

I'll close with this seven minute compilation from one of Susan's performances at Club Passim in 2007. This is an excellent glimpse of exactly what a Susan Werner concert is like:

Susan Werner, with Trina Hamlin & Julia Biber
Club Passim, Cambridge, MA
Thursday, April 2, 2009

That's How It Happens
(Why Is Your) Heaven So Small
Our Father (The New, Revised Edition)
Sunday Mornings
Did Trouble Me
Probably Not
Give Me Chicago
I Can't Be New
Time Between Trains
Movie of My Life
May I Suggest
Lonely People (America)
Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology) (Marvin Gaye)
The Wind (Cat Stevens, with Bach Suite for Cello #3 in C Major intro)
Solo by Julia Biber on Cello (Paul Hindemith)
Marshmallow Peeps (Werner/Biber improvisation)
Minute Waltz (Frederic Chopin, performed by audience member Amy)
A Hazy Shade of Winter (Simon & Garfunkel, with Vivaldi Four Seasons intro)

Encore:
Happy Birthday to Susan (Traditional, sung by the audience)
Turn Turn Turn (Peter Seeger, The Byrds)
Help Somebody

Concert Report: Richard Shindell @ Tupelo Music Hall

2009-03-28T10:13:00.000-07:00

Patti and I were back at Tupelo on Thursday night, March 26, for Richard Shindell's 90-minute set. It's been just over a year since we last saw Richard play, also at Tupelo.

Richard's new album, Not Far Now, is just weeks old, so I was somewhat surprised we only got two songs from it all night long. One was Get Up Clara, a simple and nearly silly tune in which a weary traveler begs his mule to get up and get going. Set in the Roman empire, the song plays on "roaming" and "Roman" for its lyrical twist. The other song from the new album was Balloon Man, a wonderful description of a character from Richard's adopted town of Buenos Aires who sells balloons to children in the city's parks. The sight of the balloon man makes everyone smile, in real life as well as in my mind's eye:

balloon man's a little bit ragged
his glasses are slightly askew
one lens is cracked and shoes never match
he might have a screw loose or two

his rig is a marvel of equipoise
Leonardo might've designed
bamboo for the wide horizontal
pine for the vertical rise

he's wearing in a flag-bearers harness
he's holding the whole thing aloft
balloons all arrayed, he's a one man parade
if he ran he'd surely take off

Richard's cover of Glen Patscha's (of Ollabelle) Blue Northern Lights was a great and welcome surprise. Richard recently did a small tour with Ollabelle, and he picked this song up during that stint. I also heard at least one audible gasp of happy surprise in the audience when Richard launched into Leonard Cohen's Famous Blue Raincoat.

Richard continued what is for me an unbroken string of messing up the lyrics to Transit for, I think, the third for fourth time in a row. I don't know what it is about that particular song, but Richard seems unable to get through whole thing without a lyrics flub at some point. I sort of love that, though, as it makes him human. He also flubbed the second verse of Fishing, one of my all-time favorite Shindell songs. Fishing is a haunting fictional tale of an INS (Immigration and Naturalization Services) interrogation, and perhaps this is the perfect point for me to include a YouTube video for those of you who are not yet familiar with his music. Watch this:

By far the biggest audience reaction of the night came when he played Are You Happy Now? — isn't it funny how we seem to love bitter breakup songs? This song is set on Halloween night, and our storyteller sits in the dark after his lover has left him. I particularly love the imagery of the second verse:

I smashed your pumpkin on the floor
The candle flickered at my feet
As goblins flew across the room
The children peered into the room
A cowboy shivered on the porch
As Cinderella checked her watch
A hobo waited in the street
An angel whispered, trick-or-treat
But what was I supposed to do
But to sit there in the dark?
I was amazed to think that you
Could take the candy with you too

Are you happy now?

Man! Nothing like a good breakup song to make use feel better, eh? The first verse also contains what I consider to be signature Shindell lyric hooks - look at his use of "role" and "roll", as well as color — black, white, gray, and red:

You left your camera on the bed
Where we played roles in black and white
You left a roll of black and white
I set the timer and thought of you
And put the lens up to my head
I took a photograph for you
What comes out gray is really red

I was thrilled to find this version of the song on YouTube:

Richard mostly played his acoustic guitar, but switched to bouzouki for, if my notes are correct, three songs — Robbie Robertson's Acadian Driftwood, and his own A Summer Wind, A Cotton Dress, and Reunion Hill.

Here's one more video from YouTube, this one of Richard performing A Summer Wind, A Cotton Dress so that you can hear what the bouzouki sounds like:

All in all, a fine night of entertainment by one of my favorite songwriters. As usual, the photos above are my own, and you can view the full set on Flickr.

Richard Shindell
Tupelo Music Hall, Londonderry, NH
Thursday, March 26, 2009

The Island
Acadian Driftwood (Robbie Robertson)
Blue Northern Lights (Glenn Patscha)
Get Up Clara
Poor Wayfaring Stranger (Traditional)
A Summer Wind, A Cotton Dress
Balloon Man
Sitting on Top of the World (Traditional)
Reunion Hill
Are You Happy Now?
Fishing
So Says the Whippoorwill
Famous Blue Raincoat (Leonard Cohen)
Transit
Last Fare of the Day
There Goes Mavis
Encore: Waist Deep in the Big Muddy (Pete Seeger)

Concert Report: Ollabelle at Club Passim

2009-03-07T17:05:00.000-08:00

Right off the bat I'm going to say that this was not my favorite Ollabelle concert. That's not to say I didn't have a rocking great time, but more an acknowledgement of the fact that this was three-fifths Ollabelle, not the full quintet. Neither Tony Leone (drums) or Amy Helm (vocals, mandola) were with the band for their Boston stop, and I missed them both. Tony's drums wouldn't have fit on Passim's postage stamp of a stage anyway, and Amy gets a pass as she is home with a new baby. But a significant part of the Ollabelle repertoire can't be performed without those two, including the signature knock-you-back-in-your-seat Before This Time, and The Band-channelling Cane on the Brazos. (Tony regularly plays with the Levon Helm Band, and Amy is Levon's daughter, so channelling The Band comes naturally.)

Ollabelle, for those not paying close attention, is best described as a NYC-formed urban, gospel, roots, harmony band named after roots music pioneer Ola Belle Reed (1916-2002). Besides Tony and Amy, the other three members are Fiona McBain on vocals and guitars, Byron Isaacs on vocals and bass, and Glenn Patscha on vocals and keyboards. Early in their career they were taken under the wing of T-Bone Burnett.

On Thursday night the band was joined by singer-songwriter Martha Scanlan on vocals and guitar, and everybody's favorite Boston-based session guitarist, Duke Levine. You may have never heard of Duke, but his collaboration resume includes Peter Wolf, Otis Rush, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Shawn Colvin, Aimee Mann, Kathy Mattea, Sleepy LaBeef, Ellis Paul, Dar Williams, Lucy Kaplansky, and Susan Werner - just to name a few!

The first set lacked a little energy for my tastes. Starting with the opening song, Fiona's rendering of the traditional gospel Elijah Rock, there just wasn't the pin-you-back-in-your-seat feel. Could this be partially due to Fiona being well along in her pregnancy? (Word has it the baby is due in April.) Could it be getting used to Martha and Duke? Who knows, but I noticed that Elijah Rock didn't quite rock with the force it normally has. They did jam it out nicely, but just a bit softer than I'm used to.

My reaction to the first set could also be influenced by the new songs they are trotting out. The band recently rented out a house in upstate New York, turned it into a recording studio, and went on a writing binge (shades of Big Pink!). New songs were sprinkled throughout the night, including Glenn's One More Time, and Fiona's Remember to Forget - both in the first set.

Martha's singing style was also a factor. She was nearly whisper quiet, even on her own songs. I found myself alternatively struggling to hear her lyrics, and wanting the sound man to add more vocals to the house mix. To be fair to Martha, she sings and plays with intense feeling, and simply brought the house down with her lead vocals on Abilene in the second set.

Not to mention that watching the guitar interplay between Martha and the incredible Duke Levine was a highlight throughout the night. You could tell how much Martha was enjoying Duke's playing, with her eyes closed and head bent in his direction, a look of bliss on her face.

Oh, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that Byron was playing a stunningly beautiful stand up bass. It was so fitting for the small room and tiny stage.

Although the band is writing more and more songs, we were still treated to a good smattering of traditional songs, one Ola Belle Reed song (I've Endured, sung by Fiona), a Buddy Holly treat (Raining in my Heart, also sung by Fiona), and a simply gorgeous and harmonious rendering of Garcia and Hunter's Ripple (Fiona on lead vocals).

While they may have started slow, Ollabelle found its voice in the second set, and we left very satisfied.

Photo note: I took all the photos you see on this page with my trusty Canon Rebel, and you can see the full photo set on Flickr.

Ollabelle, with Martha Scanlan & Duke Levine
Club Passim, Cambridge, MA
Thursday, March 5, 2009

Set 1:
Elijah Rock (Traditional)
One More Time
Gone Today
Remember to Forget
John the Revelator (Traditional)
Seeds of the Pine (Martha Scanlan)
I Don't Even Have to Ask (Martha Scanlan)
Jesus on the Mainline (Traditional)
I've Endured (Ola Belle Reed)

Set 2:
Brotherly Love
Raining in My Mind
Blue Northern Lights
The West Was Burning (Martha Scanlan)
Abilene (Composer?)
Move On
Raining in my Heart (Buddy Holly)
Get Back Temptation
Ripple (Robert Hunter/Jerry Garcia)
Encore: ? (I feel like such a slacker for not recognizing the encore!)

Concert Report: Paul Rishell and Annie Raines at Club Passim

2009-01-25T11:03:00.001-08:00

Blues duo Paul Rishell and Annie Raines (Paul and Annie) played nearly two hours of masterful acoustic country blues last night at the legendary Club Passim, just off of Harvard Square in Cambridge, MA. The house was nearly at Passim's full capacity of 125 people, and the audience was attentive and appreciative.

Paul and Annie features Paul on guitar and Annie on blues harmonica, with both sharing vocal duties. Paul mostly played his gorgeous National Reso-Phonic guitar, and Annie switched to an equally beautiful Rigel mandolin on a few tunes.

One of the things I most appreciate about Paul and Annie is their knowledge of blues history and the old time blues masters. We heard Paul tell stories of Scrapper Blackwell, Jelly Roll Morton, Washington Phillips, and Bo Carter. Annie told us of Ma Rainey ("Mother of the Blues") and Bessie Smith. By far the most jaw-dropping story of the night was told by Paul about Tommy Johnson. Tommy, it seems, had his demons and addictions, not unlike many of the blues legends. Tommy's particular problem was alcohol, and he was known to drink anything and everything that had alcohol in it, including hair tonic, shoe polish, and, yes, sterno - which is also known as "canned heat". Thus the origin of Tommy's Canned Heat Blues (not to mention the origin of the name of the Canned Heat band from the 60s):

I woked up, up this morning, with canned heat on my mind
Woked up this morning, canned heat was on my mind
Woke up this morning, with canned heat, Lord, on my mind
Crying, Lord, Lord, I wonder, canned heat, Lord, killing me

I was thrilled to hear Paul say a few kind words about another of my musical heros, Spider John Koerner, followed by a great rendition of Spider John's Good Luck Child.

Audience favorites included Paul and Annie's own Got To Fly, an infectious and catchy tune that Annie sings, as well as the rousing Old Man Mose (a Louis Armstrong composition). We were singing along on both tunes, particularly well on the latter's chorus in a call-and-response fashion:

Now one time there lived an old man
With a very crooked nose
He lived inside a log hut
and they called him ol' man Mose
One dark and dreary morning I knocked upon his door
I didn't hear a single sound
so I ain't gonna do it no more.

'cos I believe ol' man, I believe ol' man
I believe ol' man, that ol' man Mose is dead.
I believe ol' man, I believe ol' man
I believe ol' man, that ol' man Mose is dead.

The evening's songs ranged from achingly slow and beautiful (It'll Be Me/I'll Be Looking For You), to the tongue-in-cheek humorous (Bessie Smith's You Been a Good Ol' Wagon), to soulful gospel (Washington Phillips' I Had A Good Father and Mother), to rousing blues (Johnny Winter's Dallas).

If you see that Paul and Annie are going to be playing near you, give 'em a chance. You won't be disappointed.

As always, here are some YouTube clips to give you an idea. First up, a short clip of Paul and Annie doing Johnny Winter's Dallas. This really showcases Paul's vocals and National Steel guitar:

And on this clip, Annie's blues harmonica will blow you away:

The setlist:

Paul Rishell & Annie Raines
Passim Folk Music and Cultural Center, Cambridge, MA
Saturday, January 24, 2009

Set 1:
Custard Pie (Blind Boy Fuller)
Trouble Blues (Scrapper Blackwell)
Honey It Must Be Love (Blind Willie McTell)
It'll Be Me / I'll Be Looking For You (Jack Clement / Paul Rishell)
Got To Fly (Annie Raines / Paul Rishell)
I'm Gonna Jump and Shout (author?)
Black-Eyed Blues (Ma Rainey)
Dallas (Johnny Winter)

Set 2:
Ragtime Millionaire (William Moore)
You Been a Good Ol' Wagon (Bessie Smith)
Michigan Water Blues (Jelly Roll Morton)
Old Man Mose (Louis Armstrong / Zilner Randolph)
I Had A Good Father and Mother (Washington Phillips)
You're The One (Jimmy Rogers)
That Old Heartbreak (author?)
I Get The Blues (Bo Carter)
Canned Heat Blues (Tommy Johnson)
Good Luck Child (Spider John Koerner)
Encore: Some These Days (Charlie Patton)

Photography Notes: This was my second outing with my new Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS lens, and I must say I am loving it. A full set of 22 pictures are posted in a Flickr set if you want to see more than just the ~~three~~ four I included here. I did crop each photo, and also used an unsharp mask on each. I didn't do any color adjustments, though, and you can see that the lighting color on Annie was vastly different than on Paul - Paul's skin looks quite natural, while Annie is bathed in a pretty ghastly orange-yellow. I was tempted, but I left Annie's color alone - she really did look that way. Also I couldn't really do much with that Passim banner in the background which, from my vantage point, split both Paul and Annie right down the middle of their heads.

Concert Report: Lucy Kaplansky @ Tupelo Music Hall

2009-01-17T10:12:00.000-08:00

Patti and I last saw Lucy Kaplansky at our favorite local venue, the Tupelo Music Hall, just about a year ago. She was back again last night, on a single-digit cold Friday night. Lucy seemed genuinely thankful for the turnout when the crowd let her know that, yes, this was cold even by New Hampshire standards; the room was probably at a bit more than half capacity.

Lucy opened with her haunting cover of the traditional Scottish song, Loch Lomond, one of the ~~three~~ four as-yet unrecorded covers she performed during her 75-minute set.

The second cover of the night was a beautiful rendition of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, performed on the Tupelo's baby grand piano. Lucy said this was the first time she had performed that particular song in concert. I am all for having this in her regular rotation. I guess most people are familiar with the Rufus Wainwright version used in the Shrek soundtrack, but there are a ton of wonderful covers (including, now, Lucy's!). I just had a blast browsing through a bunch of versions on YouTube, including versions by Jeff Buckley, K.D. Lang, Bob Dylan (a live audience recording), Sheryl Crow, John Cale (!), Bon Jovi (that one was a surprise), Allison Crowe (wow, who is she and why haven't I heard her before? fantastic voice!), and of course a version by Cohen himself.

Also covered on the baby grand, later in the set, was Lucy's version of Lennon and McCartney's "Let It Be." We also heard that last year, and it would take me a long time to tire of hearing her sing it. Lucy mentioned that she is considering a new CD containing nothing but stripped down live take versions of covers such as Loch Lomond, Hallelujah, and Let It Be. A number of us in the audience did our best to encourage her to do it. Personally I'd love an album like that. Even more so if she included one or more of her dad's songs, which she said it would.

Speaking of her dad (the late mathematician Irving Kaplansky), Lucy told of recently taking her daughter, Molly, to the New York Hall of Science. One of the current exhibits is a math exhibit (Mathematica: A World of Numbers), and Lucy couldn't help but break down in tears when she spotted a photo of her dad in the exhibit. She explained to Molly how much it meant to her to see her dad in the exhibit. This must have made quite an impression, as weeks later Molly (who is all of 6 years old) was talking about how she wanted to grow up and do math, just like her grandpa. Oh, and our Irving Kaplansky cover song of the night was A Song About Pi.

After performing Hallelujah and her own Just You Tonight on piano Lucy switched back to guitar to "lighten it up." I asked her if that was even possible, and she said something like "for a little while, at least." So Patti and I shared a laugh when she then launched into Don't Mind Me, a song about maniacal obsession, followed by Scorpion, arguably another song about maniacal obsession!

Don't mind me
I'm just a bit maniacal about you
And derailed when I'm without you
Don't mind me

Gonna sting you with a kiss from my lips
Gonna sting you with a piece of my mind
Gonna sting you with a taste of my skin
Then you're mine, then you're mine

Here's a nice version of Scorpion from YouTube, probably from sometime in the past year or two:

Another good example of Lucy's work, and also a song we were treated to toward the end of the set, is this version of Lucy performing Ring of Fire:

The set ending Guinevere was a nice treat of an oldie. Lucy recorded this Robin Batteau song on her first album, The Tide, originally released in 1994. It's nice to hear a song that isn't in regular rotation anymore.

The set list:

Loch Lomond (Traditional)
Line in the Sand
Mother's Day
Ten Year Night
Manhattan Moon
Somewhere Out There
Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen)
Just You Tonight
Don't Mind Me
Scorpion
More Than This
A Song About Pi (Irving Kaplansky)
When You Love Someone
Sleep Little Darling
Let It Be (Lennon/McCartney)
Ring of Fire (June Carter/Merle Kilgore)
Guinevere (Robin Batteau)
Encore: The Red Thread

The opening act was Karen Grenier, a local artist from Nashua, NH. Strong voice and good guitar skills, she played a nice seven song set. Some of her own songs, including the opening When I Say I Love You and closing One Life were just a tad too close to sounding like Indigo Girls wanna-be songs for my taste. Not that that is bad, but I preferred songs like Superhero, which to my ear just sounded like her own voice rather than an imitation. The set highlight for me, though, was an incredibly strong version of Tom Waits' Jersey Girl. She gets two thumbs up from me for that cover alone. Her set:

When I Say I Love You
Both Sides Now (Joni Mitchell)
Superhero
Love Will Come
Jersey Girl (Tom Waits)
One Life

Photographic notes: I posted the two photos above, along with four others, in a flickr photo set. The photos, as posted, are straight out of the camera with no post-processing (although resized down via the Flickr Uploadr application). This was my first chance to try out my new Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS lens. I do like having some zoom ability, but I also did miss the f/1.8 aperture of my fixed 50mm lens. I shot in shutter speed priority mode at 1/50 sec., ISO 1600. I think I like the piano shot the best. I wish I had the ability to take lots of shots and really play around, but the Tupelo is such a small and audience-focused venue that I am always very conservative - never taking more than about 10 or 12 shots during an entire show, and trying to be as non-distracting to the other patrons (and the artists) as possible. To me, even the sound of my shutter going off is too loud in that environment.

Reflections on the Great Ice Storm

2008-12-24T17:28:00.001-08:00

All of the photos in this post are available in a photo set on flickr, The Great Ice Storm. You can also click on any of them here to see a higher resolution version.

It Rained
It rained. On Thursday, December 11, 2008, it rained. We didn't pay it much attention. After all, it was just a steady rain. Oh, maybe there was the small observation that we haven't had much rain lately. But it was more a wet annoyance than anything else.

I went to dinner with a group from work that night. End of the year celebration and all that. We had a great time with food and drink, without giving the weather a second thought. When I neared home around 8 or 9pm I noticed the temperature was dropping, and some small branches were down on the back roads near my house. Didn't think much of it though. Just some crap in the road. Not all that unusual.

But the temperature continued to drop.

The lights flickered several times around 10pm. I knew what was coming. Well, I knew we would lose power; I really had no clue what was coming. No clue at all.

The power was still on when we went to bed around 11pm. Shortly after the trees started falling. No, falling isn't the right word. Shattering is more like it. SNAP. CRACK. A frightening sound, when a tree branch shatters under the weight of all that ice. Think of the sound of a baseball bat shattering upon impact with a fastball down the middle of the plate. Now amplify that up to the size of a tree.

Did the power go out before we started hearing trees shatter, or after? I don't know. The sequence is lost in the dreamy drifting in and out of sleep of that night. But I do know that the trees continued to shatter. All night long.

The World Is Ice
Morning comes. No power. Outside, ice. Everything is covered with ice.

The trees are bending to the ground in submission. And the world is oddly black and white, as if the ice has sucked the color out of everything.

And destruction. Holy crap. There was a war, and the trees were bombed. Thirty, forty, fifty feet up they snapped and shattered.

Many small trees didn't stand a chance.

It doesn't take a genius to understand that travel will be treacherous. Roads will be blocked.

There Is No Power
The numbers are old news by now. What was it, somewhere north of one million people without power in the five northeast states? In New Hampshire alone, almost 400,000 were without power. Even today, almost two weeks later, there are about 2,000 poor souls who haven't been restored. Public Service of New Hampshire (PSNH) reports that it has restrung more than 120 miles of power cable, replaced more than 250 broken poles, 16,000 fuses, and 1,500 transformers. They don't do that in an entire normal year, no less in a couple of days. But the numbers alone don't tell the story.

We started preparing that first day long before darkness took over. Emergency lanterns. Mag lights and other flashlights. Batteries. The emergency supply of water from the basement. The emergency one-burner butane cook stove. Inventory of easy to prepare food. Check. Check. Check. Check. Check. And check. Surely the power will be back on soon, but these are the necessary steps you take when you lose power during winter in New England.

We ventured out in the afternoon. The Shaws grocery store in Derry was open and operating under emergency power. What an odd experience. A bare minimum of dim emergency lights. All of the open cold cases, normally stocked with milk and OJ and eggs and meat, are empty and dark; all of that stuff was evacuated to power-safe locations in the middle of the night. The freezer aisles are still stocked, but blocked off to prevent anyone from opening the case doors and letting the precious cold air out. The water aisle is pillaged, but we score some; without the ability to run our well pump, we are entirely dependent on our emergency supply. Tuna fish and canned soup are gold.

By 3pm we worry about the house getting cold. Our friend, Mark, is our lifeline. Mark heats with a woodstove, and he stockpiles wood on his property the way a squirrel prepares for a long winter. We can use our fireplace woodstove insert as an emergency heat source. It isn't nearly as good as an honest-to-goodness wooodstove, but it will keep the house out of the danger zone. After a trek to Mark's to bring home two recycling bins of wood, the stove is generating heat. Patti and I laugh when I go to plug in the woodstove fan power cord. D'oh! But soon the living room is above 60 degrees F.

Without the ability to circulate heat out of the woodstove via its fan, we burn wood at probably four or five times the normal rate. Mark is a trooper, though, and he keeps us supplied. We average two to three bins a day, with the living room hovering around 60. Rooms further away are down to 50. The basement is 45. The pipes won't freeze. We are thankful. Monitoring the temperature becomes a fundamental activity, particularly when the outside temperature drops into the mid-teens on Saturday night.

In all, we were without power for eight and a half days. They were exhausting days. Our supply of water, batteries, butane, and wood become our primary focus. We sleep in sleeping bags on the living room floor, near the woodstove. Sure as hell can't sleep on our now stone cold waterbed, much to the dismay of our cat.

The house is a wreck. Everything is dirty. Between the dirt from burning wood, and conservation of our bottled water supply, daily activity clean up is nowhere near normal. I wonder, what did the pioneers ever do without Clorox Wipes?

We may be running out of clean clothes, but showers at work are a blessing.

Our cat, GK, a creature of habit if there ever was one, is freaked. He has this look that says, "SRSLY, WTF?"

The tropical fish tank water temperature is well below the safe zone. The neon tetras are dead within three days, but Pleco the plecostomus hangs in. He's got a lot of body mass, and he appears to go into a state of semi-hibernation. We establish a pattern of filling the tea kettle with bottled Poland Springs water, heating it on the wood stove, and using it to bring the water temperature up a few degrees. We don't really know if it helps Pleco at all, but it makes us feel better.

We emptied both refrigerators, as well as the upright freezer, on Sunday afternoon. It started when we noticed a puddle of water under the fridge in the kitchen. Sh*t, there goes a whole bunch of food. But at least we have curbside garbage pickup, and tomorrow morning is garbage day. All three appliances are spic and span. Better to do it now, before it becomes a battle against rotting smell.

The sound of portable gas generators fill the neighborhood, but we don't have one. People wait in lines at Home Depot for daily shipments.

Eight long days of this. Sure, going to work helps. But we're distracted, and tired, and scattered.

Twitter Shines Brightly
Coming home after work at night was the most difficult. It would be all too easy to let depression get the better of you. You drive toward your home, seeing houses and neighborhoods brightly light with restored power. But as you near home it all goes dark, except for the dimmest of lights coming from houses with generators. You wander around the house with a headlamp and a flashlight, feeling like a stranger. It's your house, but it isn't home. (Credit for that last line goes to my friend Carolyn. Actually, her exact words were, "Impossible to explain being a refugee in your own home... you just want to go home, but you're already there, and it's not home." Exactly.)

Our twitter community kept us sane, though. Patti and I both have lightweight twitter clients on our smartphones, and the ability to stay in contact became far more important than I would have thought. Some of it was the solidarity (misery loves company?) among the many of us without power. We stayed in touch, and rejoiced when one of us was restored. We were warmed by invitations to come to friends' houses. We were touched by expressions of concern from those near and far. And we were able to shout out to the world; twitter became a cathartic outlet. I smile looking back at my twitter stream. Just a few posts:

Sunday night: have another guinness. throw some more wood in the stove. fall asleep reading in the dark, with cat on lap. my house. tonight.

Monday night: one of our 6 volt battery lanterns hit the too dim stage. OTOH, i scored D batteries today. we measure quality of life by batteries & water

Tuesday: PSNH told my neighbor "maybe Thurs, Fri, or Sat. But maybe next week." Translation: we dunno

Tuesday: Score! 2 butane fuel cartridges and 2 6 volt lantern batteries at Ace Hardware in Concord, MA. Living high on the hog tonight!

Wednesday morning: a hot cup of freshly brewed coffee and the morning paper bring a sense of normalcy

Wednesday night: I know! Let's sit in the dark and read by flashlight! <sarcasm>Again.</sarcasm>

Thursday: at first those PSNH restoration estimates seemed so full of progress and hope. now they just seem like taunts, don't they?

Friday morning: Day 8 begins. PSNH telling us there are only 30,000 customers to go does not bring joy. Where is my fricking power?

Friday afternoon: When I woke up this morning I wondered what would come first - restored power, or the snowstorm? Yea, you guessed it. The snowstorm is here

Friday night: Dear Santa, All I want for Christmas is for MY FRICKING POWER TO BE RESTORED AGAIN. Yours truly, Tommy

Saturday morning: Day 9 of power outage hell begins. Oh boy, I can use snowblowing the driveway as a diversion from my other survival activities.

And then at 11:12am on Saturday: OMG OMG OMG!!!!! WE HAVE POWER!!!!!! WE HAVE POWER!!!!!!!!!!

Beauty
Yea, so the week was hell. But on that first Friday morning I grabbed my camera and walked around. And what I was most attracted to was the beauty of the small, rather than the large. Some examples:

Perspective
Some perspective is called for. My first thought here is that the region got lucky on that first Friday, because the temperature went up to the high 30s rather than the other way. Had the region gone into a deep freeze while all that ice was still in the trees, it would have been far worse; no question. But with higher temperatures on Friday, and the help of the sun, much of the ice melted and set the trees free. As bad as the ice storm and power outage was, New England dodged an even bigger bullet.

And next, really, all this only amounted to a week or so of inconvenience. Sure, we worried about freezing pipes. And chimney fires. And I understand there was at least one death because of carbon monoxide poisoning. And yes, some people had damage to their houses and cars from trees and branches falling into them. But for the vast majority of us in the region, it really amounted to a major pain in the ass. Nothing more.

Not like my former colleague and friend, Lucille, whose house in Biloxi, Mississippi was hit by Katrina. I remember her description of the first floor of her house. She said something like this: it was as if someone had filled the first floor with 6 feet of water...and then turned the blender on.

Or Ellen Isaacs in California. Her description of losing her house in the Ormsby Fire ("solving the mouse problem once and for all") in March 2008 puts our power outage in its rightfully puny perspective.

Within days, heck, within hours, of having our power restored we were back to normal - heat, lights, wireless network, cable, the works. But for Lucille, and Ellen, and thousands more, well, some of them are still putting the pieces back together. So I will count myself as inconvenienced for a week, but very fortunate.

But I sure as hell am getting a stand-by backup generator running on liquid propane. Never again!

Concert Review - David Bromberg @ Newburyport City Hall Auditorium

2008-11-29T14:20:00.001-08:00

Wow. This was special. David Bromberg played a solo acoustic show last night at the Newburyport City Hall Auditorium. I have seen David play in all sort of configurations - with the David Bromberg Big Band, with the acoustic David Bromberg Quartet, with the Angel Band, and with Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Cassidy in an acoustic Hot Tuna Bromberg format. But solo acoustic is a rarity and a special treat.

Like so many other supremely talented musicians, Bromberg isn't as well known as he should be. He plays an eclectic range of styles that mixes bluegrass, blues, folk, and rock in his own unique way. As a music major at Columbia University in the early to mid 60s, Bromberg was shaped by the Greenwich Village music scene of the time. He studied finger-picking blues guitar from the Reverend "Blind" Gary Davis by exchanging lessons for helping to lead the Reverend to his gigs; imagine being a human seeing eye dog for a blues guitar legend! Bromberg has been a sideman studio guitarist on literally hundreds of albums, including records by Bob Dylan, The Eagles, Ringo Starr, Willie Nelson, and Carly Simon. He co-wrote one song, "The Holdup" with George Harrison, and has played with the likes of Jerry Garcia (who appeared on two of Bromberg's albums), Tom Rush, Vassar Clements, and more.

The Newburyport City Hall was built in 1851, and it includes an honest to goodness auditorium right in it. It's not ornate, but it does have surprisingly good acoustics. The sound was bright and clear with no noticeable echoes. The floor was set with folding chairs; I estimated about 250 chairs on the floor and probably another 100 or 150 seats in the balcony that ringed three sides of the hall.

You know those crystals that swell to one hundred times their size in water? Bromberg reminds me of that. I mean, when you look at the man you think nothing of him. In his own words you just see "an average, overweight, middle age, Jewish guy." But like those crystals in water, he swells to a hundred times his normal size on stage. He has a command of the stage, and a performing presence, that strikes awe. This is equally true when he is performing something slow and sad, such as "Watch Baby Fall" or rip roaring like his unique version of "Statesboro Blues."

We got the full range of Bromberg's styles during the 90-minute set. Some of it was Bromberg's own humor infused songs, including "Demon in Disguise", "Black and Tan", and "Tongue". His cover of Big Bill Broonzy's "Long Tall Mama" fits equally well in this category:

I got a long tall mama
She stands about seven foot nine
I got a long tall mama
She stands about seven foot nine
When it comes to making love she hollers
Lordy, Davey, take your time

We also got a good mix of the heartfelt, including a beautiful show version of Dylan's "It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry" Bromberg's own "Watch Baby Fall" (there's a song that can make you cry), and Ian Tyson's "Summer Wages". The latter is a song that I consider signature Bromberg, even if it is a cover; his version is so fine he simply owns the song. He called Annie Raines up to the stage to accompany him on harmonica for a rare "Going to Germany", a World War I era song he was inspired to do because of the WWI memorial plaques lining the downstairs hallway in the city hall. Another treat was an instrumental "Over the Rainbow", as well as the show ending "Mr. Bojangles".

And we had our fill of the blues. From the traditional "Delia's Gone" (a song about the murder of fourteen-year-old Delia Green in Savannah in 1900), to Robert Johnson's "Come On In My Kitchen", the Reverend Gary Davis' "Maple Leaf Rag", and Tommy Johnson's "Big Road Blues."

Most of the set was solo Bromberg, but he did call his wife, Nancy Josephson, to the stage a little more than half way through his set, and she accompanied him on a standup electric bass and with harmony vocals. There were a few humorous moments between them when David started playing songs which she has never done before, but she was a trooper and it all went without a hitch.

I looked around on YouTube for something that would capture what Bromberg is like today, and this studio piece of him talking about the Reverend Gary Davis and then playing "Maple Leaf Rag" seemed to be the overall best to give you a sense of the man:

The opening act, Paul Rishell & Annie Raines, was a fantastic surprise. Although their names were familiar to me, I was not familiar with their music at all. Their acoustic blues floored the entire audience, with Paul playing a National Steel guitar and Annie on kick-ass harmonica, and both sharing vocal duties. Their thirty minute set ranged from Spider John Koerner's "Good Luck Child", to Scrapper Blackwell's "Trouble Blues", to their own infectious "Got To Fly" which included an audience call and response. More than a handful of us headed to the merchandise table to pick up their CDs at the break.

I was disappointed that I couldn't find a version of "Got To Fly" on YouTube, but here's a small snippet of Paul and Annie performing "Louise" that very much tells the tale:

The set list...

David Bromberg
Friday, November 28, 2008
City Hall Auditorium, Newburyport, MA

Solo:
Demon In Disguise
Black and Tan
It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry
Try Me One More Time
Come On In My Kitchen
Delia's Gone
Maple Leaf Rag
Big Road Blues
Long Tall Mama
Levee Camp Moan
Watch Baby Fall

With Nancy Josephson on upright electric bass:
Don't Let Your Deal Go Down
Summer Wages
Who's Lovin' You Tonight
Dark Hollow
Going to Germany
Over the Rainbow (instrumental)
Tongue

Encore 1 (solo):
Statesboro Blues

Encore 2 (w/ Nancy):
Mr. Bojangles

Opening Act
Paul Rishell & Annie Raines:
Custard Pie
Honey It Must Be Love
It'll Be Me / I'll Be Looking For You
Good Luck Child
You Been A Good Ol' Wagon
Trouble Blues
Got To Fly

Concert Report - Janis Ian @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-11-22T12:56:00.001-08:00

Patti and I were back in our front row seats at Tupelo Music Hall this past Thursday night for an evening with Grammy award-winning singer/songwriter Janis Ian.

For many in the audience, Janis is an icon and a legend and we greeted her warmly and paid rapt attention to her every word. Janis' concerts have a leisurely pace, and are as much about her stories as they are about the music. Three stories from Thursday night stood out for me.

The first was her recounting of the events surrounding her first hit single, "Society's Child" in the mid-1960s. This song is about an interracial romance between a white girl and her African American boyfriend, and the societal pressures that ensue from the girl's family, classmates, and teachers. Written when Janis was just 14 years old, it thrust her into the spotlight of the civil rights movement, and propelled her from playing 50 seat clubs to 1,500 seat halls almost overnight. She told of the controversy it generated in those racially turbulent times - a radio station in Atlanta was burned for playing it, and disc jockeys who played it were fired. And she told of hateful racial epithets being hurled at her as she sung the song, and her discovery of courage and the power of song to overcome hate and racism. Imagine a barely 5 foot tall Jewish teenager from New York mustering the courage to face bigotry and racism with lyrics and guitar (Janis mentioned the slogan written on Woody Guthrie's guitar: this machine kills fascists).

Come to my door, baby,
Face is clean and shining black as night
My mama went to answer
You know that you looked so fine
Now I could understand the tears and the shame
She called you "boy" instead of your name
When she wouldn't let you inside
When she turned and said
"But honey, he's not our kind."

Janis ended the first set with a long and well-practiced story of her mom. It built from the innocence of her mom's clumsy ways as a source of family humor, to the sober realization of the slow onset of multiple sclerosis as the real cause of mom's pratfalls, to the onset of depression and dementia. The description of her mom's last night left not a dry eye in the house, and was followed by "I Hear You Sing Again", a song that Janis finished based on unreleased Woody Guthrie lyrics:

If I could only hear my mother sing again
If I could close my eyes and hear your voice as then
All the friends and family
would sing along with me,
and set your spirit free

In my heart I hear you sing again
Every note as natural as then
and when I sing those songs
for family and friends,
in my heart I hear you sing again

The third story preceded the humorous "Married in London." Janis is openly gay, and she recounted getting married to her partner in Toronto, and the amazing feeling of being treated as "normal" for once in her life. As much as we were all crying when she spoke of her mother's death, we were all bursting with joy and pride to hear this story of love and committment.

We're married in London
but not in New York
Spain says we're kosher
The States say we're pork
We wed in Toronto
The judge said "Amen"
and when we got home
we were single again

One nice surprise was the slow treatment given to John Lennon and Paul McCartney's "Love Me Do." It's nice to hear such a familiar song given a well-done alternate delivery. We also were treated to, of course, Janis' most famous song - the 1975 Grammy award winning "At Seventeen." It's likely that if you have no idea who Janis is, you have heard this song:

I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
and high school girls with clear skinned smiles
who married young and then retired
The valentines I never knew
The Friday night charades of youth
were spent on one more beautiful
At seventeen I learned the truth

And those of us with ravaged faces
lacking in the social graces
desperately remained at home
inventing lovers on the phone
who called to say - come dance with me
and murmured vague obscenities
It isn't all it seems at seventeen

Want to learn or hear more? Head over to the Free Music Downloads page on janisian.com for some free MP3s; count Janis among the enlightened musicians who understand that freely sharing her music is the absolute best way to sell more music and concert tickets. And, as always, YouTube is our friend...

"When The Party's Over" is a song that you might recognize from some FM airplay:

Another interesting thing that YouTube allows is to compare Janis "back then" and Janis today. Try these:

Finally, how about a little humor? "Married in London":

Oh, the photo at the top of this post is mine. I have a few more that I took posted on flickr.

The set list:

Set 1:
Through The Years
When The Party's Over
Society's Child
From Me To You
Silly Habits
My Autobiography
I Hear You Sing Again (Woody Guthrie/Janis Ian)

Set 2:
Love Me Do (Lennon/McCartney)
Tea & Sympathy
Light a Light
Watercolors
Married in London
At Seventeen
Encore: Jesse

Concert Report - John Gorka, Cliff Eberhardt, & Eliza Gilkyson @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-11-16T10:06:00.000-08:00

Humorously billing themselves as "Longing for Eliza", or even better yet, "Laugh Laugh Laugh" (see this if you don't get the reference), John Gorka, Cliff Eberhardt, and Eliza Gilkyson took to the Tupelo Music Hall stage last night. Once again Patti and I were sitting up front, not more than about 6-feet from John and Eliza, and maybe a whole 12 feet from Cliff!

We've seen all three of these Red House recording artists solo before, but tonight they were all on stage together in a songwriter's circle format. Unlike Cry Cry Cry, they stuck to their own songs with minimal backing vocals and guitar here and there helping each other out. The notable exceptions to this were the opening and closing numbers, both Gorka tunes, but executed as a trio, ala Cry Cry Cry. The energy and power of these two tunes made me wish for more of this, rather than the one at a time format; "Good Noise" indeed, as that closing song reminded us.

As with Cry Cry Cry a decade ago (has it been that long? wow.), you could feel how much these three artists were enjoying the company and companionship of each other. The solo artist gig must feel a bit lonely after a while, and sharing the road and stage for a change was clearly uplifting to all three. It was particularly interesting to see Eliza concentrating on John and Cliff's songs, learning parts and softly singing away from the microphone.

The show was two sets, with the first lasting nearly 90 minutes and the second around an hour. Some of the length was due to the leisurely banter between the artists; there was no hurry, but the audience didn't mind.

Highlights? I was surprised by Gorka pulling out his classic "I Saw a Stranger With Your Hair" early in the first set; I expected this to show up more towards the end of the show. No complaints from me though, as "Stranger with Your Hair" and "Heart Upon Demand" are I think Gorka's two best songs ever; we didn't get the former though.

The best song sequence of the night was Gorka's "Writing in the Margins" followed by Eliza's beautiful "Jedidiah 1777." Gorka's song was inspired by a conversation he had with an Iraq war veteran. It is written from the perspective of a soldier, writing a letter to his loved one back home. Eliza's "Jedidiah 1777" is based on letters written by her ancestor, Brig. Gen. Jedidiah Huntington. Jedidiah fought in the Revolutionary War with George Washington, and participated in the dreadful Valley Forge winter encampment in 1777.

As always, I encourage you to check out some YouTube samples if you aren't familiar with these three wonderful artists. Recommendations:

John singing "I Saw a Stranger With Your Hair"
Eliza singing "Jedidiah 1777"
Cliff singing "The Long Road"

The photos above are mine, and you can see a few more that I took on Flickr.

The set list:

Set 1:
When She Kisses Me (Gorka)
The Party's Over (Eliza)
Money Don't Care for Me (Cliff)
I Saw A Stranger With Your Hair (Gorka)
Think About You (Eliza)
It's Home Everywhere I Go (Cliff)
Writing in the Margins (Gorka)
Jedidiah 1777 (Eliza)
Only in Heaven (Cliff)
Branching Out (Gorka)
He Waits for Me (Eliza)
The High Above and the Down Below (Cliff)

Set 2:
The Long Road (Cliff)
When You Walk On (Eliza)
Ignorance and Privilege (Gorka)
Love Slips Away (Cliff)
Mama's Got a Boyfriend (Eliza)
Mean Streak (Gorka)
Sugartown (Cliff)
Beautiful World (Eliza)
That's How Legends Are Made (Gorka)
That Kind of Love (Cliff)
Wildwood Spring (Eliza)
Good Noise (Gorka)

Concert Report - Rory Block @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-11-15T14:59:00.000-08:00

We were back at the Tupelo Music Hall last night for a nearly two-hour solo set by Rory Block, a master of the Mississippi Delta Country Blues style.

Patti and I have seen Rory, oh I dunno, maybe five or six times going back to around 1990 or 1991. Each time I am struck by both her mastery of the acoustic blues, as well as her encyclopedic knowledge of the blues masters. She is a walking history book, telling tales of Robert Johnson, Son House, Muddy Waters, Mississippi John Hurt, Reverend Gary Davis, and others. Some of this is first-hand knowledge, as she left home at the age of 15 to seek out and learn from the blues pioneers who were still alive. Her stories give insight into the men and the music. I never tire of hearing her compare and contrast the guitar styles of Robert Johnson and Son House, or of her demonstration of how to find the tuning for old country blues songs.

Patti and I were right up front at Table 3, and my seat couldn't have been but about six feet from her. I was so close that I was hesitant to take too many photos, but you can see how close I was from the photo at left, as well as three others I posted to Flickr.

As is typical of her shows, the set started with a bunch of Robert Johnson and Son House tunes. We also got our fair share of her own songs, including "Lovin' Whisky", "Like a Shotgun", and at fan request both "Silver Wings" and "Gypsie Boy." She told a wonderful story of Stevie Wonder singing on the latter tune on her 1986 I've Got a Rock in My Sock album. (Side note: David Bromberg and Taj Mahal also appear on that album.)

As with most artists these days, you can get a good feel for their live shows from YouTube. If you aren't familiar with Rory, here are a couple of clips to get you started:

Silver Wings, one of Rory's own compositions
Crossroad Blues, by Robert Johnson
Preaching Blues, by Son House
Me and the Devil, another Robert Johnson number

The set list:

Crossroad Blues (Robert Johnson)
County Farm (Son House)
Me and the Devil (Robert Johnson)
Death Letter (Son House)
Preaching Blues (Son House)
Rambling on My Mind (Robert Johnson)
Declare
Lovin' Whiskey
Don't You Mind People Grinning In Your Face (Son House)
Like a Shotgun
I Be Bound (Muddy Waters)
From the Dust
Silver Wings
Gypsie Boy
Encore (a cappella): Ain't No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down (Claude Ely)

City of Manchester Half Marathon - A Fine Box of Chocolates

2008-11-02T13:32:00.001-08:00

As a runner, the Forrest Gump quote about life being like a box of chocolates resonates with me. When going out for a run, or starting a race, you never know what you're gonna get. Most of the time, of course, it is average. Sometimes it really sucks. And every once in a while, it is really, really special. For me, for today, the City of Manchester Half Marathon was one of those really, really special days. Far better than I could have dreamed.

Going in, I wasn't at all confident. A week ago I had a Charley horse type of cramp in my left foot, and I've been worried about the resulting soreness ever since (shhhh, don't tell Patti!). The higher my weekly mileage goes, the more I get unexpected cramps in my legs and feet. I am fairly certain I get enough potassium, so I suspect I'm not getting enough magnesium.

And then this morning, when I saw below freezing temperatures at 6am, I started to question my sanity. The weather forecast was for 34 degrees Fahrenheit at the 8:50am start time. "Ugh, I'm doing this why?"

I met up with Dan and Marty for the start. These two guys are even more nuts than I am - they're doing the full marathon. But we're compatible runners, and Marty and Dan decide to run with me despite my warning them that I was planning on running steady 7:50 miles for a 1:42:00 target finish time. Dan's pace in this same race a year ago averaged out to 8:17 miles, and Marty's averaged to 8:23. Using me as a "rabbit" for the first half of their marathon really didn't seem like a smart idea to me.

We were shivering at the starting line. The wind was whipping down Elm Street, and we were standing in shade. The loudspeakers played the slowest version of the national anthem known to exist, making the starting gun anticipation all that much worse. And then we were off...

I thought the first mile would be really slow. After all, we were mid-pack, and it takes a long time for the pack to thin out. The first quarter mile, in particular, felt like a shuffle. And so I was shocked (as were Dan and Marty) when we passed the Mile 1 clock at 7:44. Really? 7:44? How could that be? It felt so slow.

OK, I thought, let me just find that 7:50 pace. I'm usually good like that - I can find a pace and lock into it with little variance, often just plus-or-minus 5 seconds per mile. Mile 2 passed in 7:55. OK, not bad, maybe a tad slow. Then a 7:36 mile 3, despite the first half of that being all uphill; I swear Marty set the pace on that hill. But, woah, that was way faster than I expected. On the other hand, I felt great. This is a stroll.

And so it went. When I felt really strong after a 7:30 mile 8, I decided I could pick it up for the final 5 miles. I dropped Dan and Marty with a 7:18 mile 9; good to know those guys have some sense.

Me, Marty, and Dan at Mile 8; my smile is from Patti's cheering:

And the rest of my race went like a dream. Each of the last six miles was under 7:30, with an extra kick (somewhat gravity assisted) 6:53 mile 13. Runners dream of "negative splits" when they race - running the second half of a race faster than the first half. It is far easier said than done, but that was my box of chocolates today - a perfectly executed negative split half marathon.

My final finishing time: 1:39:39 (7:36 pace). I'm still waiting to hear how Marty and Dan made out; I'm predicting they paid the price for those first 8 miles.

All sorts of serious at fifty feet from the finishing line:

Catching Up On Concert Reports!

2008-10-26T11:55:00.000-07:00

What? You thought maybe I stopped going to concerts? No, not likely. But with the general busy nature of the end of summer, vacation (two weeks motorcycling in the southeast U.S.!), and changing jobs (yikes! stress city!) I fell behind in my concert reports. Here's a quick catch up post, with a brief run through of the last four shows Patti and I attended. Probably no surprise, but all four of these shows were at our favorite local venue, Londonderry's own Tupelo Music Hall:

Suzanne Vega - Thursday, August 14, 2008
Arlo Guthrie - Monday, August 25, 2008
Hot Tuna - Sunday, September 7, 2008
Willy Porter - Saturday, October 26, 2008

Suzanne Vega
Suzanne was touring in a trio format, with bass and drums. They never got the sound quite right, or at least to my liking, as I would have preferred Suzanne's vocals more up front. Her lyrics are intricate and intense, and I prefer not to have to fight past the instruments to concentrate on them. It did get better towards the latter half of the show, though. Particular highlights include the ever fascinating "Queen and the Soldier" and the heart-breaking "Luka". There are excellent live versions of both of these songs up on YouTube; if you aren't familiar with Suzanne, I highly recommend you spending ten minutes to watch these two songs: "Queen and the Soldier" and "Luka".

Arlo Guthrie
Arlo was touring with his son, Abe, on keyboards, and grandson, Krishna, on drums. I can't help but think of the importance of the Guthrie family on American music whenever I see or hear Arlo - would Bob Dylan be possible without Woody Guthrie? And as important as Woody is to our musical heritage, Arlo himself is now a legend - from his performance at Woodstock ("Coming into Los Angeles"), to "Alice's Restaurant", to his hit with Steve Goodman's "City of New Orleans", to his collaborations with Pete Seeger, and more. Arlo is humorous, and thoughtful, and in complete command of the stage and the audience, and every moment of his concerts is a special experience. I was particularly moved when they sung two of Woody's songs; right in front of me in flesh and spirit were four generations singing "This Land is Your Land" and "My Peace". I wonder, do they still teach "This Land is Your Land" in kindergarten in the U.S.?

Hot Tuna
From one musical legend to another. Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen are both in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as members of Jefferson Airplane. This year Jack and Jorma are celebrating fifty years of playing together; this is simply incredible. Fifty years! This was an acoustic Hot Tuna show, my favorite variant of Jack and Jorma, with Jack on bass, Jorma on acoustic guitar, and Barry Mitterhoff on mandolin. Like most shows at the Tupelo, Patti and I were right up front; I brought along a camera this night, and here's the view from our front row seats:

Willy Porter
I was unfamiliar with Willy Porter, but Tupelo owner Scott Hayward has raved so much about his shows that we had to see him this time around. We weren't disappointed. Willy is often described as a "contemporary American folk musician" (Wikipedia), but that really doesn't do him justice. But he is hard to pin down. At times he reminded me very much of Martin Sexton (powerful vocals), at other times Todd Snider (slacker/stoner humor, perhaps?), and at other times I was struck by his guitar chops. Speaking of guitar, Willy played both a six-string and a nine-string; Nine-string? I'm used to see six- and twelve-strings, but I'm not sure I've ever seen a nine-string before. Willy clearly has a following - it was obvious that about half of the 200 or so people in the audience were big Willy fans. Highlights including a song made up on the spots that incorporated phrases suggested by the audience (such as basset hound, skin rash, foreign policy experience, and a bunch of others) and a 15-minute wild encore that can best be described as starting with "It's a Wonderful Day in the Neighborhood" (you know, Mr. Roger's Neighborhood!) and then morphing it with an acid trip of a wild neighborhood story. Willy was joined on a few songs by Natalia Zuckerman, and wow, she's got a gorgeous voice. The opening act was Gerry Putnam and Tom Pirozzoli (aka, the Putnam-Pirozzoli Guitar Duo) doing incredibly intricate guitar instrumentals ranging from their own compositions, to Pat Metheny ("Jaco"), to Beethoven ("Ode to Joy").

OK, that's a quick run through. Set lists for the Vega, Guthrie, and Hot Tuna shows follow. Sorry, I didn't write the set list for Willy Porter.

Suzanne Vega
Tupelo Music Hall
August 14, 2008

Rock In This Pocket
Stockings
Frank and Ava
Cracking
Caramel
Gypsy
Heroes Go Down
Calypso
Pornographers Dream
Penetant
Fat Man and Dancing Girl
Left of Center
Blood Makes Noise
Solitaire
Queen and the Soldier
Marlena on the Wall
Ludlow Street
Luka
Tom's Diner

Encore:
Small Blue Things
Rosemary

Arlo Guthrie
Tupelo Music Hall
August 25, 2008

Set 1:
Chilling of the Evening
In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree
In My Darkest Hour
St. James Infirmary
Cornbread Song (Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee)
Keys to the Highway
Motorcycle Song
Instrumental
(Woodstock story)
Coming Into Los Angeles
Green Green Rocky Road

Set 2:
Alice's Restaurant (18 minutes!)
When a Soldier Makes It Home
In Times Like These
Highway in the Wind
(Steve Goodman story)
City of New Orleans (Steve Goodman; Arlo solo, on piano)
This Land is Your Land (Woody Guthrie)

Encore:
(Arlo's "tuning arrows" story, prompted by audience)
(Story about Woody Guthrie writing songs)
My Peace (Woody Guthrie)

Hot Tuna
Tupelo Music Hall
September 7, 2008
Early Show (6:30pm)

Search My Heart
Tom Cat Blues
I See The Light
Heart Temporary
Hesitation Blues
Sea Child
Nashville Blues
Preaching On The Old Camp Ground
I'll Let You Know Before I Leave (instrumental)
How Long Blues
99 Year Blues
Genesis
San Francisco Bay Blues
Encore: Embryonic Journey

Garage Kitty

2008-08-13T17:49:00.000-07:00

Garage Kitty (aka, GK) walking on "his" garage.

Concert Report - Cowboy Junkies @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-07-29T18:13:00.000-07:00

Patti and I saw the Cowboy Junkies at the Tupelo Music Hall on Sunday night, July 28. We had great seats - second row, not more than 20 feet from Margo Timmins in her center stage spot.

I whine about how much I miss the old Muse at the Grey Goose, the venue that became the Tupelo Music Hall when Meredith retired and sold the business to Scott Hayward. I miss Meredith. I miss the charm of the old Muse. But I have to give Scott credit. Being able to see bands like the Cowboy Junkies (and Bruce Cockburn, and Suzanne Vega, and Arlo Guthrie, and and and...) at the intimate listening room is a special and wonderful thing. Last night was no exception. You can tell how artists are appreciative of being able to play in such a small place, with fantastic acoustics, and with an attentive audience.

I cannot believe that I have NEVER seen the Cowboy Junkies before! Patti saw them play Tupelo last year, but I didn't go that night because I was sick and feeling horrible. I mean REALLY sick and horrible. For me to miss a concert, that's big time hurting.

To this day I can remember the moment the Cowboy Junkies came to my attention. They were interviewed on NPR by, I believe, Scott Simon, shortly after their landmark Trinity Session album was released. Stopped me dead in my tracks. If I remember correctly, Trinity Session was the very first compact disc album I ever bought! That had to be, what, 1988. And I didn't even own my own CD player at the time! I still have that very same CD too. Played it last night.

The concert was wonderful and intimate, and I was entranced by Margo's voice. Patti thought it was too loud, but it was just this side of too loud for me. But Patti says I'm deaf. (What? Can't hear ya.) The set was a good mix of songs from their latest album, At The End of Paths Taken, and old favorites - especially from Trinity Session. They played Richie Havens' Handouts in the Rain in preparation for next weeks Newport Folk Festival, as they will be sharing the stage with Richie. Margo is particularly nervous over that.

They also played three new songs in a row, Confessions of Georgia E, The Girl Behind the Man Behind the Gun, and Angels in the Wilderness. Margo remarked that it was unusual to play so many new songs in one set, and she blamed it on Michael for making the set list.

The set lasted for just about two hours:

Brand New World
Lay It Down
I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
Those Final Feet
I Don't Get It
Handouts In The Rain (Richie Havens)
Confessions of Georgia E
The Girl Behind the Man Behind the Gun
Angels in the Wilderness
Bread and Wine
Someday Soon
My Wild Child
To Love Is To Bury
Highway Kind
Hunted
Follower 2
Encore:
Misguided Angel
Working on a Building

The opening act was spoken word artist Tim Mason. Well known in New England folk circles as the booking agent for the legendary Club Passim (and prior to that, The Old Vienna Kaffeehaus in Westboro, MA) Tim's poetry was a refreshing change for an opening act. His voice and delivery and humor and storytelling were spellbinding.

Concert Report - Ollabelle in Manchester, NH

2008-07-27T14:33:00.001-07:00

Yikes, before too much time elapses, I need to do a quick write up of the Ollabelle concert on July 17th. It's been over a week now since I made that quick post on the night of the concert.

Ollabelle first came to our attention when they opened for Nanci Griffith in Boston a couple of years ago (note to self: go find that ticket stub). They were still relatively unknown at that point, with just their self-produced debut CD. They were still green and nervous and star-struck. Although they didn't realize it, they had the entire audience in the palm of their hands from the moment they started singing. During intermission I bought their CD and had Fiona sign the cover. When she looked at me she remarked, "I remember you. You're in the front row, right? I was so relieved to see someone enjoying us!" She signed the CD cover with "thank you for listening!"

They've come a long way since then.

Ollabelle is part roots music, part rock, part gospel, part urban. They take their name from Ola Belle Reed (1916-2002), a North Carolina folk/gospel/bluegrass singer and musician best known for the song High on a Mountain. Ollabelle is a collaborative partnership of five very talented musicians. From left to right in the photo above:
Glenn Patscha - vocals, keyboards, accordion
Amy Helm - vocals, mandola
Fiona McBain - vocals, acoustic and electric guitars
Byron Isaacs - vocals, bass, dobro
Tony Leone - vocals, drums, percussion

On some songs you can close your eyes and swear that Ollabelle is channeling The Band, and I'm sure that's due in no small part to Amy. Note her last name. Yes, she is Levon Helm's daughter. A new mom, Amy was particularly attentive to babies and little kids in the audience. Here she is watching a grandmother strolling her grand kid:

Likewise, little girls in the family-oriented crowd seemed fascinated to see two women front and center on the stage:

This pic didn't come out as well as I'd like, but still I just love Fiona's smile:

Every single member of the band has a great voice. Fiona, though, has the ability to send shivers up my spine:

Their set was a mixture of songs from their first two albums, and some new (to me) covers. The traditional Ain't No More Cane was done in The Band's style. Fiona gave me chills on her vocal cover of Garcia and Hunter's Ripple, as well as on Elijah Rock.

Like every band nowadays, there's plenty to sample on YouTube. Here are some recommendations:

If you only have time to watch one video, watch this one of the rousing Before This Time. This showcases Amy's lead vocals, lots of hand clapping, and the entire band singing the chorus.
Wanna see what I mean by Fiona's ability to send chills? Then watch her sing Elijah Rock.
Does Ollabelle's's ability to channel The Band grab your attention? If so, then listen to Ain't No More Cane.
Like what you have heard so far? Then you must watch Get Back Temptation.

Ollabelle's set:

Ollabelle
July 17, 2008
Veterans Park, Manchester, NH

Gone Today (Bryon Isaacs/Fiona McBain/Ollabelle)
John The Revelator (Traditional)
?
High on a Mountain (Olla Belle Reed)
Ripple (Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter)
You're Gonna Miss Me (?)
Ain't No More Cane on the Brazos (Traditional)
Brotherly Love
Northern Star (Amy Helm/Byron Isaacs/Ollabelle)
Elijah Rock (Traditional)
Get Back Temptation (Glenn Patscha/Ollabelle)
Corrina (Taj Mahal/Jesse Ed Davis)
Riverside (Traditional)
Before This Time (Bessie Jones/Alan Lomax)
Encore: Brokedown Palace (Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter)

The opening act was Mike Morris, and we quite enjoyed him. At times reminiscent of Ellis Paul, at other times his innovative guitar playing made us think of Michael Hedges. We will keep our eye out for him again.

Ollabelle!

2008-07-17T19:11:00.000-07:00

Ollabelle played a free concert (free!) tonight courtesy of Intown Manchester. This was the second in a series of four shows in their Thursday Night Live series. Each concert is held outdoors in Veterans Park. It was a beautiful night tonight, and several hundred people gathered in the park for the show.

Patti and I think this was the fourth time we have seen Ollabelle. We simply LOVE this band.

I brought along my camera and took a few shots early in the night. Here's just one of 'em. I'll post more pics, plus a concert review, in a day or two...

Live Aid - July 13, 1985

2008-07-13T08:24:00.001-07:00

Twenty-three years ago today I was in Philadelphia for the Live Aid concert. Live Aid continues to hold a very high position on my personal list of musical highlights. How could it not? There was a palpable excitement that hazy, hot, humid Saturday. For many of us, this was our generation's Woodstock. And we were doing it on a global basis, for an important cause, and with the entire fricking world watching live on TV. They say that there were some 1.5 billion people in 100 countries watching on TV.

We had to be there. For me and my friends, there was no question - we had to be at a musical event of this size, particularly since the U.S. portion of it was right here on the east coast. I'm pretty sure my friend, Scott, scored the tickets. I don't know how he did it, and I don't know how many he got. However it happened, we managed to gather a large circle of friends at Scott's house in Atlantic City on Friday, July 12th. There must have been twenty of us. Don't ask me how we kept the multi-car caravan together all the way from Atlantic City to the parking lots surrounding JFK Stadium. We managed. Somehow.

Ninety thousand of us gathered in JFK Stadium that day, and another 80 thousand at Wembley in London. The opening of the Philly show at something like eight o'clock in the morning is perfectly representative of the day: legendary promoter Bill Graham introducing actor Jack Nicholson, who in turn introduced Joan Baez. When's the last time you saw Bill Graham, Jack Nicholson, and Joan Baez in a single sentence? Joan started us off with Amazing Grace.

From there it was a full day of music. The concert in Philly didn't end until something like 11pm that night. There were so many acts, so many highlights. Crosby, Stills, and Nash fairly early in the day, and then later a Neil Young solo set, and then even later Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young! The Beach Boys. Santana. Clapton. The Led Zeppelin reunion, with Phil Collins playing drums. Mick Jagger and Tina Turner burning it up. Ron Wood and Keith Richards backup up Bob Dylan. Those are just a few of my personal highlights, but there was so much more - Black Sabbath, Run-DMC, REO Speedwagon, Judas Priest, George Thorogood, David Bowie, The Pretenders, The Cars, Madonna, Tom Petty, Duran Duran, Hall & Oates, and more.

Wow. I'm so glad I was there.

Smuttynose 5K, June 22, 2008

2008-06-27T17:40:00.000-07:00

Race photos from last Sunday's Smuttynose Brewing "Will Run for Beer" 5K were posted (today?) on the PHOTOGRAPHY web site. (I HAVE REMOVED THE NAME AND LINK TO THE PHOTOGRAPHY WEB SITE, SINCE THEY WERE DICKS ABOUT ME HAVING THEIR IMAGE HERE, EVEN THOUGH I LINKED TO THEM AND GAVE THEM COPYRIGHT ATTRIBUTION. THEY WANTED MONEY.)

I always like looking for myself in race photos, and was pleased to find seven shots. None of them were really all that great, though. Certainly not great enough to shell out any money to PHOTOGRAPHY WEBSITE (NAME REMOVED), but that's not meant to be a negative comment on their abilities. It is darn hard to get great race shots, particularly great shots of each runner in a field of over 700. The best of the seven of me, I think, was this one (PHOTOGRAPHY WEBSITE COPYRIGHT ATTRIBUTION REMOVED):

IMAGE REMOVED BECAUSE PHOTOGRAPHY WEBSITE WANTED MONEY FOR THEIR FAIRLY CRAPPY IMAGE.

This was taken about 100 feet from the end of the race. We're just about to turn the corner for the short, very steep, climb to the finish line. I might not look it, but at this point I can't wait for the race to be over. As described in the race results on Cool Running, this race was, uh, "challenging." It's not that the course was hilly or anything like that (well, except for the climb the last 75 feet), but it is more the 11am start time that caused the challenge. It was well over 80 degrees, a bit humid, and accompanied by an unrelenting sun. I started noticing it in mile 2, as there was no shade at all, and I could feel the heat bouncing up off the road. Oh how I wanted some shade.

Considering the heat, I was happy enough with my 22:25 finishing time, good for 70th overall, and 12th out of the 54 in my age division. This was the first race I've run since last fall's City of Manchester Half Marathon, which was just weeks before I went down with a stress fracture for the winter. And it was the first 5K I've done since the Durgin Memorial 5K in May, 2007, which put me out of action for several weeks with a pulled hamstring. At least I'm not injured now! (Hamstring is a little tight, but that's par for the course anymore. Getting old sucks.)

Concert Report - The Roches in Portsmouth, NH

2008-06-27T16:05:00.000-07:00

There is something magical about the vocal harmonies produced by siblings. Is it the genetics, or from a lifetime of singing together, or some combination of both? Ah, it doesn't matter, it just is. And for me, sisters Maggie, Terre and Suzzy (rhymes with "fuzzy") Roche are at the top of the family harmony heap. Known collectively as The Roches, they have been performing and releasing albums for more than 30 years, with a style uniquely their own.

Patti and I saw them play at the lovely Unitarian Universalist Church in Portsmouth, NH, last Sunday, June 22. Also known as the Stone Church, this church was built in 1824 to 1826. With an impressively high ceiling and a massive pipe organ behind the altar, it is the kind of space that just cannot be found in a modern building. Not to mention fantastic acoustics.

The Roches have a long history with Paul Simon, dating back to the early 70s when Maggie and Terre were backup singers on his There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973) album. Paul also produced Maggie and Terre's debut album, Seductive Reasoning, in 1975. More recently, all three sisters joined Paul for five nights of concerts in April during his month-long residency at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. This recent experience is clearly still lingering, as they included three of Paul's songs in their hour and a half set. First up was the somewhat somber "Another Galaxy", then the humorous but metaphorical "Pigs, Sheep and Wolves", and then towards the end of the set the classic and oft covered "American Tune".

The concert started with "Gung Ho", a tornado of a song from their newest album, Moonswept. This was followed immediately with the crowd pleasing "We", one of their signature pieces. The very first song on their very first album as a trio, "We" is a catchy introduction to the group:

We are Maggie and Terre and Suzzy
Maggie and Terre and Suzzy Roche
we don't give out our ages
and we don't give out our phone numbers
give out our phone numbers
sometimes our voices give out
but not our ages and our phone numbers

The crowd responded with delight at this well known favorite, and the prospect of hearing more of our favorite vocal harmonic acrobatics. There's a pretty decent clip of "We" performed at the 2006 Philly Folk Festival on YouTube. Go watch it.

"No Shoes", written by Paranoid Larry, is a new addition to their repertoire, but it is so classically "Roches" that it could easily be an old favorite. Once again, YouTube to the rescue.

Other standouts included the wonderful "Hammond Song", which may be the best showcase of their vocal harmony (YouTube clip from 1983), and "ing", with the chorus repeating the "ing" phrase as if their voices were hand bells (YouTube clip from 1991).

But the absolute highlight of the night was their classic a cappella version of the "Hallelujah Chorus" from Handel's Messiah.. Their three-part arrangement of this is nothing short of stunning, particularly when sung in a church that is more than 150 years old. The audience gave a thunderous standing ovation in appreciation. If you don't view any of the YouTube clips I link, go and view at least this one from 1982. You won't be disappointed.

Since Patti and I were sitting in the first row, not more than 10 feet from the microphone stands, I was able to grab Suzzy's set list after the show. Here's a scan of it. (Yea, she mis-dated it as July! Must have been the hot weather.)

Gung Ho
We
Another Galaxy (Paul Simon)
The Long Lonely Road to Nowhere
Only You Know How
One Season
No Shoes (Paranoid Larry)
Love
The Train
A Prayer (words by Bill Barbeau, music by Maggie)
Hammond Song
ing
Pigs, Sheep and Wolves (Paul Simon)
September Eleventh at the Shambhala Center
Clothes Line Saga (Bob Dylan)
Hallelujah Chorus
American Tune (Paul Simon)
Jesus Shaves (Paranoid Larry)
Encore: Yakety Yak (The Coasters)

Concert Report - Vance Gilbert @ Kick Off Your Shoes

2008-06-07T08:53:00.001-07:00

Patti and I met friends Nancy and Larry for the Vance Gilbert concert in Topsfield, MA last night. This was a house concert in the Kick off your Shoes house concert series.

I've been to hundreds of concerts (hmmm, I wonder what the real total number night be?) in venues large and small, but this was the first house concert I have ever attended. A house concert is exactly what the name implies - a concert in a private house. The Kick off your Shoes concerts are held in a nice house on a quiet side street in Topsfield. The concert itself was held in a large den room, with about 40 of us cozy (but not too crowded) in folding chairs. Close and intimate would be an apt description.

I'm always curious about the financial aspects of the music business, and last night was no exception. At house concerts, or at least this series, all ticket proceeds go directly to the performer. Vance did two shows - the early show starting at 7pm, and the late show probably starting at about 9:30pm. We were at the early show, which was sold out at just over 40 people. There were still some seats left for the late show, but it looked like about 30 tickets had been sold. Simple math for Vance's pay - 70 tickets at twenty bucks a pop, or $1,400.

Vance opened with Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come", which is on Vance's latest album. I found this particularly poignant, given the past week's significant political event (Obama clinching the Democratic nomination):

There were times when I thought I couldn't last for long
But now I think I'm able to carry on
It's been a long, been a long time coming
But I know a change is gonna come, oh yes it will

Vance didn't say anything about it (either the song or politics), other than saying "I think every concert should start with a Sam Cooke song, don't you?" after he finished singing it. But race cannot be avoided at a Vance Gilbert concert. After all, Vance is a black singer-songwriter in an overwhelmingly white genre. And Vance addresses it with humor, grace, and the very real insight that we are all the same, whether we be black, brown, white, or whatever.

Vance could easily be a professional comedian if he weren't such a gifted musician and songwriter, and he had us in stitches numerous times. One particular comic interlude had us both laughing and crying, as Vance talked about his dogs - including the highly recognizeable dog obsession with tennis balls, and the utter grief we feel over losing one of our four legged friends.

One the music front, Vance played two 45-minute sets for the early show, with much of the material coming from his soon-to-be-released new album. This album, to be called "Sounds Like..." is based on the "what if" concept of Vance writing songs which sound like they were written by others. Included are songs that Vance wrote in the style of Bruce Springsteen (in the Nebraska alubm style), Richard Thompson (a song about his dog!), Tom Waits, and others. Oh, one song was a mashup of Prince and John Haitt!

Early in the set he played a cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Castles Made of Sand" for Larry. I've heard him do this before, and just love the cover. He played "Unfamiliar Moon" from his latest album, followed by "Unforgiveable". From the way back machine, I remember he did "Taking It All To Tennessee", but not a whole lot of other of his older songs. He closed the early show with a cover of Joni Mitchell's "A Case of You", much to the delight of Ashara, our host, who is a big Joni fan.

I don't have a full set list, as I forgot my set list notebook. :-(

Concert Report - Bruce Cockburn @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-05-22T18:46:00.001-07:00

Patti and I saw Bruce Cockburn (see also here) last night at our favorite local venue, the Tupelo Music Hall. This was, I think, the second time Bruce has played at Tupelo - the previous time being in September, 2006.

I first saw Bruce in the late 1980s, and have seen him at least a half dozen times or more. Mostly in mid-size venues, like the Capitol Theater in Concord, NH, or the Somerville Theater in Davis Square, Somerville, MA. But seeing him in Tupelo is special, because it is such a small venue. Patti and I were fortunate enough to secure seats in the second row, close to the center of the stage. Because of the way the seats and stage are in Tupelo, we were literally no more than 15 feet away from Bruce. I love being close enough to see individual guitar strings vibrate!

Most typical descriptions of Bruce probably call him a Canadian singer-songwriter, but that description is wholly inadequate without adding the clause "and totally frickin amazing guitarist." I put Bruce up there with the late, great Michael Hedges and Leo Kottke when it comes to my personal short list of acoustic guitar gods; although all three have vastly different styles, mind you.

Last night was an intimate, relaxed show with an adoring crowd and occasional good humored back and forth between the audience and performer. After one particularly mind-blowing song with some gorgeous guitar playing, a voice called out "hey Bruce, when are you going to learn to play that thing?" Much laughter all around, followed by Bruce's reply, "I'm trying. Believe me, I'm trying."

There are so many Cockburn songs I'd love to hear, but I have no complaints about his chosen set:

World of Wonders
Last Night of the World
See You Tomorrow
Don't Feel Your Touch
Night Train
Life Short, Call Now
Beautiful Creatures
Tokyo
Tibetan Side of Town
This is Baghdad
Put It In Your Heart
Wondering Where the Lions Are
If A Tree Falls
Mystery

Encore:
The End of All Rivers
Pacing the Cage
Tie Me at the Crossroads

"Wondering Where the Lions Are" was a natural highlight - for Bruce as well as for the crowd - because of the easy sing along nature of the song, and Bruce's encouragement of us to participate. He was clearly pleased with hearing us. See this YouTube video from the May 15th show at the Iron Horse Music Hall to get a really good idea of what it was like. (Although, we sang a whole lot better, and there were certainly NO talkers in the Tupelo audience - Tupelo prides itself on being a listening hall.)

The instrumental "The End of All Rivers" was particularly stunning. The same YouTube contributor also posted the May 15th version of this song. Go watch it to see just what I mean about Bruce being in rare company on guitar. (The video gets a better look at Bruce around 1 minute in. Play the whole song.)

The opener was Catherine MacLellan, a singer-songwriter from Prince Edward Island. I really loved her voice, and will be on the lookout for her from now on in. Here's her setlist, although I'm not sure of some of the song titles:

Take a Break
?
Isabella's Song
At the Top of Those Hotel Stairs (?)
My Everything
It's Been a Long Time
Church Bell Blues

In Memory of Cynthia Ice

2008-05-17T17:05:00.000-07:00

Mary Beth reported on the passing of Cynthia Ice. Like MB, I want to take a moment to remember and honor our friend and colleague.

Cynthia was one of a small handful of things that made working at the IBM/Lotus facility in Westford, MA something special. Cynthia was an accessibility expert and tester, but not just any accessibility expert. You realized this the moment you saw her walking down the hall with Cashmere, her seeing eye guide dog.

Having Cynthia on its staff said a lot about IBM/Lotus and its committment to accessibility. I can remember feeling fortunate on many occassions to be able to call or email Cynthia to get her input on design decisions.

I'm afraid that accessibility is a theoretical exercise in too many software development organizations. Those who manage, design, code, test, and write about software all too often have little, if any, interaction with users who need accessible accommodations. Seeing first-hand a user with a motor skill impairment, or a user who needs a screen reader to read her mail, brings the imperative to design and build accessible software home in a very real way. It's a moral imperative.

Cynthia was kind, and insightful, and yes humorous. In the comments on MB's blog post Brandon wrote this:

She never lost her sense of humor, even (especially?) when it came to disability. My favorite line of hers was while we were discussing how much people of various disabilities wanted a particular feature. At one point she said, "Quadriplegics would go to the mat for this issue...y'know, if they could."

Perfect.

Cynthia will be missed by many. Today I pause in her honor.

Photo Credit: AP Photo/Elise Amendola, found here

Light Switch Fail

2008-05-14T18:22:00.000-07:00

I spotted this in the hallway at work. You can't make these things up.

Got Punctuation?

2008-05-12T18:42:00.000-07:00

Like many, I delight in funny signs. These are often the result of misspellings or lack of punctuation. This example falls in the latter category, and was first spotted and admired by Paul. It is a handwritten sign on the second floor door for the handicapped elevator in the Colonial Inn in Edgartown, MA:

That sign is now three or four years old, and we delight in reading it literally every year: "Do not slam door shut gently." OK, we think, we will slam the door shut forcefully!

We by no means want to disparage the kind folks who run the Colonial Inn, for they are warm and wonderful and we go back there every year because they treat us so well. But we love the lack of punctuation on that little sign.

Zooming back a little, we can see a larger design issue:

Notice the tennis ball on the string tether? No, that's not for some Golden Retriever's amusement. That's a door modification suggested by Paul when they first installed the handicapped elevator. See, if you are in a wheelchair and you need to open that door and get yourself into the elevator, the task is nearly impossible. You have to reach, pull the door, and back up all in a sequence that is easy for us able bodied people to not even think about. Paul's brilliant door modification allows him to pull the door open via the tennis ball, with his wheelchair already back out of the way of the opening door. Sorta makes me wonder if the elevator manufacturer did much user research.

I swear there is a consulting business to be had in handicapped access design in the hospitality industry. Traveling with Paul I've learned some of the most overlooked but important design points, like having clothes hanger rods in closets low enough for wheelchair access. Same with shower controls and shower heads. And light switch and phone access within easy reach of a handicapped person in bed, as they might not be able to reach over to the night stand like most of us can. All of these things are often overlooked in hotel room design for the handicapped. It's not just about adding a ramp and a wide door to the bathroom. I've learned all this only through Paul.

Concert Report - Steve Forbert @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-05-10T09:23:00.000-07:00

Patti and I returned to our normal spot (table #4 - front and center) at the Tupelo Music Hall for last night's Steve Forbert concert.

Steve played for a bit more than an hour, with a stripped down sound consisting of his well-worn Martin guitar, harmonica, and boots tapping out rhythm on a square of plywood. For the first few songs Steve had a little battle going on with Tupelo owner Scott over the house lights. Scott initially had the lights off, but Steve wanted to see the audience. It took two or three songs for Scott to bring the lights up enough to satisfy Steve - he clearly feeds off of seeing his audience, hearing his audience, and getting the audience to participate with rhythm and filling vocals.

Steve's sets have a very loose structure, and he eagerly asked for requests early in the set. "Wild as the Wind", "Good Planets", "Laurel", "Mexico", and "Romeo's Tune" were all called out and worked into the set at one point or another.

Steve also mixed in two Jimmie Rodgers tunes, "Years Ago", and "Miss the Mississippi." Steve and Jimmie Rodgers are both natives of Meridian, Mississippi, and Steve's Any Old Time album is a tribute to the songs of Jimmie Rodgers.

News to me last night is word that country artist (star?) Keith Urban has a cover of Steve's "Romeo's Tune" on his new Greatest Hits CD. I don't really know much about Keith Urban, although I have of course heard of him. But I hope Steve gets a big chunk of royalty payments from the CD sales. "Romeo's Tune" is one of those songs which I can hear over and over and over and never tire of:

Meet me in the middle of the day
Let me hear you say everything's okay
Bring me Southern kisses from your room
Meet me in the middle of the night
Let me hear you say everything's alright
Let me smell the moon in your perfume

Oh, gods and years will rise and fall and there's always something more
Lost in talk I waste my time and it's all been said before
While further down behind the masquerade the tears are there
I don't ask for all that much -- I just want someone to care

If you have never heard "Romeo's Tune", go check out this live version by Steve from a concert in New Hope, PA last November. You can also easily find Steve's original 1979 version, as well as Keith Urban's version.

The opening act was Kate Klim, a Berklee College of Music alum now transplanted to Philadelphia. We've seen her open at the Tupelo at least once before, although I don't remember for whom. Kate played a short six-song set on the Tupelo's baby grand piano. Her voice reminds me a little bit of Lori McKenna

Set list...

Thinkin'
Years Ago (aka Fifteen Years Ago Today)
Wild as the Wind (a tribute to Rick Danko)
Real Live Love
Hang On Again Till The Sun Shines (?)
Good Planets Are Hard To Find
Goin' Down To Laurel
My Stolen Identity
The Baghdad Dream
I Just Work Here
Miss the Mississippi and You
Sing It Again (?)
Baby, Don't
The American In Me
Mexico
Schoolgirl
About a Dream
What Kinda Guy
Romeo's Tune
Encore:
Thirty More Years
You Cannot Win (If You Do Not Play)

Opening Act - Kate Klim:
The Day's Gonna Come
Gepetto
Ripple (no, not the Grateful Dead song)
Skin My Knees
Tracing The Lines
Blue Sky Love

Ride Report: National MS Society "Ride the Vineyard"

2008-05-07T17:55:00.000-07:00

This is a big thank you to all those who supported me in the National MS Society's "Ride the Vineyard" bike ride this past Saturday. Your support helped me exceed my goal and raise a total of $2,075 for MS research and local support programs. The event itself will likely top $300,000 once everything gets tallied up. Your support means a lot to me, and I cannot thank you enough.

"How was the ride?"

Picture a beautiful spring day on Martha's Vineyard. Deep blue skies. Bright sunshine warming your skin. A light breeze carrying the salty ocean smell. Nice image, isn't it? Keep that image in your mind, as that's the image I kept in mine while riding the 100-kilometers (62-miles) in the actual weather we had on Saturday: a steel gray sky, temperatures in the mid-40s, gusty winds, and on-and-off rain showers!

The weather kept the turnout smaller than normal. And I know that more than a few riders had had their share of cold and rain by the 40-mile mark, where they took a left to take them directly back to the finish line, rather than a right to take them to the final Katama-Edgartown-Oak Bluffs loop part of the ride. But I was riding for Paul, and I was riding because of your support, so I didn't cut any corners.

I was, though, happy to find Patti, and Paul and the warm van waiting for me at the finish line. Despite wanting to warm my feet up, we snapped a quick finish line photo. Paul's comment when he put his hand on my back was, "Oh, you're wetter than you look!"

Thanks again.

One more shot -- dirty bike:

Concert Report: John Prine @ Capitol Center for the Arts

2008-04-27T11:31:00.001-07:00

Hey, look at that - we saw a concert at a venue other than the Tupelo Music Hall! Patti and I went up to Concord on Friday night to see John Prine at the beautifully restored Capitol Center for the Arts.

While perhaps not as widely known as he should be, John Prine has somewhere around 20 albums under his belt, dating back to his self-titled debut album in 1971, which happens to be number 458 on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. He has won two Grammy awards - in 1991 for The Missing Years, and in 2006 for Fair and Square, and was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2003. Of all this, though, I suspect John is most well known for writing "Angel from Montgomery", which has become a signature piece for Bonnie Raitt. Prine's deceptively simple lyrics somehow make each and every song almost instantly familiar, telling stories of depth and complexity with simple phrases and nothing extraneous; "Angel" is no exception:

I am an old woman named after my mother
My old man is another child that's grown old
If dreams were lightning thunder was desire
This old house would have burnt down a long time ago

Chorus:
Make me an angel that flies from Montgom'ry
Make me a poster of an old rodeo
Just give me one thing that I can hold on to
To believe in this living is just a hard way to go

John's two-hour set opened with three up-tempo old favorites, "Spanish Pipedream" (also known as "Blow Up Your TV"), "Picture Show", and "Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore". John was accompanied by a bass player (Dave Jacques, I think - playing both stand up and electric bass) and a guitar player (Jason Wilber, I think - playing both electric guitar and mandolin), and the three of them cranked the energy level for these three songs, instantly getting the audience enthused. "Flag Decal", a sarcastic commentary on patriotism and war, is just as relevant today as it was in 1971:

Well, I got my window shield so filled
With flags I couldn't see.
So, I ran the car upside a curb
And right into a tree.
By the time they got a doctor down
I was already dead.
And I'll never understand why the man
Standing in the Pearly Gates said...

"But your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
We're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more."

The next three songs slowed the pace down. First up was "Speed of the Sound of Loneliness", which Nanci Griffith did a beautiful cover of on her Other Voices, Other Rooms album. Next up was "Souvenirs", dedicated to the memory of Steve Goodman (they co-wrote it), and then "Far From Me."

And so the set went, mixing the pace every few songs. John played five songs solo in the middle of the set, including "That's The Way The World Goes 'Round" with its now obligatory "happy enchilada" story before the final chorus. See, the chorus of this happy little ditty goes:

That's the way that the world goes 'round.
You're up one day and the next you're down.
It's half an inch of water and you think you're gonna drown.
That's the way that the world goes 'round.

But John tells a wonderful mistaken lyrics story in which a fan once asked him to sing the song about the enchilada. John replied that maybe she had him confused with another songwriter, "perhaps Jimmy Buffet, he writes songs about food!" But the fan insisted it was John's song. "You know, the song about the happy enchilada":

That's the way that the world goes 'round.
You're up one day and the next you're down.
It's a happy enchilada and you think you're gonna drown.
That's the way that the world goes 'round.

John's solo portion ended with the band returning during "Sam Stone." As with "Flag Decal", this heart-wrenching story of the tragic effects of war on returning veterans is as relevant today as it was in 1971:

Sam Stone came home,
To his wife and family
After serving in the conflict overseas.
And the time that he served,
Had shattered all his nerves,
And left a little shrapnel in his knee.
But the morphine eased the pain,
And the grass grew round his brain,
And gave him all the confidence he lacked,
With a Purple Heart and a monkey on his back.

Chorus:
There's a hole in daddy's arm where all the money goes,
Jesus Christ died for nothin' I suppose.
Little pitchers have big ears,
Don't stop to count the years,
Sweet songs never last too long on broken radios.

"Sam Stone" has been called "the best Dylan song Dylan never wrote", and Dylan actually showed up unannounced at the Bottom Line in 1972 and backed John on harmonica on the song. Johnny Cash also covered "Sam Stone", although Johnny changed "Jesus Christ died for nothin' I suppose" to "Daddy must have hurt a lot back then, I suppose".

After "Sam Stone" John switched from acoustic to an electric guitar and the band ripped through the Carter Family's "Bear Creek", "That's Alright By Me", and "She Is My Everything", the latter written for his (third) wife:

She is my everything
From her suntanned shoulders
Down to the freckles
On her wedding ring
Her feet are so warm
They could melt the snow
In the early Spring
She is my everything

After all that electric energy, it was time to bring the pace down with perhaps the saddest song of all, "Hello In There":

Ya' know that old trees just grow stronger,
And old rivers grow wilder ev'ry day.
Old people just grow lonesome
Waiting for someone to say, "Hello in there, hello."

So if you're walking down the street sometime
And spot some hollow ancient eyes,
Please don't just pass 'em by and stare
As if you didn't care, say, "Hello in there, hello."

For the encore, we got both "Illegal Smile" (with big audience sing along on the chorus) and "Paradise." I remember John once telling a story in which bluegrass legend Bill Monroe, after hearing John sing "Paradise", remarked that it sounded like a song which he himself had written but had forgotten all about. John says that was the best compliment he had ever received about one on his songs.

When I was a child my family would travel
Down to Western Kentucky where my parents were born
And there's a backwards old town that's often remembered
So many times that my memories are worn.

Chorus:
And daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay
Well, I'm sorry my son, but you're too late in asking
Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away

We had a full two hours of Prine, and the audience was with him every step of the way. The opening act was Chris Knight, who I had never heard of before but who clearly had a few fans in the audience. His 30 minute set was well received. He's got a gravel voice full of Tennessee drawl, but his songs sounded a little too much straight country for my taste.

The set list...

Spanish Pipedream (aka Blow Up Your TV)
Picture Show
Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore
Speed of the Sound of Loneliness
Souvenirs
Far From Me
Please Don't Bury Me
Fish And Whistle
The Glory Of True Love
Crazy As A Loon
Angel From Montgomery

Solo:
You Got Gold
Blue Umbrella
Dear Abby
That's the Way that the World Goes 'Round
Mexican Home

Band returns:
Sam Stone
Bear Creek
That's Alright By Me
She Is My Everything
Hello In There
Lake Marie

Encore:
Illegal Smile
Paradise

Opening act, Chris Knight:
Enough Rope
Old Man
To Get Back Home
William
River Road
Encore: It Ain't Easy Being Me

Outlook Error Message o' the Day

2008-04-22T13:33:00.000-07:00

Oh dear, it seems that there is a conflict in my Outlook calendar. Worse yet, there is no winner. I hope it isn't a violent conflict, or an armed conflict. Do I call the United Nations for conflict resolution?

And before my Lotus Notes friends (yes, you John. And you too, MB) start assuming airs, let me remind them of my old favorite Notes "Your password quality is required to meet the standards for level" message. People in glass houses and all that.

Concert Report: Patty Larkin @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-04-20T16:44:00.000-07:00

Imagine that - Patti and I were back at the Tupelo Music Hall on Saturday night, April 19. We feel very fortunate to live just two miles from the venue.

Every time I see Patty Larkin I am reminded anew just how good she is on guitar. She has some serious guitar chops, and is easily head and shoulders above most singer-songwriters. Was she always that good on guitar? I've seen her numerous times in the past twenty years, and her guitar skills don't stand out in my memory from the first couple of times I saw her. But sometime over the past ten years, wow.

No opening act, so Patty played two sets. The first was about 50 minutes, and the second around 45 minutes. As with the last several times I've seen her, she played both a 6-string acoustic, and an electric Fender Strat (full details here).

One new technical addition to her repertoire (at least since I last saw her) is the use of sampling loops with the electric guitar, which she used on several of the songs from her latest album (Watch The Sky), including on "Beautiful", "Traveling Alone", and the encore "Phone Message". The latter song is a wild piece that she started on the Fender, sampled, and then switched instruments to a bouzouki. On "Dear Heart" she sampled, and then started playing the Fender with a fiddle bow; I've seen all sorts of innovative guitar players (RIP Michael Hedges), but I don't recall ever seeing that before. (Or am I just being dense?)

The show was a good mix of her newer material and our old familiar favorites (on acoustic guitar, unless otherwise noted):

Set 1:
Open Arms (Don't Explain)
The Book I'm Not Reading
Cover Me
Hand Full of Water
Hollywood
Italian Shoes
Wolf at the Door
Dear Heart (electric)
Beautiful (electric)
Hallelujah

Set 2:
Johnny Was a Pyro
I Told Him That My Dog Wouldn't Run
Island of Time
Who Holds Your Hand
Walking in My Sleep (electric)
Traveling Alone (electric)
Tango
Might As Well Dance
Encore: Phone Message

Concert Report: Dar Williams @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-04-18T08:05:00.000-07:00

Patti and I were back at Tupelo on Wednesday night for another sold out show - this time for the beautiful soprano voice and lyrics of Dar Williams.

Behold, a real ticket stub:

We normally don't have ticket stubs for Tupelo shows, as they normally just track reservations by name. But we happened to purchase these tix when we were at a show earlier this year, and received honest to goodness printed tickets.

Amazingly enough, this was the first time Dar has played in Londonderry. How can that be? I'm mystified that Dar had never been booked by Meredith to play at the Muse (the venue's name prior to being Tupelo). She indicated that she clearly new of the venue and its wonderful reputation, as one would expect. After all, pretty much all of her contemporaries have played there - including Lucy Kaplansky, Richard Shindell, Vance Gilbert, and Shawn Colvin.

Patti and I had not seen Dar since the Cry Cry Cry tour she did with Richard and Lucy way back in 1999 and 2000. Yow, that was a long time ago. And we haven't seen her solo since before that.

There wasn't an opening act, and Dar played a single set that lasted about an hour and a half long. For most of the set she was accompanied on piano and harmony vocals by Laura Meyer Atkin (at least that's what I think her name is). The accompaniment was nicely subtle, just helping to fill out the sound.

Her set was a mixture of mostly older songs with just a few new numbers. An early highlight for me was "The Babysitter's Here", done slowly and poignantly, yet with its little undercurrent of humor. "Spring Street" was introduced with yet another take on the four seasons in New England: Winter, Mud, Road Construction, and Tourists. A new song, "Buzzer" appears to have been influenced by the Milgram obedience experiments.

I was surprised that not many in the audience seemed to know of her cover of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb", which she put out on her 2005 album. Scott, on the soundboard, introduced a little spacy reverb to her vocals, which caught her by surprise.

Another new song, "It's All I Need To Know" was written for her husband. I hope this shows up on an upcoming album, as it was simply beautiful and heartfelt.

The set list:

Fishing In The Morning
The Babysitter's Here
Spring Street
The Business of Things
Buzzer
Book of Love
If I Wrote You
After All
The Ocean
It's All I Need To Know
The Mercy Of The Fallen
February
When I Was A Boy
Encore: We Learned The Sea

This Thursday - April NH UPA Meeting!

2008-04-14T17:51:00.001-07:00

I'm excited about this month's NH UPA meeting. We're going to try a discussion session on three short papers. I've organized these types of reading and discussion sessions among colleagues at work before, but have never tried it with a group who might not know each other well. I'm helping Mike Hawley moderate the discussions, and am eager to see if people like the format.

About a month ago or so Mike put out a vote for choosing the articles, and the three winners are:

"Cultures of Prototyping" by Michael Schrage,
"Getting the Right Design and the Design Right: Testing Many Is Better Than One" by Maryam Tohidi, William Buxton, Ronald Baecker, Abigail Sellen, and
"Feature Richness and User Engagement" by Jakob Nielsen

For an extra bonus, this month's meeting is at Fat Belly's Grill & Bar in Portsmouth, NH. I've never been there before, but what could be better than meeting some new people, discussing Schrage, Buxton, and Nielsen, and having a beer and maybe a burger? (Don't answer that.)

Join us? Networking starts at 6pm, and the meeting starts at 7pm. It is, of course, open to the public, although it is polite to RSVP to info@nhupa.org.

Oh, and please read the articles ahead of time! We want you to come prepared to discuss them with us, and ask that everyone jot down at least one discussion point about each article -- it could be a question, or an observation, or an insight, or just about anything. Oh, and one more thing -- we want to keep it positive. Let's look for the value in what the authors' wrote.

I Ride For Paul

2008-04-13T11:18:00.001-07:00

Most people who know me know that I identify myself as a runner when it comes to exercise. But every spring I put in enough bicycle "seat time" training to participate in the 100-kilometer Ride the Vineyard bike ride to raise funds for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. This year's ride is on Saturday, May 3, 2008.

The funds I raise will be used by the National MS Society to support research as well as programs to help address the needs of people living with MS, which remains an incurable disease today. If you read my blog, would you please consider sponsoring me via a tax-deductible donation? My goal this year is to raise $1500, and you can help by donating via my pledge page. Any amount will help. Thanks!

Office Prank Par Excellence

2008-04-01T17:58:00.000-07:00

Today, of course, is Aprils Fools' Day. This office prank actually happened last week, it was close enough in time to qualify...

My friend and colleague Chris came back from his extended vacation (aka sabbatical) to find his office had been appropriated by the shipping department for a packing peanuts storage facility:

I have nothing but admiration for the intrepid perpetrators of this most excellent office prank. The photo above hardly does it justice. DIY instructions and more photos on Instructables. Since then it has been slowly making its way across the internets. It made today's Popular Mechanics Top 5 April Fools' Day Office Pranks list, as well as #7 on LifeHacker's Top 10 Harmless Geek Pranks. Impressive.

Update: OMG, Chris' office made today's NPR Talk of the Nation! Rock star territory! :-)

That Felt Great!

2008-03-30T19:16:00.000-07:00

My last blog post about running was way back in early November, when I ran the Manchester Half Marathon. While I was really pleased with finishing that run in a respectable time (with gas to spare), things went downhill from there.

By late November I had a nagging pain on the inside of my right shin. I started to have that "uh oh" feeling when I noticed the pain would get worse during my runs. It would feel great for mile 1, then start to bother me in mile 2, and then get worse and worse. By the second week of December I knew it wasn't good, and I actually took a week off to see if it would go away. No dice there, and December was a horrible month of running on and off, but mostly running in pain. By Christmas I knew I would not be able to run my favorite race of the year - the Hangover Classic 10K on New Years Day (is that a great name for a race or what?).

And then came an absolutely agonizing run on January 4th, and I knew I had to throw in the towel. A visit to the doctor followed by an X-ray confirmed what I had suspected for over a month - a stress fracture in my right tibia. This is a very common running injury, and my symptoms were text book - particularly the part where the pain gets worse during a run, not better (as with many muscle injuries, which feel better when the muscle warms up).

The cure? No running for 6 to 8 weeks. Ugh, there goes my stress management program!

I completely shut down (exercise-wise) for January and February. My orthopedist gave me the OK to start using my Precor elliptical trainer about four weeks ago. A follow up X-ray last week looked good, and so today was the first day I got to go out for an honest to goodness run.

It was a modest (and slow!) two and a half miles, but boy did it feel great be out there running again. The run wasn't without trepidation - will it start to hurt again? But I think I'm good, even though I am still "listening" to my tibia now several hours later - is it OK? Does it feel normal? That isn't a pain, is it? Funny how you get gun shy, and then start imagining the worst.

But for tonight I'm being optimistic, looking forward to getting my fitness level back up to snuff, and looking forward to my normal yearly pattern of events - the National MS Society Ride the Vineyard 100K bike ride in May, the Londonderry 5K (killer hill) in August, the Union Leader 8K in September. I need to find a new 10K for October, as I hear the beautiful Bridges 4 Friendship 10K won't be back this year. Then the Feaster Five Mile on Thanksgiving, and before you know it right back to the Hangover Classic for the first day of 2009. The year slips by, race to race.

Springtime in New England

2008-03-28T17:44:00.000-07:00

My backyard at about 8am this morning. Guess I should wait another week to bring the motorcycle out of winter storage, eh?

Cisco TelePresence!

2008-03-27T18:20:00.001-07:00

I had my first encounter with a Cisco TelePresence video conferencing system yesterday. Holy cow, the future of video conferencing is here, right now.

If you have been around any number of large U.S. corporations in the past 10 years or so, you have likely run into a number of largely unused video conferencing systems. I've seen a variety of the old PictureTel systems (like this one)in three different companies, and from what I have seen they tend to sit silent and unused in the corner of conference rooms, taking up space and gathering dust. The user experience of those systems was just horrible. The user interface always seemed confusing. The video lag disconcerting. And, frankly, viewing a whole table full of people on a 26-inch television screen really wasn't "just like being there." It was a horrible experience, and those systems didn't add much of value over just the phone connection.

To be fair to PictureTel, they have been acquired by Polycom, and I'm sure they must have really nice, high end video conferencing too. But my experience was with the Cisco system. The system I used looks exactly like this:

That photo really doesn't even do it justice. The whole experience has "wow" written all over it. I'd love to know who was in charge of the overall experience design, because they did an outstanding job.

The primary user interface is the phone you see on the table. Turning the entire system on is as simple as two touches on the touch screen - one touch to open the phone directory, and a second to dial the remote location. When you dial... ring, and then *bam*, it's on. The video screens are turned on, the cameras are turned on, the audio is on. It's beautiful.

What is so compelling is the people "across the table" from you are life size. There's something just so compelling about that. And the detail is amazing - that's what high def gets you. And absolutely no video lag. And, of course, perfectly color balanced cameras. It all adds up.

The audio, too, is just so well done. In the photo you can see the microphones, which are embedded into the table top - no moving them around, no messy wires. The speakers are embedded in the area below the video monitors, and there are three speakers - one below each monitor. When the guy on the right side is speaking, you hear his voice from the right speaker. Likewise, the woman on the left is heard from the left speaker, and those in the center from the center speaker. The directional audio cue is really effective.

There are a ton of other little details in the design. Like how the physical table in the room is actually a full oval, and the monitors are butted up against it. This helps create a nearly seamless visual flow from the physical table to the video table. It's a beautiful touch that shows an attention to design detail.

You can see the shared presentation area in the picture above too - look below the center video monitor and you can see a slide being projected (ah, they should have had the laptop showing that slide too, but what do you want for a marketing photo?). Putting the presentation area down there was a brilliant thought. Sure, looks obvious after the fact, but I can imagine that it wasn't easy to stumble upon that solution.

I applaud whoever was responsible for the design. They paid attention to experience, and thought about the details. Nicely done.

NH UPA March Meeting this Wednesday

2008-03-23T17:36:00.001-07:00

The NH UPA March meeting is this coming Wednesday night, March 26. Looks like a great topic. It is open to the public, but you gotta RSVP to info@nhupa in advance. See you there?

Topic: Expanding User-Centered Design in the 21st Century or Why Design Thinking is the Next Big Thing.

Speaker: Sarah Bloomer, Sarah Bloomer & Co.

When:
Wednesday, March 26th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00PM
Meeting: 7:00PM – 8ish

Where:
Liberty Mutual
150 Liberty Way
Dover, NH 03820

Abstract:
What is design thinking? Why is it important? What does design thinking mean to the field of user centered design?

Take a closer look: it seems design thinking heavily leverages user-centered design...

Stanford University recently set up a new Institute of Design (the d.school), founded by, amongst others, David Kelley and Terry Winograd, big names in interaction design. Its website boldly states "we believe design thinking is a catalyst for innovation and bringing new things into the world."

Business Week Online includes a section on Innovation, where design is a major theme. And in his book A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink says that the new MBA is the MFA. He claims we are moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age. And people with design thinking will lead the way.

This talk is an overview of how design thinking is finding its place in companies worldwide, and how user-centered design is being applied across many fields, from organizational design to product design.

Buzzword - Worth the Buzz

2008-03-12T18:31:00.000-07:00

Last night I saw Rick Treitman and Robby Shaver talk about Buzzword at the monthly BostonCHI meeting.

It is usually difficult to really "wow" a BostonCHI type of audience. Not impossible, but difficult. But with YAWP (Yet Another Word Processor)? I mean come on, a word processor? We are supposed to get excited over a word processor? Are you serious?

Yes. Serious. These guys did it. Frankly, Rick had me sold very early in his part of the talk, when he said:

"If you are going to build something new, build it beautiful."

(Yay, a new quote to add to my list of favorite design quotes!)

And that very much was the theme of everything they talked about and showed us all night long. Beauty and elegance. Design that resonates. (Note to self: go re-read Gelernter's Machine Beauty.)

Buzzword is a Flash-based word processor that works inside a browser. It has some collaboration features built in, but I think what resonated more with many of us in the audience is that it was designed with a fresh look at the solution space, and with an elegance that isn't often seen today. An Apple-like elegance, you might say.

I was quite interested in what I could glean about Robby's design process, as his role was (is) that of the design lead. No surprise to me, his is a design process rooted in creating interactive artifacts (wanna call them prototypes?). He made an interesting comment about steering away from wire frames, and instead creating pixel-fidelity interactions. Hmmmm, pair that up with the Business Week Tech Beat post last week about Apple's design process and "pixel perfect mockups." I see a design tension here between fast (sketching) and fidelity that I find myself mulling over and over. Can it be that Robby just glossed over the phase where he considers ten ideas to concentrate finally on one or two?

They talked about creating an Adobe AIR version of Buzzword. That, I think, could be a killer app in the word processing space, and I'll be watching for it. In the meantime, check out Buzzword. And if you get a chance to see Rick or Robby talk, don't pass it up.

Bored? Restless?

2008-03-09T08:18:00.000-07:00

I know. Let's try some door surfing.

Concert Report: Richard Shindell @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-03-01T15:02:00.000-08:00

Patti and I were back at Tupelo Music Hall last night, this time for the sold out Richard Shindell show. As I mentioned in my review of the recent Susan Werner show, Richard is unsurpassed in the art of telling stories via his songwriting.

Another thing that shines in Richard's songwriting is his ability to turn a phrase in a way that catches me in wonder and amazement. One example from a song last night is the first two lines of the third verse of Kenworth of My Dreams, a song about selling it all to go on the road as a trucker:

A lot of folks just shook their heads
Convinced that I’d lost mine
They said living in a God-damned truck
Is just a waste of time
That to spend your life behind the wheel
Ain’t as great as it might seem
I just thanked them all and left one night
In the Kenworth of my dreams

I love the cleverness of those first two lines. Another snippet that always gets me like that are the lines from There Goes Mavis that juxtapose two colors:

Then out of the blue
There’s an orange canary
On our driftwood flagpole
Shovels down Boys! — step away

This song, by the way, is about a canary set free by her little girl owner ("Now’s your big chance, Fly away!"). But those two lines, with the clever use of "out of the blue" followed by the contrasting orange, are just brilliant.

Richard shook things up a little last night by opening with Transit, which is more typically his set closer. His voice was a little off, but we found out later he is just getting over a cold and he felt so lousy earlier in the day that he thought he was going to have to cancel the gig. Thankfully the show went on, and by the third song or so his voice was full strength and he admitted that he was feeling much better.

Richard told an amusing story about Transit which I hadn't heard before. The central figure in Transit is Sister Maria from St. Agnes’s Church in Paterson , NJ. Now, this is all made up - when writing the song he needed a church, and St. Agnes's just popped into his mind. And he needed a nun, so he pulled Sister Maria's name out of his imagination. Except, as it turns out, there really is a St. Agnes's Church in Paterson, NJ. And even better, there really is a Sister Maria at St. Agnes's. And even better, he recently received a letter from none other than Sister Maria which said, in its entirety:

Dear Richard,
Please drive safely.
Yours,
Sister Maria

Priceless! Go read the lyrics and you'll understand.

We were treated to two new songs which are likely candidates for his next album. "Clara" is an upbeat and humorously amusing ditty about a mule, and "Balloon Man" is about a local character in his adopted hometown, Buenos Aires. Neither were instant killer Shindell songs to me, but who knows what I'll think after hearing them more.

The setlist (all songs written by Richard unless noted in parentheses):

Transit
Kenworth of My Dreams
Northbound 35 (Jeffrey Foucault)
Clara
Balloon Man
Fenario
Waist Deep in the Big Muddy (Pete Seeger's allegorical anti-war song)
Cold Missouri Waters (James Keelaghan)
Sitting on Top of the World (Traditional)
Reunion Hill
Hazel's House
Are You Happy Now?
So Says the Whippoorwill
There Goes Mavis
Encore: On A Sea Of Fleur De Lis

The opener was Meg Hutchinson.

Five Essays for Interaction Designers

2008-02-26T17:14:00.001-08:00

This is a warm up exercise for an updating of my somewhat out-of-date "top five books" list. These are my top five favorite essays about software design. Well, OK, to be accurate there are three essays and two interviews. The good news is that the three pieces from Winograd's Bringing Design to Software can all be read on the hci.stanford.edu Web site (sans figures though). For the others, you'll have to buy the books. Heck you ought to buy Bringing Design to Software anyway.

Here we go. Five essays for interaction designers...to inform, to inspire.

"A Software Design Manifesto", Mitch Kapor. In Bringing Design to Software (Winograd, 1996). This essay was first given as a talk at Esther Dyson's PC Forum in 1990, and it first appeared in print in Dr. Dobbs Journal in 1991. Kapor's essay represents a call to arms for a software design profession, and draws a strong parallel between software design and architecture.

"The Right Way to Think About Software Design", Theodor Holm Nelson. In The Art of Human-Computer Interface Design (Laurel, 1990). Ted Nelson is an early pioneer in Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) and information technology. He is credited with coining the terms "hypertext" and "hypermedia" in the 1960s, and along with Andries "Andy" van Dam he created the first hypertext system at Brown in the late 60s. Nelson's essay draws an analogy between software design and movie-making; interactivity is a key concept in both.

"The Designer's Stance", an interview with David Kelley by Bradley Hartfield. In Bringing Design to Software (Winograd, 1996). David Kelley is the founder of IDEO, which is arguably the world's premier design firm. This interview is a nice short introduction to Kelley's ideas, and should whet any designer's appetite for reading The Art of Innovation, written by David's brother Tom Kelley (IDEO's general manager).

"Cultures of Prototyping", Michael Schrage. In Bringing Design to Software (Winograd, 1996). Schrage is a well known consultant, writer, and researcher at the MIT Media Lab. This essay discusses the importance of prototyping to creativity and innovation, and draws on examples from the automotive and consumer electronics industries. This essay plays well with my opinion that software design needs to be much more like industrial design, and that we place far too much emphasis on "specs" as the primary deliverable of product designers, rather than multiple methods of articulating design and vision.

"Designing the PalmPilot: A Conversation with Rob Haitani", an interview with Rob Haitani by Eric Bergman. In Information Appliances and Beyond (Bergman, 2000). Rob Haitani was the Product Manager for the original PalmPilot, and is widely credited with being in charge of the design of the PalmOS user interface. As a Palm user from the very first PalmPilot, I'm an unabashed PalmOS fan. This interview, the longest reading so far at 20 pages, is a fascinating look at the design process and design for the small screen.

Things That Are Important

2008-02-24T09:29:00.000-08:00

"Things That Are Important" is a list of 5 principles that I have carried around in my Palm Pilot/Treo/Blackberry since the day in 1997 when they seemed to flow from my thoughts effortlessly. At least I think it was in 1997. I was about to transition from being an individual contributor to being a manager at Sun Microsystems, and I found myself thinking about my career, about what I thought was important, and how I wanted to manage my group. I like to believe that I have guided my career by these principles, and that I manage by them. Everyone who reports to me gets to hear them at least once.

1. Teamwork. This is about working for the good of the team, and thinking about the team. I use the term "team" in reference to all levels of the team - your local group, your larger organization, your division, all the way up to your corporation. All too often I have seen individuals act in their own self interests, rather than the interests of their group. Or groups act over the interests of their larger organizations or even their entire corporation. For people in my team, I expect them to watch each others' backs. This might be as simple as sharing information or giving a team member a "heads up" about something. Or it might be seeing a need and helping out. As for managers, we should always be aware of how our words and actions either foster or destroy a sense of team, both within our groups and among different groups.

2. Leverage. This is about making use of your work beyond the immediate purpose. Leverage is about making your organization more efficient. This is often played out in terms of taking lessons learned and sharing them with others, so that they don't have to learn what you already know the hard way. Sharing templates and tools and techniques that you have developed is another way of applying leverage to your work. One might call this just an aspect of teamwork, but I find it unique enough to deserve a place on my list.

3. Technical excellence. I am simply blown away, day in and day out, by the technical excellence displayed by the engineers with whom I work. As design professionals, it is important to also demonstrate a level of technical excellence and competence. There are two aspects of this. The first aspect is a level of technical competence regarding the software or device architecture upon which we are designing. This does not mean knowing the architecture as well as the engineers, but it does mean knowing enough to be an effective designer. You must have an understanding of what is possible, of what is difficult, of what is impossible. Without some level of technical competence, you will almost surely fail to establish a meaningful and productive relationship with your engineering counterparts. The second aspect is a level of technical excellence with respect to the domain for which you are designing. It doesn't matter whether you are designing, say, a programmer productivity tool, a financial application, a network or system management application, a social networking application, or a civil engineering application. You simply cannot be an effective designer without some level of technical competence in the application's "domain space."

4. Attention to presentation and detail in everything we produce. We are design professionals, and everything we produce should speak to that. This does not mean spending an infinite amount of time on an infinite amount of detail. Not at all. But it does mean considering the audience for everything you produce, and producing it with an eye toward design. Think of it this way - it isn't just about the quality of your design ideas, but also the quality of how you convey them.

5. It's not just a job, it's a profession. I am extremely passionate about this principle. While I don't discount that there are some pure natural design geniuses, most of the rest of us are mere mortals. I have a masters degree in the field, and have spent two decades practicing and reading and learning my profession. As such I have little patience with those who seem to think they can click their heels three times and call themselves an interaction designer, or a usability engineer, or whatever - all without having the foggiest idea of fundamental human-computer interaction and design principles, or without having any familiarity with the body of knowledge, or with the important thought leaders of the field. And, frankly, this means more than simply browsing a couple of web sites every once in a while. Like all established professions, we stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us. When I was in graduate school twenty-some-odd years ago the field was small enough that you could literally read the body of literature. This is no longer the case, but you darn well ought to be familiar with the major works, and you darn well ought to be actively staying in touch with the field though readings and publications, local professional networking groups, and other training opportunities. Another way to think of this is as using constant professional learning as a means of continual process improvement - of learning and getting inspired by others to continually improve yourself. (Which reminds me, I posted a "top 5 books" list to my web site several years ago, and it is in dire need of updating - maybe that will be my next bog post.)

There you have it. Five things that are important. Have you thought about your own career principles? Or maybe just as important, do you have any idea of what your manager thinks, and whether his or her principles are in concert with your principles?

Design is about articulating vision of what is to be

2008-02-22T17:20:00.000-08:00

In my reading and conversations and thinking lately I keep coming around to this phrase: design is about articulating vision of what is to be.

I was struck by this thought several times yesterday, including late last night while reading a passage in Henry Dreyfuss' autobiography, Designing For People. Dreyfuss was, IMO, the most important industrial designer of the twentieth century. Among other things, he designed the Twentieth Century Limited locomotive, the classic John Deere tractor, the Honeywell circular wall thermostat, the classic Hoover vacuum cleaner, and perhaps most iconic of all, the Bell model 550 telephone (the classic desktop phone). It was Dreyfuss' passage about the model 550 that stuck me. Here are some snippets from a section that is about three or four pages long:

Toward this goal, we proceed slowly, discarding more innovations than we accept.

Every conceivable kind of handgrip was considered... Laboratory and field tests by typical telephone users...pointed up advantages.

...the phone began to fall into shape. This is an easy way of stating that something like 2500 rough sketches were scrutinized and narrowed down to half a dozen...

It would serve no purpose to confound the reader with the infinite mass of statistical detail that had to be carefully studied, the suggested changes that were agreed upon, rejected, or modified, and the compromises effected between engineers and industrial designers. Inherent limitations dictated much of the design.

Our office was in turmoil for weeks over what was called the "ROH Battle" - receiver off hook...

Sketches were made of all these variations, then accurate layout drawings. These were followed by full-size "breadboard models" of the components. When several designs appeared likely, they were modeled in clay, which can be easily modified as ideas develop. Later they were cast in plaster, sculptured and lacquered. This high polish was important so that the model could be analyzed for light reflection that might prove annoying or tiring. Some were equipped with mock components such as handset dials, cords, and number plates to simulate the finished product. When all decisions were made, a bronze master was made of the final design.

Is this any different than what those of us in software product design do, other than we don't work in the physical realm but in the software realm? I think not. All of these things ring true - the discarded ideas, the formative testing, the endless sketches and detail, the interaction between developers and designers, the inherent limitations of the software architecture, and the weeks of turmoil over thorny design problems.

And what Dreyfuss is describing, to me, is the many different ways of articulating vision of what is to be, every step of the way.

There's a side topic here too, about the role of "specs." Too many software organizations, I think, confuse design with "writing the spec." I think design is all of those other ways of articulating the vision of what is to be, each one reducing uncertainty and answering questions and focusing the idea. Then you write the spec, if needed, when things are pretty well nailed down. Not unlike how the telephone bronze master wasn't made until all the decisions were made about the final design.

Google loves tomspine.com

2008-02-20T18:55:00.000-08:00

I don't know what it is about it, but Google just loves tomspine.com in its search results. Maybe it is because my site has been up for a long time. I just checked the Wayback Machine and found that I must have set up my domain late in 2003, although I know I first set up a site several years before that via my cable provider. In any event, I'm constantly amazed at how often my site shows up in search results.

Today was a case in point. I received a mail message out of the blue from a guy named Jonathan in Hudson, NH. Jonathan is a patient of Dr. Wingate at Nashua Eye Associates and he is considering LASIK eye surgery.

Like any sane person, Jonathan was doing some research on the surgery and the doctor. He found my write up of having Dr. Wingate perform LASIK surgery on me in 2000, updated with follow ups in 2001 and 2004. Jonathan wondered how things have gone since then.

I was thrilled to be contacted, and told Jonathan that yes, I'm still very happy with my LASIK surgery. While I do now wear reading glasses (ahem, no cracks about middle age), I continue to have excellent vision and no negative side effects.

But I wondered just how Jonathan found my web site. I thought, hmmm, maybe he did a Google search on "Dr. Wingate lasik", so I tried that. Holy cr*p, the order of the search results blew me away. First result is, of course, a sponsored link for some LASIK vision center. But then the first "real" search result is my web site! I come up before Dr. Wingate's bio, before a Nashua Telegraph article, even before the Nashua Eye Associates web site! That astounds me.

But I love it. :-)

Gender and Design

2008-02-18T08:18:00.000-08:00

Talk of gender issues and the high tech industry usually focuses on the glass ceiling - the dominance of men in the senior leadership positions of many high tech companies. But there is a growing awareness of the importance of gender considerations in the design of technology products. The headline article in the Business section of today's Boston Globe, titled "Tech's feminine side" is a high level introductory look at the issue.

I recently had the pleasure of speaking with Laura Beckwith, one of the researchers quoted in the Globe article. Laura, now working at Microsoft, researched computing and gender issues while obtaining a Ph.D. at Oregon State University. She looked at how the design of end-user computing environments, such as spreadsheet debugging tools, influenced performance differences across male and female users. I was fascinated to learn of her work, and found it fundamentally important. You can learn more about it here.

The very important bottom line is summed up in this quote by Laura in the Globe article:

"There's a possibility that if you don't consider gender when you're designing your software, you are unintentionally designing for one and not both genders."

Two (count 'em, two!) Boston-area UPA meetings this week

2008-02-17T17:46:00.000-08:00

For the moment I will put aside my rant that we have too many splinter groups in the greater Boston area - Boston CHI (formerly SIGCHI, and IMO the granddaddy of all of these upstarts), UPA Boston, NH UPA, Boston-IA, and IxDA Boston are just five - and I'm sure I'm forgetting one or two more.

Anyway, what is this post about? Oh, yea - this coming week we have both NH UPA and Boston UPA meetings.

The NH UPA meeting is on Tuesday night, February 19 at PixelMEDIA in Portsmouth, NH. The meeting will feature four 10-minute talks, one each by Chauncey Wilson (Autodesk), Shannon McHarg (H&R Block), Rebecca Richkus (Autodesk), and Margot Bloomstein (PixelMEDIA). Go Chauncey and Rebecca! See the NH UPA site for more info.

And Autodesk is again taking the spotlight on Thursday night, February 21, at the UPA Boston meeting. This one will be held at Autodesk in Waltham, MA, and the theme is a series of short talks about design and usability organized by Chauncey and the Autodesk Revit product design team. More info is available on the UPA Boston site.

I'll be at both meetings this week, cheering on the home team.

Project Ticket Stub - 1988

2008-02-16T13:30:00.000-08:00

This was a year for lots of Hot Tuna, David Bromberg, John Hartford, and the Dead...

Hot Tuna
The Stone Pony, Asbury Park, NJ
March 26, 1988

Acoustic and electric sets at the legendary Stone Pony. I think my ears are probably still ringing from the electric set. This show was just an added bonus for the Dead shows coming up in a few days...

Grateful Dead
Meadowlands Arena, East Rutherford, NJ
March 30 and 31, 1988

These were the first two of three shows played at the Meadowlands, and they were on Wednesday and Thursday nights. Why, I wonder, didn't we go to the Friday night show? That seems peculiar, and I have no recollection that would explain it.

Nothing stands out, other than this was the period where the band was doing Dear Mr. Fantasy > Hey Jude, and we got that on Thursday night. Both those songs were loads of fun, with Brent singing lead on Fantasy, and the crowd singing along on Hey Jude.

Grateful Dead
Hartford Civic Center, Hartford, CT
April 3, 1988

The Sunday night show in Hartford. If I remember it correctly, this was the show where Jerry's voice was completely shot. Painfully shot. This was the first of three shows in Hartford, and we were glad we were skipping the last two shows, and hoping he recovered by later in the week when the band hit Worcester...

Grateful Dead
The Centrum, Worcester, MA
April 7 and 9, 1988

Here again I went to only two of three shows. For some unknown reason I skipped the Friday night show. Perhaps it was cash flow?

Note the "Behind Stage" mark on the Thursday night ticket. The Dead were starting to get popular, touring behind the fairly successful "In The Dark" album and the band's only top 10 song, "Touch of Grey" Popularity - bummer.

John Hartford
Nashua Center for the Arts, Nashua, NH
April 23, 1988

No doubt about it, this is a top-10 all time concert.

Memories of this concert are strong, owning in no small part to the WEVO-FM live broadcast of the show. Since I was going to the concert, I took my trusty Nakamichi BX-100 cassette deck over to my friend Chuck's house, and set Chuck up so all he had to do with hit the record button. Chuck did a fine job recording the show for me.

In October, 2002 I transferred the cassette masters to computer WAV files, and created lossless SHN files. These SHN files are now widely circulated among Hartford fans and collectors, and in fact bt.etree.org has an active torrent seed of the show right now.

WEVO-FM itself occassionally plays some cuts from my recording during the Sunday night Folk Show. Although WEVO did quite a few live broadcasts from the Nashua Center for the Arts, it seems they never recorded them (or the tapes are lost in somebody's private stash). So after I did the transfer from cassette I gave a copy of the resulting CDs to Kate McNally, the Folk Show DJ. She was really happy to receive it, and every now and then I hear her play a cut from the show.

John had the respectful Nashua audience in the palm of his hand. The sing along portions are particularly great on the recording. WEVO must have had some mics on the audience, and the result is excellent.

Chuck Berry and Friends
Cheshire Fairgrounds, Swanzey, NH
May 7, 1988

This was an all afternoon show at the outdoor fairgrounds in Swanzey, NH. It was a wonderful late spring day in New Hampshire. I don't remember the exact order of the show, but I think it went:

Carl Perkins
Johnny Rivers
Roy Orbison
James Brown
Chuck Berry

The highlight of the show was, without a doubt, Roy Orbison. I feel very fortunate to have seen him. Little did we even think at the time that Roy would be gone by the end of the year, dead at age 52 from a heart attack.

The lowlight of the show was James Brown. We were all very much looking forward to seeing the Godfather of Soul, but this wasn't the night. I don't know if he was just drunk or high on drugs, but he was out of it. He could barely stand up, and had to be, uh, assisted on stage by two of his flunkies. His performance, if you could call it that, was short and just plain stunk.

Grateful Dead
Oxford Plains Speedway, Oxford, ME
July 2 and 3, 1988

The weekend was probably the most fun I ever had in all my Dead shows. This setting, rural Maine, was the polar opposite of all those very fun Dead shows at Madison Square Garden. We had a very large group of probably 20 or more all camping together next to a lake about a mile or two from the speedway. My Web site has this photo of a boat on the lake in fog that I took at the campground late one afternoon. It looks oh so peaceful, but behind the camera's view is the cacophony of tents and grills and music and dozens of happy campers.

I remember there was some amount of trepidation leading up to the weekend. If I recall correctly, a week or two before there was a heavy metal concert at the speedway, and things did not go well. Rowdy, drunken metal heads did some disrespectful things to the locals, and the result was predictable. Word spread, and both the Deadhead community and the locals were wary of what would happen when we arrived. No worries, though, for as the locals found out, Deadheads tended to be a mellow and peaceful bunch.

Funny, but one of my memory highlights is walking to the speedway for the shows. I'm pretty sure the cops closed the road leading up to the speedway to vehicle traffic. So I have this memory of this rural Maine state highway full of Deadheads as far as the eye could see, all walking to (and from) the show. Surreal.

Kingston Summer Jam
Kingston Fairgrounds, Kingston, NH
August 21, 1988

This was an all-afternoon outdoor concert on the fairgrounds. I recall it was quite the low key and relaxed affair. The line up, in order as I recall it was:

Papa John Creech
David Bromberg (solo)
Max Creek
Rick Danko
Hot Tuna with David Bromberg

I'm really glad I got to see Papa John. I think that may be the only time I saw him. Or was he along on the Jefferson Airplane reunion tour in 1989? No, I don't think so, or I'd remember it.

Nonetheless, the highlight for me was the closing Hot Tuna Bromberg set. This was all acoustic, and sitting in chairs from left to right were David, Jorma, and Jack. Bromberg and Jorma together are, IMO, more than the sum of their parts, and this set mixed Bromberg tunes and Hot Tuna tunes together.

Bob Dylan
Riverfront Park, Manchester, NH
September 3, 1988

Riverfront Park! Ha! Some park. Riverfront Park was nothing more than an asphalt parking lot hemmed in by a number of the old mill buildings along the Merrimack River. This was also called Arms Park, and today there is a pretty strip of trees and grass in this area, just south of the Bridge Street bridge. Were there some buildings there that have since been torn down for parking? I really recall being hemmed in by brick buildings. You can imagine how good the sound wasn't.

I'm pretty sure the opening band was Timbuk3. Besides the venue, the only thing that really stands out about Dylan's set is a fair number of familiar songs that were almost completely unrecognizable, particularly "Girl From The North Country."

Eric Clapton
Great Woods Performing Arts Center, Mansfield, MA
September 14, 1988

Crap. I just don't remember this show. Nothing sticks out. Pretty easy to research it on the Web though - it was a Wednesday night, Mark Knopfler was part of the band, a pretty typical Clapton setlist ("Crossroads", "White Room", "After Midnight", and more), Knopfler did "Money for Nothing", encore was "Sunshine of Your Love." But I'm afraid there really aren't any memories that stand out.

Grateful Dead
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY
September 16, 18, 19, 20, 22, and 23, 1988

Here we go! A full week-plus of Dead at Madison Square Garden! Actually, the band's run at MSG started on the 14th, but I didn't see either that show or the show on the 15th. My run started on the Friday night show on the 16th.

Looking back now almost twenty years later, the week is just one long blur of Dead shows, and it is impossible to say "oh yea, and on the Tuesday night show they played 'Louie Louie'." Of course, they really did play "Louie Louie" on the Tuesday night show, but distinguishing that night from the other nights just isn't possible.

Grateful Dead & Friends
Madison Square Garden
September 24, 1989

Even though this is the next, and last, night in the MSG run, I am listing it as an individual entry. This night was special, and more than "just" another Dead show.

This was a benefit concert with proceeds going to Cultural Survival, Greenpeace, and the Rainforest Action Network. The concert was broadcast live on WNEW-FM in New York, and WMMR-FM in Philadelphia. Bruce Hornsby & The Range opened the show.

And then the real fun began with the Dead's two sets. We knew it was going to be a special night when three songs in former Rolling Stones guitar player Mick Taylor was on stage for "West L.A. Fadeaway" and "Little Red Rooster." The latter song, being a blues number, was perfect for Taylor. (Ah, I suppose West LA is sorta blues inspired as well.)

The rest of the first set was pretty straight forward, but the second set opened in a completely surprising way with Suzanne Vega on stage with an acoustic guitar and the band backing her on two of her own songs, "Chinese Bones" and "Neighborhood Girls." The surprises continued a couple of songs later when Daryl Hall and John Oates came out to play "Every Time You Go Away" and "What's Going On." Daryl Hall's lead vocals on "What's Going On" was particularly memorable, and the song rocked out. Drumz was notable for the inclusion of a bunch of folks, including Baba Olatunji.

Everybody was out for the encores, "Good Lovin'" and "Knocking On Heaven's Door" - Hornsby, Hall and Oates, Jack Casady (on bass, of course), Suzanne Vega, and Olatunji.

Without a doubt, this was the most unique Dead show I ever saw.

Hot Tuna
Raoul's Roadside Attraction, Portland, ME
October 20, 1988

The ticket says Jorma Kaukonen, but this really was acoustic Hot Tuna - Jorma and Jack Casady. Raoul's is a little hole in the wall sort of place, still running today, and for me the perfect type of venue for Jorma and Jack sitting down and playing their acoustic magic. A fine show.

David Bromberg, The David Grisman Quartet, & John Hartford
Sanders Theatre, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
October 21, 1988

It is impossible to not catch your breath in awe the first time you walk into Sanders Threatre. If you have never been there, this picture gives you a small sense of the its beauty. Deep rich wood, constructed with a detailed craftsmanship that simply isn't possible today. The acoustics of Sanders is phenomenal. It is absolutely one of my most favorite venues, and the only complaint I could ever have about it is that it can be rather cozy - there will be no space whatsoever between you and whomever is sitting next to you. Oh, and don't get stuck behind one of the support pillars.

For this show, John Hartford went first, then Grisman, and then Bromberg closed the show. With the acoustics, this was a perfect venue for Hartford, and he expertly got the audience singing along, and even singing in round (on "Long Hot Summer Days" if I am not mistaken). The other thing that stands out from this night is Bromberg singing several songs without amplification. Now he often does this in shows, but I remember that something different was going on - was there a power outage, or a temporary malfunction of the sound system? Something like that, but whatever the cause he didn't miss a beat and the sound in Sanders is so perfect that no one had to strain to hear him.

David Bromberg
Raoul's Roadside Attraction, Portland, ME
November 18, 1988

Back to Raoul's, this time for Bromberg performing solo.

Hot Tuna
The Ritz, New York, NY
December 10, 1988

And last but not least for 1988, acoustic and electric Hot Tuna - just like the year began.

Start Simple, Build Complexity Over Time

2008-02-16T08:42:00.000-08:00

I just ran across a post by Paul Graham titled Six Principles for Making New Things. Paul succinctly stated his principles as:

"I like to find (a) simple solutions (b) to overlooked problems (c) that actually need to be solved, and (d) deliver them as informally as possible, (e) starting with a very crude version 1, then (f) iterating rapidly."

Sweet. I like it. I was immediately reminded of one of my own often used design aphorisms:

Start simple, build complexity over time

Yes, I'm aware that the grammar is a bit awkward. And I also admit that this is just a variant on Occam's razor.

But I'm amazed at how often we in the software industry paint ourselves into design corners by violating the law of parsimony. Really good software design takes a tremendous amount of discipline, and a willingness to draw boundaries in the name of elegance, simplicity, and usability. Design for the essential, not the edge cases. It turns out to be much easier said than done.

Interaction 08 Videos

2008-02-13T18:36:00.001-08:00

The Interaction Design Association (aka, IxDA) held its first annual conference, Interaction 08, last week in lovely Savannah, GA. Exciting times, and a potentially important step toward a more recognized establishment of the interaction design profession.

And even better, they are posting a ton of videos of the sessions on brightcove (and soon on the conference site as well). See this post in the IxDA discussions for a list of the first batch of videos.

This is going to chew up hours of my time. First stop for me is Alan Cooper's keynote address, An Insurgency of Quality. And then maybe Jonathan Arnowitz on Effective Prototyping Methods. And then, and then...

Thank you, IxDA!

Yes We Can parody video

2008-02-12T16:47:00.000-08:00

You knew it had to happen. First the Yes We Can video gets millions of hits on both YouTube and at its original location - over three million complete viewings at each site, and counting. So the parody couldn't be far behind, could it?

No, of course it couldn't be far behind. It's in the top 10 most viewed on YouTube so far this week, with over 500,000 views: john.he.is.

You really need to watch the two videos back to back to appreciate how well the parody was done. Oh, and if you are a Republican you probably need a really good sense of humor too.

Concert Report: Susan Werner @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-02-11T18:16:00.000-08:00

Patti and I were back at the Tupelo Music Hall on Sunday night to see Susan Werner, one of my most favorite singer-songwriters.

As with Lucy Kaplansy, I distinctly remember the first time I heard Susan. It was 1996 or maybe 1997, and I was driving to work. I was in Lowell, MA, and Susan was an in-studio guest on WERS-FM. Susan and the DJ talked for a bit, and then Susan played a live version of "Petaluma Afternoons". Bam! I was hooked, by the voice as well as the mastery of lyrics.

To this day I think that Susan is the most musically-gifted of all my favorite singer-songwriters. Richard Shindell is the best song storyteller. Vance Gilbert is the most gifted stage performer. But Susan is the most gifted musically. Her understanding of song and the craft of songwriting is unparalleled. This is illustrated, I think, in her last two albums, both of which are "project" or concept albums. The previous album, "I Can't Be New" is full of songs written in the Great American Songbook style; songs in the style of George Gershwin, Cole Porter, and Richard Rogers.

Susan's current album, "The Gospel Truth" is a bold and honest approach at questions and issues of religion and faith in a gospel and slightly bluegrass influenced style. Susan describes it as "hymns for the spiritually agnostic", or "agnostic gospel." There are questions of faith and doubt, and those who aren't willing to question their beliefs are advised to not venture into this album.

A wonderful suprise for this concert was the addition of Trina Hamlin for harmony vocals, percussion, and a killer harmonica. Trina is incredibly talented, and she is an excellent sidekick for Susan. If you have some time, check out some of the YouTube videos of Susan and Trina playing together.

Patti says this was the best Susan concert we have seen, and she may be right. And we have seen Susan probably close to a dozen times - solo, in a trio format, and co-bills (the co-bill with Vance Gilbert at the Somerville Theater stands out in memory). The setlist went like this (all with Trina, unless otherwise noted):

I Will Have My Portion
(Why Is Your) Heaven So Small
Our Father (The New, Revised Edition)
Sunday Mornings (solo)
After All of This (solo, on piano)
Probably Not
Did Trouble Me
Don't Explain It Away
Lost My Religion
Time Between Trains
St. Mary's of Regret
May I Suggest (solo)
All Of The Above (solo)
I'm In Debt (on piano)
Give Me Chicago
Jacaranda (Trina solo)
Give Me One Reason to Stay
(Barack Obama) Get Happy
I Can't Be New
Encore:
Help Somebody
Together

Trina played harmonica on a number of songs, but she had a killer, extended harmonica solo on the end of "Time Between Trains" that rocked out. Susan performed "May I Suggest" on guitar, rather than piano as she originally always performed it; interesting variant. "All Of The Above" was played as an audience request. "(Barack Obama) Get Happy" was a contemporary political version of the old song, you know:

Forget your troubles,
Come on get happy...

Only substitute "Barack Obama" for "Forget your troubles" and then let your lyrical imagination run wild.

After the show we got to tell Susan that Lucy Kaplansky sang Susan's "May I Suggest" on the same stage just a week earlier. Susan had heard that Lucy was covering it, but hadn't yet heard Lucy's version. I also got a kick out of telling Susan that my signed pre-order copy of "The Gospel Truth" was number 13 out of the run of 100 pre-orders (Susan took pre-orders for the first one hundred CDs via her Web site). We both agreed that getting number 13 was superstitiously auspicious!

The opening act was Jenn Adams, whom I'm surprised I have never heard of before. A little bit folk, a little bit blues, she is new to the New England scene via Montana and then Nashville.

Concert Report: Lucy Kaplansky @ Tupelo Music Hall

2008-02-08T19:55:00.000-08:00

We interrupt Project Ticket Stub for an honest to goodness concert report. Patti and I saw Lucy Kaplansky last Friday night at Tupelo Music Hall.

I remember vividly the very first time I heard Lucy on the radio. It was 1995 and I was driving to work. As I was pulling into the parking lot this song came on, and I was mesmerized by both the voice and the lyrics. I parked my car and sat there amazed at what I was hearing. There was no way I was leaving my car until I found out who it was. I sat for a full 15-minutes until the set was over, and finally the DJ told me that I had heard Lucy singing the title song to her first album, The Tide.

Since that day I've seen Lucy, oh, I bet a dozen times. Solo. Co-bills with Richard Shindell. And three times during the wonderful year when Lucy, Richard, and Dar Williams teamed up and toured as Cry Cry Cry.

Lucy is known both for her own songwriting, as well as for her covers. And the covers are what really stood out for me Friday night. She opened with Nerissa Nields' "I Know What Kind of Love This Is", singing it sadder and slower than the Cry Cry Cry version. While I missed the harmony of Dar's voice, Lucy's solo of this song is heart wrenching, and you could tell that even Lucy was close to having tears in her eyes. Ah, nothing like a good dose of sad to start the evening off, eh?

A surprise cover was Susan Werner's "May I Suggest." This is new to Lucy's concert repertoire. She heard Susan do it this past summer at the Falcon Ridge Folk festival, and only recently printed out the lyrics and learned it. I am so used to Susan's version that Lucy's version just didn't seem right to me. But I'm sure that was just because my brain cells were expecting Susan but hearing Lucy.

Lucy also did Sir Paul McCartney's "Let It Be" on the Music Hall's baby grand piano. I don't recall if I have ever heard her do it before, but I loved it. She also pulled out Gram Parsons' "Return of the Grievous Angel", which she recorded on the Flesh and Bone album. When the album came out in 1996 I didn't like her cover of this song, probably because my mind wanted to compare it to Emmylou Harris' version. But over the years I have come to love Lucy's version as much as Emmylou's.

Patti and I were happy that she has returned to singing one of her Dad's songs mid-set again, and we cheered when she introduced it - prompting the familiar "I see he has fans" comment from Lucy. Her dad wasn't a song writer, but a musically-gifted mathematician who wrote a handful of wonderfully oddball songs. And Lucy has long talked about her dad and performed one of his songs during her shows, much to the delight of her regular fans. Well, Irving Kaplansky died at the ripe old age of 89 about a year and a half ago. It wasn't unexpected, and Lucy did get to say goodbye to him, but for a long time afterward she just couldn't bring herself to sing his songs in her show. Happily, she's back to making us Irving Kaplansky fans satisfied again, and she sang "A Song About Pi" for us. I would have preferred "On A Rocket Ship for Two", but I'll take what I can get. She closed the show with "Today's The Day", a song she wrote shortly after her dad passed away:

Tonight's the night I'll say goodbye
The last time that I can
I'll kiss your sleeping head
And hold your dying hand

Yea, not a dry eye in the house. As the concert started, so it ended.

The opening act was an up and coming young singer songwriter, Liz Longley. Liz is a student at Berklee College of Music, and wow, she is packed with poise and talent. Her voice can be silky and sultry, or bluesy and biting. Her songwriting craft isn't bad for someone who is just twenty years old. And she is quite poised on stage. She got good laughs from the audience, like when she told us she felt old because she had just turned twenty. As the mostly middle-aged audience laughed, she peered out at us and said "oh, wrong audience." I'm sure she has one heck of a career ahead of her, and you can check out her music on her MySpace page.

Yes We Can Song

2008-02-07T18:50:00.000-08:00

I didn't think I would ever inject a political point of view here, but yes we can.

Airbus A380 Cockpit

2008-01-28T17:03:00.000-08:00

Oh, wow. This is so cool - Airbus A380 Cockpit. After it loads, put it in full screen mode (last button on the right), and you can use your mouse to pan (click and drag) and zoom (mouse scroll wheel).

Really well done (although the mouse panning is backwards from what I expected, but I quickly adjusted).

(It's done Flash, by the way.)

Let Me In

2008-01-27T08:19:00.000-08:00

"For crying out loud, people, it's snowing out here. Let me in already."

January NH UPA Chapter Meeting

2008-01-22T10:46:00.000-08:00

A little public service announcement...

The first official New Hampshire UPA (Usability Professionals' Accociation) chapter meeting is this coming Thursday, January 24th, at UNH in Durham. Some of the details...

When:
Thursday, January 24th
Refreshments & Networking: 6-7:00 PM
Meeting: 7:00 PM

Where:
University of New Hampshire (UNH)
Kingsbury Hall, Room N101
33 College Road
Durham, NH

Guest speaker: Jared Spool
Topic: What Makes a Design Seem Intuitive?

RSVP: Seats are limited. You must RSVP to attend. Send RSVPs to info@nhupa.org.

NH UPA meetings are open to anyone who is interested in attending. Membership to the UPA is not required.

Stay informed about NH UPA meetings and events by joining the NH UPA Yahoo! group at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nh-upa/.

Project Ticket Stub - 1987

2008-01-20T09:31:00.000-08:00

1987. With this year you will start to see why I don't remember each and every Dead show I've been to...6 Dead shows for the spring tour, 3 in the summer, and 6 more for the fall tour.

Grateful Dead
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA
March 29, 30, and 31, 1987

My spring tour begins with the three shows in Philly. I'm not sure why these aren't mail order tickets, but rather are boring Ticketmaster stubs.

Happily for me, the three encores were Mighty Quinn, It's All Over Now Baby Blue, and Brokedown Palace. The Useless Blues curse is broken.

Grateful Dead
The Centrum, Worcester, MA
April 2, 3, and 4, 1987

Philly was Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, making Wednesday, April 1 the road trip day for me (and the band) to drive north. Then Thursday, Friday, and Saturday in the Centrum.

The Saturday show brought out a song called Willy and the Hand Jive, which was a Johnny Otis hit in 1958 (and also covered by Eric Clapton in the early 70s). This will turn out to be the last time they ever play this song, out of six total times played.

John Hartford and Nancy Griffith
The Colonial Theatre, Keene, NH
April 12, 1987

Although this is the first ticket stub I have with Nanci's name on it, I know it isn't the first time I saw her. My friend Leo and I saw Nanci at the legendary Passim folk club in Harvard Square sometime in 1983, 84, or maybe 85. I can't pin down which year, but I know I went there with Leo, and I remember being struck at how small the venue was (and still is today - total capacity is around 120 people). It was the first of many special musical nights I would spend at the small club in the basement on Palmer Street.

Anyway, back to this show... this was a double bill, and John played the opening set, followed by Nanci. I remember Nanci thanking John for being so gracious as to insist that he play the opening set. Nanci was still relatively unknown at this point, and John was ever the gentleman. Both John and Nanci played solo this night. This was long before John regularly toured with the Hartford String Band, and Nanci with her Blue Moon Orchestra band.

John Hartford
Joseph's Water Works, Norwich, VT
April 19, 1987

A week later and I was back to my favorite spot in Norwich to see John play another show at Joseph's Water Works. I think he had his son, Jamie, playing with him at this show. Jamie has turned into quite the musician himself, and his tribute album released a couple of years after John's death is nothing short of heartbreaking; it's amazing how much his voice sounds like his dad's.

The Neville Brothers
Club Casino, Hampton Beach, NH
May 15, 1987

I don't really remember the opening act, Judy Mowatt, but I can attest that the Neville Brothers are a hell of a lot of fun. Aaron Neville has one of the most amazing voices in the world, no?

New Riders of the Purple Sage
Joseph's Water Works, Norwich, VT
May 17, 1987

Panama Red...

Bill Staines
Joseph's Water Works, Norwich, VT
May 24, 1987

I probably discovered Bill Staines via Nanci Griffith, as Nanci gives much credit to Bill for encouraging her early in her career, and she does a beautiful cover of Bill's song, Roseville Fair.

Bill hails from New Hampshire, and today makes his home in Dover, NH - although he doesn't appear to be home much -- holy cow look at his tour schedule! If he's in your neighborhood, go see him.

Dylan and the Dead
Sullivan Stadium, Foxboro, MA
July 4, 1987

Oh my, this was fun. I mean, come on, how much more fun can you get than a late afternoon outdoor Dead show (with Dylan no less) on the 4th of July? This was a huge party!

The Dead played the first set, and it was sort of a shortened normal two set Dead show played in one set, starting with Touch of Grey, and having a Drums/Space about three-quarters of the way through the set. The second set was Dylan with the Dead, and there were many memorable moments during this set, including Garcia playing pedal steel on I'll Be Your Baby Tonight. There were no fewer than ten first-time-played songs during this set, and most notably (at least for me) the Knocking on Heaven's Door encore (with both Dylan and Garcia on vocals).

This show is a serious contender for my all-time top 10 list.

Dylan and the Dead
John F. Kennedy Stadium, Philadelphia, PA
July 10, 1987

A week later and we're in Philly for the Friday night show, to be followed by a show on Sunday at Giants Stadium in NJ (see below).

We used Scott's house in Atlantic City as our home base for the weekend, and there were a bunch of us there for the weekend and both shows. Hanging out on Saturday in Atlantic City was just perfect, and I remember the multi-car caravans heading to both Philly and Giants Stadium. Do you have any idea how hard it is to keep five or six cars together for the 130-mile ride up the Garden State Parkway from Atlantic City to East Rutherford?

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The JFK show was structured just like the Foxboro show the weekend before - a Dead set, followed by a Dylan and the Dead set. Once again Garcia brought out the pedal steel for I'll Be Your Baby Tonight. And once again we had a couple of firsts, including Simple Twist of Fate, and Tangled Up In Blue - both staples of JGB (Jerry Garcia Band) shows, but firsts for the Dead.

Dylan and the Dead
Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, NJ
July 12, 1987

And the Sunday night show. This time it was a normal two set Dead show, followed by a third set of Dylan and the Dead. The encore was Touch of Grey > Knocking on Heaven's Door. Sort of perfect.

Notice that the tickets for these Dylan and the Dead shows were $21 each. These are the first over-$20 tickets so far in Project Ticket Stub. Prices are rising.

Crosby, Stills, & Nash
Cal Expo Amphitheatre, Sacramento, CA
August 3, 1987

This was fun and totally unexpected. I was in Sacramento on a business trip with colleague Dennis. Our trip spanned the weekend before this show, as I remember we went up to lake Tahoe on the weekend.

At some point I must have noticed that CSN was playing on Monday night and that tickets were still available and I was able to snag one for me and one for Dennis.

I remember it was a gorgeous California summer evening. And what could be better than CSN in California? (Well, OK, sure - adding Neil Young could have made it better.)

Grateful Dead
Providence Civil Center, Providence, RI
September 7, 8, and 9, 1987

East coast fall tour started, for me and for the band, with three shows in Providence. Notice that I was pretty much sitting in the same spot on the floor for all three shows - Section 4, in either Row A or B. These were really good seats - the first two rows of the second seating section back on the floor, on Jerry's side.

The Monday night show (the 7th) brought out a new surprise song - La Bamba, a Ritchie Valens hit from the 1950s that was back in the musical zeitgeist from the 1987 movie of the same name; at the time Los Lobos was having a number 1 hit with their version of the song from the movie soundtrack. The Dead would play La Bamba just four times, all during this September fall east coast tour.

The first time surprises didn't stop at the Monday show, though. On Wednesday they opened the show by playing Hey Pocky Way (with Brent Mydland on vocals) for the first time. This song was originally recorded by the Meters in 1974, who adapted it from traditional New Orleans Indian street chants. Over the years it has been covered by the Wild Tchoupitoulas, the Neville Brothers, and many others. The Dead would play it 25 times in total, with the last time played just four days before Brent's untimely death on July 26, 1990.

On a more upbeat note, the first set on Wednesday also ended with another first time played - the classic "Detroit Medley" of Devil With A Blue Dress On > Good Golly Miss Molly > Devil With A Blue Dress On. Good Golly was first a hit in 1956 by Little Richard, but the Mitch Ryder pairing of it with Blue Dress in 1966 really put it on the all-time classic charts for good. All told, the Dead would play Blue Dress six times in the fall of 1987, splicing Good Golly into it on three of those times.

Grateful Dead
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY
September 18, 19, and 20, 1987

After Providence, the Dead played three nights in Landover, MD, but I didn't get to them. Then they played five nights in Madison Square Garden, and I went to the last three of those shows. The thing I most loved about seeing the Dead in New York City is that it seemed like the only place in the world where the influx of Deadheads didn't make a dent in the normal comings and goings of the area. We were just one small drop in the crazy bucket of this city. The scene in and around Madison Square Garden was tons of fun. Street vendors, cops on horses, crazy cabs, Deadheads, and the normal flow of the city.

I remember a cover of Dylan's Maggie's Farm (Bob Weir on lyrics) on Saturday night, broadcast on TV as part of that year's Farm Aid. This was another relatively rare song, played only 24 times in total. We also got another La Bamba, this one in the second set of the Friday night show.

I'm not sure why I ended up with a taper ticket for the Saturday night show, but I do recall being in the taper section and being very conscious of the tapers around me, with their mic stands high in the air.

Garcia on Broadway
Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, New York, NY
October 19, 1987

Billed as "Garcia on Broadway", in October 1987 Jerry put in a record-setting 18 show engagement at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre. Promoted by the legendary Bill Graham, here was proof positive that Jerry had bounced back (at least temporarily) from his drug problems and diabetic coma of just a year earlier.

I only got to see the show on the 19th, but without a doubt it belongs on my top 10 list. The first set was acoustic (the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band), and the second electric (JGB). These were fun, spirited shows, particularly the acoustic band sets, with Jerry having a lot of fun with his pals John Kahn (acoustic bass), David Kemper (drums), David Nelson (acoustic guitar), and Sandy Rothman (mandolin, dobro). I love the sound of this acoustic band, and kick myself for not seeing more of these shows.

Cost of living notice: this was the first of my tickets to hit thirty dollars.

Project Ticket Stub - 1986

2008-01-13T16:19:00.001-08:00

On to 1986...

Hot Tuna
Paradise Theatre, Boston, MA
January 23, 1986

I really don't remember this show. Nothing stands out, either of the night, the Paradise, or the show. I see that db.etree.org shows a sweet set list for the night. Set 1 must have been acoustic, and set 2 electric.

Jerry Garcia & John Kahn
The Capitol Theater, Passaic, NJ
January 31, 1986

This night (and the next - see below) go down in the top ten list, and also sit alongside that 1979 Steve Goodman show as one of those concerts that I most wish I could go back to and experience all over again.

This was acoustic Jerry - Garcia sitting on a chair with his acoustic guitar, accompanied by John Kahn on the upright acoustic bass. The two sets were short - really only about 45 minutes each (set list here), and Jerry's voice wasn't exactly at the top of his form (we won't get into his lifestyle here), but hell, it was acoustic Jerry!

If I could change any one thing about this concert it would be to get the crowd to be silent. I would have loved to have been able to hear every note, but well, you know a crowd of Deadheads (well, maybe you don't). Today I so much prefer small intimate venues, where everyone is there to hear the music, and you can hear each and every note.

Jerry Garcia & John Kahn
Orpheum Theater, Boston, MA
February 1, 1986

Friday night in Passaic, Saturday night in Boston! There was another show Sunday night in Boston, but I'm not exactly sure why I didn't go to that one as well. It could be that I couldn't get tickets -- or that I was running low on money!

Grateful Dead
March 23, 24, and 25, 1986
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA

On to the spring tour! First stop, Philadelphia.

It looks like these are my first mail order tickets (tickets purchased through the Dead's own mail order ticket distribution system). I loved these general admission shows (before the scene got too big, too popular, and too crazy), as the crowd tended to be mellow and to flow naturally. (Well, unless you wanted to get up real close to the stage.)

Nothing really stands out about this Philly run. I'm not even sure if we used Scott's Atlantic City house as our home base, or whether I might have been crashing at my parents', or even my brother's. Deadbase tells me that I thankfully didn't get any U.S. Blues encores. :-) Deadbase also says that they played Dylan's Desolation Row for the first time ever on the 25th. I always thought that Bobby (Bob Weir) did a great job with that song, and hell, just remembering all of the lyrics is an impressive feat!

Grateful Dead
Cumberland County Civic Center, Portland, ME
March 27 and 28, 1986

The Philly shows were Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. I must have driven back to NH on Wednesday, and I suspect used my Londonderry, NH apartment as the home base for these two Portland, ME shows. At least I don't remember staying overnight in Portland.

The show on the 27th stands out, as it had some unique (even for the Dead) aspects to it. The first set included a song called Hamstrung Blues, and this was the first and only time they played it. The first set also included a relatively rare Wang Dang Doodle, which hadn't been played in almost 2 years (91 shows to be exact). The second set also included a really cool and fairly rare jam known as Spanish Jam coming out of Drums.

The show on the 28th opened with Iko Iko, and to me that's a killer way to open a show. Energy from the very start.

Grateful Dead
Civil Center, Providence, RI
March 30, 1986

Notice that this isn't a Dead mail order ticket, which leads me to believe that this must have been a last minute, unplanned acquisition on my part. Five shows in a row weren't enough. :-)

Although I cannot tell from the ticket whether section 121 was a floor section, I know I ended up on the floor at this show, closer to the stage than in any other Dead show before or since. Close enough to really see details.

This show stands out for two things. One is the Beatles' Why Don't We Do It In The Road coming out of Drums; that was the very last time they ever played it, and they never did play it that often (only seven times ever, all between June 1984 and this show). The other was Dylan's Quinn the Eskimo for the encore, a relatively new cover song for them at the time - this was only the fourth time they had played it, the first being on December 30, 1985. Quinn was, without a doubt, an enormous crowd pleaser of an encore. It's such a great encore song.

Dylan and the Dead
R.F.K. Stadium, Washington, DC
July 6, 1986

Uhhh, anyone notice any pattern yet? :-)

They played, I think, five of these shows in late June and early July that year, all with Tom Petty opening, then Dylan, then the Dead. Although Dylan played with the Dead on a couple of songs at two of the shows (July 2nd in Akron, and July 7th in RFK), this wasn't one of them.

Other than a long, hot, summer day, what most stands out from this weekend was getting hopelessly lost in some not-so-friendly parts of Washington, DC while trying to find RFK Stadium.

Go Ahead
The Channel, Boston, MA
October 1, 1986

Oh, you thought maybe this wasn't Dead related? Ha!

Go Ahead was a Dead side band formed by keyboardist Brent Mydland and drummer Bill Kreutzmann during 1986 while Jerry was recovering from his near-fatal diabetic coma (brought on by drug abuse, I might add) earlier in the year.

I remember running into a bunch of DECheads (Deadheads who worked for DEC - Digital Equipment Corporation) at this show. I know I ran into Happy in the parking lot before the show, along with a bunch of others (Dave? Ting?). If we couldn't have a fall tour (because of Jerry's coma and recovery), at least we could have a side band.

John Hartford
Joseph’s Water Works, Norwich, VT
October, 1986

I don't know the exact date of this show, but I'm fairly confident it was in October, as db.etree.org shows John played the Somerville Theater in Somerville, MA on October 4th.

I loved this venue, and this was my first time there. It was a small bar, right along Vermont Route 5 on the Connecticut River, not far out of Hanover, NH (home of Dartmouth College). I saw John there a couple of times, as well as a few other artists (all coming up in the next couple of Project Ticket Stub years).

My friend Leo brought along his 35mm camera to either this show or one of the upcoming times I saw John at this venue, and I have a couple of great 8x10 prints of John playing here. I might even have Leo's 35mm negatives from this show, in one of far-too-many boxes of prints and negatives.

Harvey Reid, Doc Watson
Joseph’s Water Works, Norwich, VT
November 16, 1986

Told you I loved Joseph's Water Works - a month later and I went back to see Doc Watson.

Harvey Reid opened; Harvey is an incredible multi-instrumentalist, and this was my surprise introduction to him. I really went to see Doc, who had only recently begun touring again after the untimely death of his son Merle in October, 1985. Doc Watson is nothing short of an American musical icon, and if you aren't familiar with his music you should be.

Project Ticket Stub - 1985

2008-01-12T16:27:00.000-08:00

Time to resume Project Ticket Stub. If you have been following along you might be looking for 1984, but no, I didn't see any concerts in 1984 (well, that may not be entirely true -- see below). 1984 was spent heads down finishing graduate school - finishing the research, writing the thesis, finishing classes, and finally defending the thesis. I completed everything in December, 1984 and moved back to NH (for good, so far) in January, 1985. And then the fun began...

David Bromberg, John Hartford
The Bottom Line, New York, NY
February 23, 1985

Yes, yes, I know that the ticket says Doc Watson and John Hartford, but it really was a Bromberg and Hartford co-bill. Doc was sick and couldn't make the show, and David filled in for him. We didn't learn this until we were inside the legendary Bottom Line, but it was quite the welcome substitution.

This was my first and only time (so far?) attending a show at the Bottom Line, and was also my first Bromberg show. Although this is the first ticket I have with Hartford's name on it, I know that it wasn't my first Hartford show. The first time I saw John Hartford was sometime in 1983 or 1984 when I was down in Blacksburg, VA. We saw him at a small club that must have been somewhere in or around the Roanoke, VA area. I have a distinct memory of the inside of that small little club, at how happy I was to be seeing John Hartford (whom I had discovered through the record collection of Rob from Tennessee when I was in school in St. Louis), at who went to the show with me (graduate school friend Lt. Commander Steve Harris and his then wife Linda), and the best memory of all -- John signing the large poster I bought. To this day that same poster hangs framed in my den, alongside a signed Aero-Plain album sleeve; two very prized possessions.

Anyway, back to the Bottom Line... This was a co-bill, and I'm pretty sure Bromberg played the first set, and John played the second set. At least that's the way I remember it. No bands either - both of them played solo.

Grateful Dead
Cumberland County Civic Center, Portland, ME
March 31, 1985

Wow, a long dry spell for Dead shows - my last Dead show was in August, 1982.

This was a general admission show, at least according to the ticket. I'm trying to remember where I may have ended up, but I really don't recall. DeadBase tells me that the second set ended with Day Tripper - I bet that was fun! And, oh no, yet another Useless Blues encore - that's six out of seven, for those keeping score at home. Ugh, is it any wonder I grew to hate that song?

Grateful Dead
Merriweather Post Pavilion, Columbia, MD
June 30, 1985

My first outdoor Dead show, and oh what fun. Merriweather is a beautiful setting. This was the "We may be lost, but we're making damn good time" show. (Mark and Scott will remember that.) I remember a killer Looks Like Rain towards the end of the first set; to this day I love the emotion of that song. And yea, you guessed it -- U.S. Blues for the encore, making for a dismal seven out of eight shows.

Grateful Dead
Merriweather Post Pavilion, Columbia, MD
July 1, 1985

Do I remember this right? The June 30th show was a Sunday night (that's a fact) and was me, Mark, and Scott (and potentially others?). We must have spent the weekend in Atlantic City, at Scott's house and driven down to Merriweather before the show. And then we must have driven back to Atlantic City after the show - about a 180-mile drive each way.

Then, on Monday, July 1, just Scott and I drove back to Merriweather. Were the Monday night tickets a last minute acquisition? Why did Mark bail, some lame excuse like work? :-) I distinctly remember that we didn't take the same driving route as we did on Sunday. On Sunday we drove Atlantic City toward Philly, then down through Wilmington, MD, and on to Route 95 through Baltimore to Merriweather. But doing that again on Monday would have been boring and routine, so Scott and I drove south from Atlantic City to catch the Cape May ferry, then west across Delaware to the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. That was fun - both catching the ferry, and the bay bridge. If you have never driven it, the Chesapeake Bay Bridge is an amazing engineering marvel.

As for the show, holy cow what a smoking second set: Scarlet > Fire, Playin' > Uncle John > Drumz > Mr. Fantasy > GDTRFB > Good Lovin! Wow. And for the encore, Satisfaction > Baby Blue! I went home happy!

Given that I came from NH, I figure I must have logged about 1,400 miles to see these two shows.

Live Aid
John F. Kennedy Stadium, Philadelphia, PA
July 13, 1985

It doesn't get any better than this. This concert, this whole weekend, goes right to my all-time top ten list. No questions asked. None needed.

Did Scott score the tickets for this? Whoever did, there's a bunch of us forever in their debt. We had a large group, and we used Scott's house in Atlantic City as the gathering point before the concert. Happy and Rae and Bill C must have been there. Was /Bill (slash Bill)? Mark, of course, and Scott. And others too distant to remember. I remember a multi-car caravan from Atlantic City to Philly, as well as one hell of a parking lot scene. Everybody knew this was something BIG, and the atmosphere was electric. And HOT. OMG, it was blazing hot that July weekend.

Where do you start when it comes to Live Aid? Ninety thousand strong in JFK Stadium that day. Joan Baez telling us that it was our Woodstock. Phil Collins playing first in Wembley and then flying across the Atlantic to play drums for the Led Zeppelin reunion. Crosby, Still, Nash, and Young! Mick Jagger and Tina Turner burning it up. Teddy Pendergrass being brought on stage in his wheelchair. Dylan, Keith Richard, and Ron Wood! From start to finish, it was mind boggling.

Favorite non-musical memory: Scott appearing through the crowd mid-afternoon with two big bags of ice over his shoulders. I don't know how he did it, but he somehow acquired them from a vendor. And they saved our lives. We weren't within reach of the large water hoses they were using to help cool down the poor folks on the field. Did I mention it was HOT?

Garrison Keillor
The Wang Theatre, Boston, MA
September 21, 1985

OK, not really a concert, but I have a scanned ticket stub so I might as well include it. This was either at the Wang or at the Opera House, I can't remember which. And this was a benefit, as the ticket shows, but I don't remember what the benefit was for? Was it for the restoration of the Wang?

The night consisted of Garrison reading selections from his then recently published book, Lake Wobegon Days. I'm pretty sure I went with friends Chuck and Jan.

The Band
The Capitol Theatre, Concord, NH
October 5, 1985

My first visit to the Capitol Theater in Concord (now the Capitol Center for the Arts). This was the reunited Band (minus Robbie Robertson), and thankfully about six months before Richard Manuel's suicide. It was a rocking good night and just what you would want from The Band - a concert chock full of songs like The Shape I'm in, Stage Fright, The Weight, and Up On Cripple Creek.

Grateful Dead
The Centrum, Worcester, MA
November 4, 1985

And my year ended with a pair of Dead shows. First, Monday night in Worcester, where the highlight was the set 1 ending Might As Well. And yes, my bad luck with U.S. Blues encores resumed, now making it 8 out of my first 10 Dead shows.

Grateful Dead
The Centrum, Worcester, MA
November 5, 1985

And then Tuesday night in Worcester. Lots of highlights from this show, including They Love Each Other, Bird Song, and It Looks Like Rain all in the first set. The second started with the band playing Happy Birthday for Boston Celtic and legendary deadhead Bill Walton; the tall red head was quite easy to spot on the side of the stage all night long. The good thing about seeing back-to-back shows is no fear of another Useless Blues, but rather an achingly beautiful Brokedown Palace for the encore.

Bromberg, Hartford, The Band, five Dead shows, and Live Aid. 1985 was a very good year.

New Hampshire Primary - Heavy Voter Turnout

2008-01-08T15:08:00.000-08:00

Just a brief interruption to Project Ticket Stub to say, holy cow, the voter turnout in today's New Hampshire presidential primary is every bit has heavy as the news reports are saying. I've been a registered voter in Londonderry, NH since 1986, and I don't ever recall seeing a turnout as heavy as what I just witnessed at my polling place around 5:30pm tonight. Ever. Not in any previous primary. Not in any previous election. Traffic was backed up in every direction leading up to the high school. The parking lot was jam packed with cars streaming in and cars streaming out. There was a steady flow of people in and out of the voting booths.

The New Hampshire voting age population is just bit over a million people. News estimates are that we could have as many as 500,000 people voting today. Sure, on the one side I have to wonder just what is wrong with that half million people who aren't voting. But on the other side, I'm proud as hell to be among the 50% of eligible voters who did voice their opinion today.

New Hampshire is speaking today. Now we just have to wait to see what it says.

Project Ticket Stub - 1983

2008-01-06T16:47:00.000-08:00

1983. Apple Lisa is born. Bjorn Borg retires. Reagan calls the Soviet Union the "evil empire" and launches the Strategic Defense Initiative proposal (aka Star Wars). U.S. embassy in Beirut is destroyed by a suicide bomber. Lech Walesa wins the Nobel Peace Prize.

And I had my head down in graduate school. I moved from Blacksburg, VA to Nashua, NH in late May or early June to begin a research internship with Digital, and I wouldn't return to Tech for classes again until the following January. I was consumed by graduate school and the internship, and had little time for anything else.

Grover Washington, Jr.
Cassell Coliseum, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA
Unknown date in 1983

I don't know the date for this show, but it had to be early in the year, before I moved to New Hampshire. I vaguely remember it being winter, so maybe it was in February?

Grover Washington, Jr.'s smooth jazz certainly wasn't the sort of music I was listening to, as you might guess by previously posted ticket stubs. I went to this concert because my next door neighbor, Terri, wanted to go and I'm guessing that nobody else in our little circle of graduate school friends was willing. But hey, I'm game for any kind of music.

Neil Young
Saratoga Performing Arts Center (SPAC), Saratoga Springs, NY
September 4, 1983

Neil was touring behind his Everybody's Rocking rockabilly-inspired album. I recall that the first set was straight-forward Neil, and the second set was Neil and the Shocking Pinks doing the more rockabilly sort of tunes. I'll take straight-forward Neil, please, thank you.

SPAC, by the way, is a wonderful place for a summer concert. Scott must have been living in Albany around this time, and I suspect Mark came up from NJ to NH and from there we met up with Scott and others in Albany. This show had a great parking lot scene, and I remember learning that, yes, you can grill hot dogs and hamburgers in the hub cap of a 1970 Chevy Impala if you have somehow forgotten to bring the hibachi grill.

Project Ticket Stub - 1982

2008-01-05T13:59:00.001-08:00

1982. Falklands War. Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney, Ebony and Ivory. The situation in Poland looks bleak. The Vietnam Veterans memorial is dedicated. Barney Clark gets the first artificial heart.

And for me, graduation from college. I spent the summer in St. Louis, enjoying the incredible feeling of accomplishment before moving to Blacksburg, VA to start graduate school at Virginia Tech. Only five ticket stubs for the year, and three of them were in August during that wonderful summer. Interestingly enough, those three August shows allowed me to visit each of the three major St. Louis venues one last time - Keil Auditorium, Kiel Opera House, and the Checkerdome.

The Police
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
April 1, 1982

The Police were very popular around this time, and this tour was in support of The Ghost in the Machine album - both Spirits in the Material World, and Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic were getting lots of air play. But nothing about this concert really stands out, I'm afraid.

Grateful Dead
Kiel Auditorium, St. Louis, MO
August 4, 1982

My sixth Dead show, and another U.S. Blues encore! That's five out six! Oh well, at least I got a Terrapin Station, which I was really into at the time.

Elvis Costello
Kiel Opera House, St. Louis, MO
August 5, 1982

Of all the musicians I have seen, I feel most conflicted about my memory of this show. You see, today I am in complete awe of Elvis and his work. He's written or performed so many iconic songs - Alison, Pump It Up, Watching the Detectives, Almost Blue, Radio Radio, (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace Love and Understanding. And his body of collaborative work is incredible - Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, Lucinda Williams, Brian Eno, Burt Bacharach, and more. Not to mention he had the good taste to marry Diana Krall.

But my memory of this concert is spoiled by Elvis' attitude toward the audience at this show. I distinctly remember a sort of "you're not clapping loud enough for me to give you an encore" moment that really turned me off. And that's my overwhelming memory from that night.

Crosby, Stills, and Nash
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
August 24, 1982

Hmmmm, nothing stands out.

Arlo Guthrie
Stages, Granite City, IL
Unknown date in 1982

I'm listing this last, but I'm fairly certain this show was early in the year - March or April maybe. Unfortunately I didn't write the date on the back of the stub, and my internet searches have come up empty.

But I distinctly remember this show, partly because this represents the first concert I saw that wasn't in a large stadium, arena, or theater setting. Stages was a bar geared toward live acts. I remember the room was set up with long rectangular tables arranged perpendicular to the stage, so that everybody twisted a little sideways to see the stage. (As opposed to half the crowd having to turn completely around.)

Arlo was, well, exactly what you would expect for Arlo - humorous and folksy and slightly offbeat in that Alice's Restaurant sort of way (which, yes, he did play).

Project Ticket Stub - 1981

2008-01-04T17:25:00.000-08:00

1981. Reagan in the White House. U.S. hostages in Iran released. IBM PC. Bob Marley RIP. Lady Di marries Prince Charles. Reagan fires the striking air-traffic controllers. Simon and Garfunkel reunite in Central Park. Sandra Day O'Connor on the court. Nolan Ryan's fifth no-hitter. Martial law in Poland.

And not a whole lot of music for me. Blame it on being a poor college student.

St. Louis Philharmonic Orchestra
Kiel Opera House, St. Louis, MO
March 20, 1981

Look, some culture among all this rock and roll! A college friend, Jon, was a backup bass player for the orchestra, and as I recall this concert was his big break. Because he was going to be playing he got a number of comp tickets which he distributed among our little network of friends. So we had a little group of poor college students out in force to support Jon that night. It was fun, and we were proud to see our friend on stage.

I remember Jon telling us that the Keil backstage area that night was a weird trip. See, while the Philharmonic had the Opera House side of Keil that night, the Auditorium side was hosting a professional wrestling show (whatever they called Wrestlemania back then). So the shared backstage area between the two halves of Keil was a mixture of two very different cultures.

The Rolling Stones
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
November 19, 1981

My second Stones show; this tour in support of the Tattoo You album. I recall the show being, well, being more "show" than the 1978 tour - more elaborate in terms of stage production, and certainly a precursor of Stones shows to come where the stage is big and elaborate. Tattoo You was also one heck of a successful album, with Start Me Up being (for me) the signature song and sound of the concert and album.

Here's a little interesting tidbit about this tour -- notice the "A JOVAN PRESENTATION" on the ticket. This was the first rock tour in history to have an advertising sponsor - Jovan Musk. It seems that Jovan paid the Stones a million bucks to print that line on the tickets!

But I'm afraid that's it for 1981 - just two shows.

Project Ticket Stub - 1980

2007-12-30T16:23:00.000-08:00

1980. Chrylser gets its money (errr, our money). Cronkite retires. The "Miracle On Ice" at the Olympics. Khomeini and the hostage crisis sink Carter; Reagan wins. CNN is born. Richard Pryor plays with fire. Solidarity in Poland. And my generation was completely and utterly shocked by the death of John Lennon; to this day I can remember exactly where I was when I heard the news, and my immediate reaction was to play the Plastic Ono Band album.

Being a poor college student, I didn't see a whole heck of a lot of shows in 1980, but there's no arguing with those that I did see...

The Who
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
April 28, 1980

Of all the shows that I cannot remember, this one bothers me the most. How the heck can I have absolutely no memory of seeing The Who? None. Nothing. Absolutely nothing! I mean, come on, no memory of Roger Daltrey or Pete Townshend at all? Sigh, wasted youth. (Literally, I imagine.)

On the positive side, ticket prices were still pretty sweet - just eleven bucks.

Grateful Dead
Boston Garden, Boston, MA
May 12, 1980

Now this concert I remember! As I recall it, school in St. Louis wasn't quite out yet, and on Saturday a couple of friends (Howard and Fletcher?) asked me if I wanted to see the Dead on Monday - in Boston! Heck yea!

So the three of us set off on Sunday morning in my 1970 Chevy Impala. I remember we drove to Boston via Brooklyn, NY, which is where Howard was from. I distinctly remember having breakfast at Howard's mom's house in Brooklyn before driving to Boston. We might have spent Sunday night in Brooklyn. And I remember we drove back to Brooklyn again before heading west to St. Louis. I remember we picked up a girl hitchhiking somewhere along the way, and she had us drop her off in a scary part of NYC in the wee hours of the morning; we were all worried about her, but she was a whole lot tougher and braver than the three of us college boys.

I figure we must have driven about 2,500 miles round trip to see this one concert.

As for the concert itself, I remember a great He's Gone > Drumz as my highlight. And yet another U.S. Blues encore -- that makes it four U.S. Blues encores out of my first five Dead shows.

Yes
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
September 25, 1980

My third Yes show. Too bad I really don't remember much about any of them. I have some hazy memory of them playing "in the round" - they played on a slowly rotating circular stage. But I don't remember if that was at all three of the concerts I saw, or just one or two of them.

Bruce Springsteen
Kiel Opera House, St. Louis, MO
October 17, 1980

Oh for crying out loud, you'd think I would remember something about this show, wouldn't you?

Jethro Tull
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
October 26, 1980

This will turn out to be my last Tull show for a long time. Sometime in the late 90s or thereabouts I saw a nostalgia Tull tour at Club Casino in Hampton, NH. But it will be a long time until I get to that ticket stub.

Project Ticket Stub - 1979

2007-12-29T09:03:00.000-08:00

1979. Sid Vicious. Pol Pot. The Shah of Iran and Ayatollah Khomeini. C-SPAN is born. A swamp rabbit attacks Jimmy Carter. Margaret Thatcher is elected, and Muhammad Ali retires. (No, those two events are no related.) Saddam Hussein gains power in Iraq, and Diana Nyad swims from the Bahamas to Florida. (Those two events aren't related either.) Chrysler needs money. Pac-Man. Eleven people are killed in a stampede at a Who concert in Cincinnati. The Clash releases London Calling.

And my year was bookended by the Grateful Dead...

Grateful Dead
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA
January 12, 1979

This night sure did alter the course of my life, or at least how I spent a bunch of time in the next decade. Sure, I was familiar with the Dead before the show, particularly the Europe '72 album. But in terms of a concert experience, this was something completely different and unlike anything I had experienced to this point. Maybe Zeppelin could be compared, but an awful lot of my first concert experiences had been "shows", but this was music. I was hooked.

If I remember right, I went to this concert with Mark, Scott, and my brother, Bob.

Grateful Dead
Kiel Auditorium, St. Louis, MO
February 11, 1979

A month later and I'm back at school in St. Louis.

Steve Goodman
Graham Chapel, Washington University, St. Louis, MO
February 17, 1979

It's too bad I got the bottom half of this stub instead of the top half. Nevertheless, I wrote Steve's name and the concert date on the back, and this stub is a prized possession. At the time of the concert I didn't know that Steve Goodman had been fighting leukemia since 1969, nor of course that he would lose that battle in just another five years at the all-too-young age of 36. I just knew that I was hooked on his quirky songs such as The Twentieth Century Is Almost Over, and also that Steve wrote City of New Orleans.

This concert was held in the incredibly beautiful Graham Chapel, with its breathtaking stained glass window backdrop.

If there was any one concert I could go back to and re-experience again, this one is it.

Sea Level
Graham Chapel, Washington University, St. Louis, MO
March 31, 1979

Sea Level was a rock/blues/jazz band spun out of the Allman Brothers. They were quite popular on my campus, but I don't recall a thing about this concert.

J. Geils Band
Keil Opera House, St. Louis, MO
April 6, 1979

Can't tell from the ticket, but I'm fairly certain this was held in the opera house side of Keil, not the auditorium side. The building had both back to back, sharing a common backstage area.

I bet this concert was fun. Too bad I don't remember it.

Dixie Dregs
Washington University Quadrangle, St. Louis, MO
April 29, 1979

What can be better than a springtime Sunday all-afternoon concert on the college campus? Called "Quadrock Sunday" because it was held in the picturesque campus main quadrangle, it featured a bunch of local bands all afternoon, with the Dixie Dregs as the headliner and show closer late in the afternoon.

Supertramp
Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
May 11, 1979

Supertramp was big in 1979, and this concert was a lot of fun. Bloody well right.

I think this whole outing was organized by my friend Scott.

I wonder about the date, though. My ticket stub clearly shows "5/11", but I found this concert program that says it was a week later on May 18. Was it originally scheduled for May 11 but postponed for a week for some reason?

Jorma Kaukonen
Convention Hall, Asbury Park, NJ
July 14, 1979

There were both acoustic and electric sets, but no Jack on bass (at least according to db.etree.org).

Me, Scott, and Mark? Anyone else?

Jethro Tull
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
November 8, 1979

Back in St. Louis and yet another Tull show.

Jorma Kaukonen
Capitol Theatre, Passaic, NJ
November 24, 1979

Back home for Thanksgiving.

Interestingly enough, this show isn't listed in db.etree.org. Maybe that's because this was when Jorma was playing with a band called White Gland, and the music was more punk than anything else. I remember that Mark and I were horribly disappointed in this show. We came to hear Jorma and Hot Tuna material, but they played what can only be described as weird punk. This concert is a solid contender for my bottom-of-the-barrel list.

Grateful Dead
Keil Auditorium, St. Louis, MO
December 9, 1979

As I began the year, so I ended it. First with the Sunday night show in St. Louis, and then...

Grateful Dead
Memorial Hall, Kansas City, KS
December 10, 1979

...the Monday night show in Kansas City.

I distinctly remember this particular show, both for the 250-mile drive (each way) across Missouri and back just for the show, as well as for the show itself. The second set, in particular, was rockin' (Scarlet > Fire, Easy To Love You > Let It Grow > He's Gone > Truckin > Drumz > Wharf Rat > Johnny B. Goode E: U. S. Blues) and the crowd went nuts for a long, long time after the band left the stage.

While a 500-mile round trip drive (in my 1970 Chevy Impala) to see one concert might seem excessive, it will turn out to be nowhere near my single-concert drive record, although all of my distance records will turn out to be for the Dead.

So there is 1979, starting and ending with a pair of Grateful Dead shows - and setting the tone for the next ten or twelve years.

On the trivia front, three of those four Dead shows had U.S. Blues encores. What's up with that? I grew to groan at "Useless Blues" encores, wishing for almost anything else!

Project Ticket Stub - 1978

2007-12-26T15:17:00.000-08:00

1978. Jimmy Carter is in the White House. New England gets hit with "the blizzard of '78". Boston's year only gets worse when Bucky Dent's home run crushes the Red Sox, and the Yankees go on to win the World Series for the second year in a row. Garfield is a brand new comic strip. Lee Iacocca is fired from Ford. Muhammad Ali beats Leon Spinks.

And I saw these five concerts...

Emerson, Lake, & Palmer
Jadwin Gym, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
February 7, 1978

Notice that my ticket stub isn't ripped. As I recall, the scene outside the Jadwin Gym that night was chaos. It snowed that day, and that might have had something to do with it. But the doors didn't open until close to show time, and I'm pretty sure the crowed just overwhelmed the ticket takers (who, in all likelihood, were just student volunteers). By the time my friend, Scott, and I got to the doors, well, we just walked right in. Actually, I walked right in. Scott was on crutches with a broken foot or something, so he sort of hobbled right in.

As for the show itself, I don't recall much other than I think ELP was already playing by the time we got inside. And that it was loud. And dark. And I'm pretty sure we never found anything resembling our seats.

Meat Loaf
Capitol Theatre, Passaic, NJ
May 13, 1978

Meat Loaf was enormously popular in 1978, riding the Bat out of Hell wave. This concert was immense fun, and is a serious contender for my top 10 list. The show was high energy from start to finish, and Meat Loaf didn't leave anything behind. I remember watching him taking hits from an oxygen tank on the side of the stage between songs!

The Rolling Stones
J.F.K. Stadium, Philadelphia, PA
June 17, 1978

It doesn't get much better than this on the pure fun scale. Summer after graduating high school and an outdoor Rolling Stones concert. Didn't we watch some guy scale (or attempt to scale) the outside of the stadium that day? Fun in the pre-show parking lot.

Note the noon start time on the ticket stub! I have no idea what time the show really started. Nor, sadly, do I really recall anything else about the concert - other than that guy climbing the outside of the stadium before the show.

Yes
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
September 28, 1978

Note the shift to the mid-west along with my move to attending college at Washington University in St. Louis. This was just 4 or so weeks after I arrived in St. Louis. I wonder who I went to this show with?

Jethro Tull
The Checkerdome, St. Louis, MO
October 19, 1978

I was still really into Tull at this point, although that was about to change in a big way. But you will have to wait until 1979 to learn how and why...

The First Ten (or, Project Ticket Stub Begins)

2007-12-22T15:39:00.000-08:00

I have saved all of my concert ticket stubs since the very first concert I attended. I fell into an easy habit of putting my used concert stubs in an envelope. Over the years that grew to two, three, four envelopes stuffed full of stubs in rough chronological order.

Every once in a while I browse through the envelopes, having a stroll down memory lane (or, sadly, a stroll down memory-loss lane). For a while now I have thought that it would be pretty cool to see what I could do with scanned images of all of the stubs. Today I was deciding what to do: I could go out and chip away at some ice in the driveway. Or I could clean up the chaos in the basement. Or I could clean up the stacks of crap in the computer room. Or, I know, I could fire up the scanner and get Project Ticket Stub off the ground!

Without further ado, my first ten concerts...

Jethro Tull
February 26, 1975
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA

As I recall, a high school friend, Rickey Remes, invited me to this concert. I remember a bus ride to Philly, and think that the entire outing was organized by the local JCC (Jewish Community Center). Hard to imagine that today!

This concert certainly made an impression on my young mind! I remember we had really good floor seats, and I remember the vast spectacle of it all - Ian Anderson was certainly into production and theatrics at this time.

Note the $7.50 ticket price!

Led Zeppelin
June 6, 1977
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY

A long two years between concerts #1 and #2, but holy cow, what a concert experience for #2! You don't get much better than Led Zeppelin in Madison Square Garden in the mid-70s.

Note that it cost a whole $9.50 to see Zeppelin!

James Taylor
July 5, 1977
Garden State Arts Center, Homdel, NJ

A month later, and now for something completely different! Sweet Baby James in an outdoor amphitheater. That's about as far from Zeppelin at MSG as you can get.

Yes
August 3, 1977
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA

The first of way too many shows of which I don't have a whole lot of recollections, I'm afraid.

Jackson Browne
September 6, 1977
Garden State Arts Center, Homdel, NJ

This was Jackson's tour in support of The Pretender, arguably his breakthrough and best album of his career.

Queen
November 23, 1977
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA

"We will, we will, ROCK YOU!" And indeed, they did!

Jethro Tull
November 30, 1977
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY

I'm pretty sure this is the concert where Livingston Taylor (James' brother) was booked as the opening act. What in the world were the concert promoters thinking? It was horrifying. Livingston was introduced and walked on stage with his acoustic guitar. He started to sing The Beatles' "With A Little Help From My Friends." He didn't get out much more than the first line ("What would you think if I sang out of tune...") before the crowd was drowning him out with booing. He stopped. He waited. And waited. And waited. But the booing continued. After what seemed like a very long time, he held up both arms in a gesture for the crowd to stop. When the noise died down, he leaned into the microphone and said "Thank you and good night" and left the stage. The crowd was stunned. And so we sat there for an hour waiting for Jethro Tull to take the stage. Stupid crowds.

Many years later I almost asked Livingston if he remembered that show, but I didn't have the heart.

Jethro Tull
December 5, 1977
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA

Yet another Tull show.

Billy Joel
December 11, 1977
Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, Uniondale, NY

To this day this concert remains as one of my best all-around concert experiences ever. I'm certain it places in my top-ten concert list. Billy Joel is the entertainer, and he was in prime form in late 1977. He was touring for the highly popular album, The Stranger, and the New York crowd simply adored him. He had us in the palm of his hand the entire concert. And rightfully so.

This concert was broadcast live by WNEW-FM, and excellent FM recordings of it are widely circulated.

Todd Rundgren and Utopia
December 29, 1977
Capitol Theatre, Passaic, NJ

Hmmmm, my first time seeing Todd, and my first concert at the legendary Capitol Theater. But no memories. :-(

There you have it -- the first ten! Jethro Tull (3 times!), Led Zeppelin, James Taylor, Yes, Jackson Browne, Queen, Billy Joel, and Todd Rundgren. Great start, and a whole lot more yet to come.

Pandora Radio!

2007-12-01T16:00:00.000-08:00

I just discovered Pandora Radio via a recent Rocketboom post in which Joanne interviews Tim Westergren, Pandora's Chief Strategy Officer and Founder.

The heart of Pandora is the Music Genome Project, a vast and ever growing taxonomy of musical information started back in 2000. They analyze songs according to nearly 400 attributes on aspects such as melody, harmony, instrumentation, rhythm, vocals, and lyrics.

Pandora then lets you stream and explore music. I started by giving Pandora a list of seed artists that Patti and I like, and Pandora took it from there - playing those artists, plus other artists and songs that are related via the Music Genome Project taxonomy. In just a couple of days Patti and I are already hooked - hooked enough to pay the $36 annual subscription to have Pandora advertising free.

There's a social networking and sharing aspect to Pandora too, and I've already bookmarked the Folk Holidays and Contemporary Folk shared music streams. And there's lots more to explore too. Like I said, I'm hooked - and excited.

The only complaint I might have so far is that Pandora's web UI is killing my "music PC", which is a 6 year old Pentium 4 with 1 GB of RAM running Windows 2000. Pandora is pegging the CPU on that old machine, and I can only assume it is due to its very nice, very slick, very modern Ajax web user interface, not the music streaming.

Oh, and if you are curious, the artists we seeded our Pandora stream with are Bruce Cockburn, David Bromberg, Diana Krall, Eliza Gilkyson, Lucy Kaplansky, Natalie Merchant, Ollabelle, Richard Shindell, Susan Werner, and Tish Hinojosa. I'm sure I'll add more, but those were no-brainers.

Boston CHI November Meeting

2007-11-11T11:46:00.000-08:00

BostonCHI, the New England area chapter of ACM SIGCHI Special Interest Group on Computer-Human Interaction, is holding its monthly program meeting this coming Tuesday night, November 13. Socializing over tea, coffee, drinks, and food starts at 6:30pm, and the featured talk starts at 7pm.

This month's featured talk is:

"'Umm, No, I Don't Actually Think That's Such a Good Idea'
OR How to Say Things your Client Doesn't Want to Hear"
Ilise Benun, Marketing Mentor

Read more about it on the Boston CHI monthly meeting page.

But, no, I won't be going. Instead I am heading to Seattle to visit some customers this week.

Manchester City Marathon and Half Marathon

2007-11-04T12:27:00.000-08:00

The inaugural Manchester City Marathon and Half Marathon was held in Manchester, NH today. Surprisingly enough for a first time race, registration was sold out several weeks in advance. Over 800 runners were registered for the half marathon, and 600 for the marathon.

We had beautiful fall New England weather for the race. Tropical storm Noel blew through here yesterday, mostly off to sea, but still with a good amount of inland rain and wind. But Noel was gone this morning, and we had temperatures in the mid 40s and plenty of sun at the 8:50am race start.

I ran the half - my first half ever, as up to now I've preferred the 10k race distance. My target finish time window was between one hour and forty five and one hour fifty minutes. I'm still waiting for official times to be posted, but my watch says 1:47:11.

I ran all but the last mile with my work running partner, Dan, who was running the full marathon. I think I paced Dan through the first ten miles, but I know that he was pacing me in miles 10 and 11. We hit a hill somewhere around mile 11 that just made me feel like crap, but Dan kept plowing on. He got me to mile 12 and told me to get going and finish strong. Thanks, Dan!

Here's a shot that Patti took of me and Dan at mile 6:

And here's a shot of me in the final stretch, somewhere between mile 13 and the finish line:

Dan kept up our first half pace on his own through the second half of the marathon, and finished somewhere in the three hour and 30 minute range. Way to go, Dan!

I'll update the post when official finishing times show up on Cool Running.

Oh, and I feel great! My quads are just a little sore, but no big deal. And I developed a blister on a toe, but again - no big deal.

Update: Both the marathon results and half marathon results are now posted on Cool Running. I finished in 1:47:10, giving me a pace average of 8:11 per mile; I was the 144th finisher, out of 816 total, and 15th out of the 40 in my age group. Dan finished in an amazing 3:36:49, which is just 6 minutes short of a Boston Marathon qualifying time; considering how frigging hilly the course was, this was a fantastic finish time for Dan. His average pace was 8:17, so he did slow a little in the second half of his race. He finished 98th out of 517, and 14th out of 49 in his age group.

Hello, Blackberry. (Bad news for Palm)

2007-10-31T18:00:00.000-07:00

I have been a loyal Palm user since day one. Since that very first Pilot. But with my ongoing hotsync crash problems, and with a recent upgrade at work to Exchange Server 2007, well, the time had come to give Crackberry, err, Blackberry a try...

There are a lot of Pearl devotees where I work, but I'd rather a full keyboard. So a just recently released Curve 8310 was delivered to my office yesterday:

Initial impressions? Compared to my Treo 650, it is light. And thin. But the plastic housing doesn't feel quite as high quality as the Treo. The keyboard is superb - even better than the Treo's keyboard!

I'm still waiting for my IT department to set up my Exchance syncing, so I cannot comment on that yet. But I found it very interesting that the first three things I added to the device were Gmail, Google Talk, and Google Maps.

The Opera Mini browser is probably next. Then it is off to find the best news feeds, discussion forums, and software repositories...

NH UX October Meeting

2007-10-20T11:35:00.000-07:00

(I know, I know. I was supposed to post more often, not take the entire summer off. What can I say? Here's to a renewed effort to post more often...)

I spotted notice of this NH UX October Meeting in a recent post to the IxDA discussion list. I'm pretty sure I'll be attending.

Topic:	Bias in Usability Testing
Speaker:	Carolyn Snyder
When:	Tuesday, October 30, 2007 6:30 - 7:00pm Food, Beverages & Networking 7:00 - 7:15pm NH-UX Info Update 7:15 - 8:15pm Presentation
Where:	Fidelity, 2 Contra Way, Merrimack NH
RSVP:	Please RSVP to Amy Cueva

Abstract:
In usability testing, we strive to eliminate bias so that the results will be accurate. But what is bias anyway? How does it affect our results? What can we do about it? And are we, as usability specialists, truly objective? Usability consultant Carolyn Snyder will lead a stimulating discussion about bias in usability testing - something we encounter on a daily basis but may not consciously think about. There are many sources of bias in usability testing, from users to tasks to reporting. Every testing methodology is biased, and so are we as facilitators. But bias is not something to be shunned. Instead, we need to understand its sources and weigh its effects. Sometimes, bias can even be harnessed to serve our purpose. Come to this presentation and you'll never look at your testing methods the same way again!

Bio:
Carolyn Snyder is an independent usability consultant in the greater Boston area. In the past 15 years she has conducted hundreds of usability tests on dozens of products and interfaces. Carolyn is the author of the book Paper Prototyping (she'll give away a copy at this presentation) and co-author of two books on web site usability. She has a BS in Computer Science and an MBA, both of which have biased her perspective :-). More information concerning Carolyn's consultancy is available at Snyder Consulting.

Microsoft Live Labs: Photosynth

2007-06-30T09:36:00.001-07:00

I'm really surprised I haven't seen more buzz about Photosynth from Microsoft Live Labs. Photosynth "takes a large collection of photos of a place or an object, analyzes them for similarities, and then displays the photos in a reconstructed three-dimensional space, showing you how each one relates to the next." This is the most "holy crap, lookit this!" new technology that I've seen in a long, long time.

Go visit the site and give it a try. They have a growing number of photo collections, but I recommend starting with the Piazza San Marco, Venice collection.

Google Does It Again - Drag and Drop Driving Directions

2007-06-30T09:29:00.000-07:00

Google Maps introduced draggable driving directions sometime in the past couple of days. Don't like the route suggested? Then just drag the blue route line to another road and have it all recalculate automagically. This is the same type of capability as available in Garmin MapSource, but as one would expect from Google, the interaction design is easier and more elegant.

Check out the video introducing the feature.

Palm Has Lost Its Mind, Or At Least Its Way

2007-05-31T17:56:00.001-07:00

Also from D 2007, Palm's Jeff Hawkins introducted the Palm Foleo. Story and video clip on the D5 site here, and recap and lots of pics on the Engadget site here.

What the bloody h*ll are they thinking? It looks all the world like a small, underpowered laptop. Why would I want one of those? Why in the world would I want yet another device, this one physically in-between my smartphone and my laptop? For five hundred bucks? You gotta be kidding me!

Palm has losts its mind.

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates at D 2007

2007-05-31T17:19:00.000-07:00

Engadget has posted a video clip of the first 15-minutes of the Steve Jobs and Bill Gates discussion from last night on stage at the D 2007 conference. I was completely enthralled, particularly listening to Bill talk about betting on the paradigm shift from character-cell to graphical user interfaces. That part of the conversation is a good reminder of just how young the software design field is yet, and of the kinds of things we were struggling with just a little more than 20 years ago. I highly recommend watching the clip.

Videos of the entire discussion are archived on the D conference site, although I haven't watched them all yet.

Microsoft Surface

2007-05-30T19:18:00.000-07:00

Oh, and if you haven't checked out the Microsoft Surface vision videos yet, you should.