2000 Light Years From Home, My Night With Brandi Carlile, Kaki King, Joe Arthur and Son Volt

So the next chapter in my bizarre life begins something like this..... Monday night, wife having small contractions, no sleep. Fat Tuesday aka Mardi Gras watch my wife give birth to son number two in the water. Watch him float right on up to the top like a cork. No Sleep. Spend Ash Wednesday getting the house in order and parenting son number one who obviously shares my anxiety that tomorrow son number two will be coming home, everything needs to be ready, buy flowers, lots of flowers, no sleep. Thursday, pick up wife and new addition, drive home, leave car running, help settle wife/kiddos into comfort with in-laws at hand ( strange to say but sometimes there is nothing better than an in-law) head to the airport. fly to NYC. take cab to Knitting Factory. Arrive at 5:30 pm Emcee and host PASTE open mic night number two at 6:00 pm. For those of you who missed the first one.... well, honestly it was somewhat mind numbing inthe surprise musical guest category (Beck, HEM, Ben Kweller, ?uestlove etc). While the anxiety to somehow meet similar expectations may have been unfounded, each party to me is in a way like preparing for another baby. Basically, I try to prepare but as a Daddy-o you are really have no true control. You just hope for ten fingers and ten toes and try and make the surroundings welcoming. Nothing really happens until a few days out that is until I realize that 400 people will be coming to our place to be entertained and I should probably make a few calls. Yesterday I called Kaki King and asked if she wanted to come down and perhaps play for a bit between Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts and Son Volt. Thankfully, she says yes. Some other music rag that sounds like Bowling Bone recently named here one of the ten modern guitar gods. Well this time they actually got something right. Kaki held court and wowed the crowd into silent submission just after Sir Arthur had whipped them into a frenzy. Yes she's like Hedges meets Hendrix but what's shocking is how much pure power comes out of such a small person. VERY lucky to have her in the house. She was the jam between the bread.

Introduce Kaki to Sir Joe in the communal backstage room which is nothing more than a glorified freshman dorm room with a Salvation Army couch and a mini fridge filled with red bull and stella artois. They bond over our podcast session and end up writing a song together a few days later. That's the third known Sweet Talk connection that has created an artistic pairing (The Roots & Wilco, The Roots and Deerhoof, and now Kaki and Joe) I love my job.

Maybe it was the redbull and vodka who knows, but the smoke in the room makes everything a bit "foggy". Hey Fountains of Wayne boys you want a couple of beers? of course go at it. Hey Eric Krasno meet Tom Marshall ( Phish Lyricist), Django Haskins (The Old Ceremony) meet Soul singing bad ass Ryan Shaw. Has anyone seen Tom Hamilton (American Babies) I was telling Kraig Jarret Johnson (Golden Smog, The Jayhawks) and Greg Wieczorek (Twilight Singers, The Honorary Title) I think he should cover the Violent Femme's "American Music" Uncle Tupelo Style. Hey Josh Werner (Matisyahu, Roots Tonic, Royal Vagabonds) and Catherine Popper (Ryan Adams, The Cardinals, Lonely Astronauts) having a bass to bass face to face.

Everything is honkey tonkey hunky dory and then Son Volt hits the stage, and I mean hits it hard. The crunch is back. This is the first time these guys have played together since November and they are feeding on the audiences collective head. The new sound and lightshow at the Knitting Factory is feeding the beast. So much so that I see John Jackson of Sony Legacy angling to try and take the same system on the road for the rest of the tour. I mean they are bringing the heat. Shit, did they just bring out horns for "The Picture"? . I stop working the VIP room mid sentence. Sorry Mr. EMI sorry Mrs. Vanity Fair, I don't know if you are hearing what's coming from the other room but I think the sky just cracked open and Zeus is side arming electric balls of sonic thunder through that stack of Marshalls, Ta- Ta. I have very few talents but of the few the one of which I am the most proud is my ability to slip and slide through a standing room only audience like a blue fin tuna on cruise control without disrupting anyone's mojo. You raise an eye in disbelief but seriously I'm like a yogi contortionist prancing through the Louvre's laser field, which is saying something when you have a Bushmills' gut Jim Morrison would envy. So I plop myself down on the side of the stage and watch Son Volt rip through an encore cover of the Stone's "2000 Light Years from Home") Using my transport powers I beam backstage as the band is toweling off, grab Farrar and scream praise at him and the boys at full volume.

Before I can pour a celebratory round, someone grabs my shoulder and asks if it's okay if Brandi Carlile and her band play a couple of tunes. Ummm Sure....wait!... what?! I mean really? ahhhh "yah" (a la a neck-braced Joan Cusack uttering her only line from Sixteen Candles ) Brandi walks onstage and let's fly a searing rendition of Radiohead's "Creep"!!!! I guess she was playing a show somehwere in NYC earlier and decided to jump in a cab at 11:30 race on down to the Knit and lay down the law to an already dazzled crowd. The details keep blurring but at one point I was standing on the balcony wide-eyed as she wrenched out a cover of Jeff Buckley's cover of Leonard Cohen 's " Hallelujah ". Later in my epileptic enthusiastic stupor of recapping what the hell just happened, I threw up my hands in surrender when my superstar photog, NEDA ABGHARI ( Neda's Site) nodded and said she took this pic during the final chorus. You can see Brandi belting it out

Giggling I dragged Brandi to the podcasting couch which as earlier described is extremely less appealing than say a casting couch. We managed to cajole Megan Hickey of Last Town Chorus to join the "conversation" which was really just me stumbling with joy. To top it off, axe wielding Jennifer Turner (Fur Slide and Natalie Merchant) joins the fray . Me with THREE extremely talented and beautiful redheads... sakes alive, I love my job!

Finally I grab some couch time with Farrar and we shoot the shit for a good while. When I introduced the band earlier in the night I told the crowd that Son Volt changed my life and I couldn't have meant it more. They are my musical security blanket and tattoo parlor all wrapped into one, so getting a little time one on one with the other "Jay" is always the highlight of such an evening. If you're lucky the powers that be won't edit out the "P-Diddy, last call, five Scottish Ladies" story we relived on the podcast. Let's just say you had to be there.

Later, much later my crew is careening crosstown to my FAVORITE late night chow down heaven, a top notch joint called Ditch Plain on the corner of Bedford and Downing. A couple of Tequilas and Dirty Martinis later and Chef Karla does me the honor of cooking her off the menu clam casino with a side of Mac and Cheese with hotdogs even though she's been off the clock for hours. That's the way you end/begin an evening/morning. I manage to find a car service that takes me to JFK for the 6:00 am shuttle flight to Boston. Two hours later I am celebrating son number one's third birthday complete with cupcakes, streamers, presents and 5 sugar high kids tearing through my echoing ears and clanging cranium. I kiss my wife. I hold our newborn. It's been 96 hours with no sleep, our new roof just started to leak, and I have a deadline creeping up my ass. Did I mention I love my job.

Comments

[Kris]

I would make out with Son Volt's Jay Farrar AND The Last Town Chorus' Megan Hickey at the same time. Ha, ha, ha...it is 4:30p and I am delirious!!! Megan's band is amazing - myspace.com/thelasttownchorus - you are sooo lucky to cover events like this, mister...

[Charlotte]

What Kris said. . .

I linked your site on mine, btw, happily, re your suggestion.
You are a busy man! Love the water-birth image, and the whole swirl of life here.

[Lisa]

Is the podcast with Brandi Carlile and Megan Hickey available anywhere? I love the music of both those women!

[ajsfour]

as soon as the podcast comes out. I will post a link.

-coolio