To hear/see an Ace getting Trumped go to here!
04/06
I: Jam > The Golden Road to Unlimited > Bertha, Jam > Bird Song > Little Red Rooster, Odessa, Señor > Crazy Fingers > Jus' Like Mama Said > New Speedway Boogie
II: K.C. Moan, Peggy-O, The Weight, China Cat Sunflower* > I Know You Rider*, Stuff*, Wharf Rat > Sugar Magnolia
E: Attics of My Life, Foolish Heart
*-w/ DJ Logic
04/07
I: Jam > Truckin > Take Me to the River > Loser, Easy to Slip > Supplication Jam* > Dark Star*, Tuesday Blues* > Scarlet Begonias*+ > Iko Iko*+
II: When I Paint My Masterpiece@4>6, Candyman@, Masters of War@, Even So+ > October Queen+ > The Deep End+ > Lady with a Fan* > Terrapin* > Stuff*+ > Black Peter*, St. Stephen* > William Tell Bridge* > The Eleven*# > Touch of Grey*#
E: At a Siding* > Terrapin Flyer*
*-w/ Tom Pope (drums); +-w/ Josh Roseman (trombone); #-w/ Warren Haynes; Stuff - Jay/Tom > Jay/Jeff/Kenny/Robin/MK/Tom/Josh
04/08
I: Jam > Shakedown Street > Maggie's Farm > She Belongs to Me > Frankie and Johnny, Row Jimmy, Jack Straw > Lazy River Road > Big Railroad Blues
II: Deep Elem Blues@, Ripple@, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall@, Easy Answers > He's Gone > Eyes of the World > Stuff > Sugaree* > Dark Star* > Bird Song* > One More Saturday Night*
E: Brokedown, U.S. Blues
*-w/ John Ginty (keys); First "Frankie and Johnny"
I'm home now!
Where to even begin?
Great nonstop flight out on Song airlines. Like Virgin Air, Song has individual screens on the back of the seats so one can choose from a variety of ways to be entertained. I watched 'Syriana" then CNN, then made a songlist for myself from an okay selection of albums. Didnt sleep- I rarely sleep on planes.
I had one day in NYC- Saturday. It was stormy and hailing. The adventures start from the first second I stepped out of the doors of JFK.
I don't have enough time at the moment to begin with the stories . It's gonna be busy here for a while as the kids are on vacation and the Jewish holidaze are just starting up.
The band was hot!
The Beacon was beautiful!
It was lovely to see everyone!
Thank yous to all, especially, Glowy, The UK girlies, Slave, Alan, Bud, Rachael, Kris, Michael & the usual suspects for helping to make my first visit to the big city unusually memorable and GREAT!
Don't get me started on the cabbies, though!
...................................................................
Actually, the big day began with taxis.
The last words to me from el Scotto at SFO were " Be careful! Be ALERT!"
I was one second out of the doors of JFK, when a guy in a suit ran up to me and yelled at me something about forgetting about taxis, that I could ride in a limo for the same price. It was a startling experience the way he ran up to me hollaring and all, I thought there was a fire or something! When I started understanding it was some sort of limo scam, I said no and walked on to the Taxi island. I was given a piece of paper and thrust inside a huge van thing that barely resembled a cab.
I told the driver the address of my hotel and off we roared.
When it appeared we were out of the airport, the cabbie asked if I would like to stop at this place he knew that sold coffee, doughnuts and had an ATM machine.
I said NO.
But he drove to a minimart anyway. He got out. He locked the doors and he left me there!
I was too tired to throw a tantrum and besides, I had no clue as to where I was. Wherever I was, it didnt look like a place I should be bolting out of a cab at 6:30 in the morning. I looked out my window into the windows of the mini mart and my cabbie was having a good old time, drinkin coffee, eating doughnuts and shopping away.
He managed to get lost on the way to my hotel too. His first choice of highways was backed up. He actually backed his van up a curb and made a U-Turn out of there.
At last, he arrived at my hotel which was at the edge of SoHo.
The hotel let me check in early but not without a bit of scowling and gruffness on their part.
I let myself in my room and promptly went to sleep.
I slept for several hours, woke up excited and ready to see NYC!
First though, there were calls to make...but oops! I left the paper with everyone's phone numbers on it at home!
Well, then, it was only 11 AM, I figured I'd knock about and get some walking in and then call home once everyone in Cali was awake (3 hour time difference) and someone there could read me the numbers.
I got myself together and bounced downstairs and out into the street. I ought to have asked the desk guy which direction to go but he had been so surly earlier that I figured I would ask around outside.
The weather was terribly foul! Raining buckets! I picked a direction and ambled on and on and on. So far not much to see that told me I was in NYC. I found myself in a China town , then Little Italy, then back to Chinatown where I bought an umbrella as the rain was starting to soak through . A few blocks from there was the Canal street subway station. I saw my first NYC Policeman! "Howyadoin?"
I ducked into a little shop in the station and bought a map.
I saw that one of my "Must See" places- Washington Square (DYLANSVILLE!) was only blocks (8 or9) away! I went back up the street and marched on up the 8 or 9 blocks. The rain was now joined by wind and 1-2-3 POOF! The wind had whipped my umbrella all apart! What a waste of $5! I kept on. Dumped the useless thing in a garbage can by NYU.
I thought of going into one of the coffee houses surrounding Washington Sq. but all appeared to be filled to capacity.
The wind and rain were miserable.
I hailed a cab.
more like-
I held my palm up and waited as at least a dozen cabs passed me. I lifted my hand more like a wave and at last, someone pulled over.
I decided then that I ought to go see the Beacon, maybe I would find a friend in line?
This cabbie was super friendly, chattered the whole time about Dylan.
I asked him if Carnegie Deli was anywhere near the Beacon ? He was emphatic that it was just a 2 minute walk up the street from the Beacon. He pointed the way...I tipped generously, mainly because neither of us had any change. Oh well, he was at least the friendliest person I had met so far on my journey.
To my surprise, there was NO one doing line duty in front of the Beacon!!
OOPS again! I remembered it was not a GA show so no need for a line!
Well, all was not lost. Supposedly the Carnegie Deli was up the street and so, I would venture up and be able to get warm and
be able to cross off "Visiting a NYC Deli" off my To Do list.
I pointed myself in the direction toward the Deli (as per Cabbie) and marched on...and on...and on...
At some point I was way past two blocks...and the rain turned to hail.
And I felt my cell phone vibrate! I fumbled around to answer it and it was Gemmi on the other end! And then it was Michael!
Bless them they talked to me til I finally found a diner!
My hands were frozen stiff and a cup of coffee was never needed more.
I was totally drenched!
And hungry too!
I was placed in a window seat. As advised by Scott, I ordered a NYC Pastrami sandwich and NYC cheesecake (mmm!)
I called home, it took a few tries before Sasha answered. She found my numbers and it still took a moment to get my frozen fingers working to write them down...but I got em!
I called here and there . Finished my fatty NYC meal and considered the rain, wind and what exactly I would be able to do next.
Of course! I'd try and see if tickets were available to the Edvard Munch exhibit!
I paid my bill, stepped back out on Broadway and boldly waved down a taxi.
I couldnt recall which museum was having the exhibit so I guessed the Metropolitan Museum.
This cabbie was quiet. It was a pleasant ride until someone honked and my cabbie started honking & shrieking "FCUK YOU!" at another driver who was honking & sreaming right back. I slunk down in my seat and hoped it wasnt going to be much further to the Met.
It wasnt. I recognized the building at the same moment remembered the Munch exhibit was at (obvious now to me) MOMA.
Ah well, seeing the Met was pretty exciting!
I was thrilled to be there.
I spent a few hours lost in art history then thought to ask someone for the time.
Eeesh! It was already 4:30pm! Time to get myself back to Soho and get it together for the show. I still needed to track down the girl who was holding my ticket.
I exited the Met and was delighted to see a stream of taxis waiting. As I told the cabbie that I needed to get to Soho, he screamed at me to get out of his cab! He yelled that it was almost time for him to check out and no way would he be taking me out to SoHo!
Geez!
The next cabby was also rather pissy about taking me back. "Friggin Soho?! Where in friggin Soho?"
Geez!
It did kinda take forever to move thru traffic and all.
I had about a half an hour to dry off, primp and try to get a hold of friends.
I thought I might just rest for a few minutes, I closed my eyes for about a minute when my phone started ringing. Ring! Ticket girl found me and we made arrangements! Ring! My UK Girls found me! Ring! My NY Girls found me! Everything was actually falling into place and I got myself together and ran back downstairs to the street, once again in search of a cab!
The rain had stopped. I was feeling good and so walked a few blocks toward the village. Waved my hand wide and high and voila! A cab stopped.
Of course, had to deal with a bit of attitude by the driver "The Beacon? Broadway? Where on Broadway? Goddammit! Shit! Where?!"
It was a long slow quiet strained ride after his little burst of impatience with me. I might have walked faster than the traffic was flowing.
Once we got to The Beacon, the driver kept on driving and didnt stop! I shouldve just gotten out but instead let him drive around the corner to end up back at the Beacon..that took like an additional 7 minutes too.
Yay!
Finally out of that cab!
A respectable sized crowd was starting to gather in front of The Beacon. I milled around and then found Ellen, her friend and the UK Girls! They walked on up to the bar while I did a once over of the crowd to see if I could find that elusive girl with my ticket. No luck but I found Chez & Me~ and they knew who to look for and where to send her. So I took off up the street and found the bar with the girls. The place was packed with Dogheads and the theme of the evening was established as "Gee, you look awfully familiar?" Everyone looked vaguely familar-either from shows or from photos posted at blogs, websites and message boards. I had a great time catching up with the girlies. Hadnt seen Ellen since the Bahamas or the girls since last Summer when we took the kids to the UK. I saw some folks take off so I figured I had better get back out and find my ticket!
I barely walked a few feet when I recognized Daisy -the girl with my ticket! Thank You Daisy and Slayve!!
After that I kept stumbling intoDeadnetters like Graceful & Rus with Loie! LL, Dire Wolf,Krispy, Tiny, FlJen, L Rob!
Somewhere I have a list but it's only halfway complete. Again loads of familiar faces!
I climbed up to my balcony seat. I could barely believe I was really there!
It was a thrill to see everyone from the rail to all the way behind me-up in the rafters get up to dance to Shakedown!
Though I do love the intensity of the rail, every once in a while it's good to be sort of hidden and alone because I can dance, sing and space out as dorky as I like. There was no one in the row behind me or in the row in front of me- I scooched down to the unoccuppied seats right on the balcony and enjoyed myself fully!
Turned out to be one of those shows where the setlist made sense to me. Doesnt everyone have a show like that once in a while? Where the words of each song seem like a personal message just for you? Scotto had that feeling at the December SF Ratdog show. Milton Keynes 2003 seemed like they were reading my thoughts.
Don't worry, I know its all coincidence/synchronicity. I suppose I could extract meaningfulness from almost any setlist..
but still, it was rather cool!
When the set was over, I ran down stairs to the main floor. The crowd was crazy thick with folks. I could see clusters of familiar people. Once I finally got into the crowd- I got to see Ben! Then a few moments later, at lonnnnnnnnnnnnng lonnnnnnnng last- I finally got to meet Michael Hotz & Doodle! Awesome! Before long it was time to head back on upstairs to my seat. The rest of the show went by too fast.
....................more later...............................
...................................
HUGE BELATED HIPPY BERTHAS TO GERALDINE! and to my JASON!!!!!!
We thought of both of you all day on the 8TH!
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