... last night was open mic night at the little coffee shop nearby... and yes, we went and yes, I sang alone in front of people... something I never imagined doing... if a few years back someone would have told me, You'll be in North Carolina and singing alone at a coffee shop, I'd have laughed in their face...
... Jay, Danielle and I put in some practice time too during the past week... so we actually had a nice little set put together by Thursday... we opened with "Mama I'm Coming Home" by Ozzy Osbourne, with Jay on electric guitar (his shiny Les Paul and Marshall amp, well cranked!), me on acoustic and Danielle singing... and we rocked it... usually, during most act on open mic night, customers come and go, get their coffee or ice creams and leave... but I have to say when we started playing, people took seats and benches and stayed... so our first song we great, and Jay ripped the solo and the whole thing sounded perfect... then the three of us did "Spoke in the Wheel" by Black Label Society, and again Jay was spot on with the fills and solos, while I did rhythm and Dani sang... I don't think the people there ever heard anything like it before, and Jay got a big round of applause...
... then I backed Danielle for her set... we started with "Standing Still" by Jewel, which Dani sings very well, and it's a good strumming song for me to loosen up with too... then we did "If You Were A Sailboat" by Katie Melua, a favorite song of mine, but very soft and sometimes the coffee grinders were muting the softer parts of the song... but we made it thru and did a good job, tho later we decided we'll have to watch doing songs that are too soft... next up was "Constant Craving" by kd lang, and this was my first little bit of singing in public, as I backed Dani on the choruses... but the piece de resistance was our last song together, "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree"... we first got everyone clapping, and then when I started the guitar they recognized the song... this was our best song of the set, cause we got everyone into it... and I was beating the hell out of the guitar, cause I wanted the chorus to be heavy and to really sound out, and the other guitarist and Jay thought I was going to bust strings for sure, heck, I thought I was going to bust strings, cause that was my intention, to make it loud and heavy at any cost... and Dani belted it out perfectly, so we were feeding off each other for that song... then we pulled out "Dust In The Wind", which I was kind of messy on, as it was hard to come down from the energy of "Black Horse..." to this mellow song, hehe, but we got thru it and I think we could do it better next time...
... so we began to step down, and people were saying, That's it?... and Dani said to me, Well, we could do some of the songs we dont really have worked up yet, OR, you can sing... and I was still unsure at this point, but I said alright, and sat back down... and I did "Hallelujah" by Jeff Buckley, which I think I do a pretty decent job of... and the nerves sure helped my vibrato in my voice, lol... I didn't know at the time, but the guy who runs the open mic night said to Danielle that I should do stuff like this more, that I was good... I got nice applause after this song, and they wanted more, so I did "If You Could Read My Mind" by Gordon Lightfoot, which I did alright with, I think it needs work... then I did "Coconut Grove", and then I was pretty much done, hehe... so we got everyone back up for a little blues jam to close the night...
... I'm still surprised I did it, that I sang alone in front of people... all my years in bands, it was easy cause I was in the background, I just had to play my guitar, I never envied being the frontperson... so this was really something for me to overcome, and I think I did well... put it this way, I plan on going back and doing it again... I'm already thinking of songs I think I can pull off... there are some pics of the night, and when I can get to them I'll post what I can...
Equally Open Mic Night
What they really want
here is just a little
passion
like
strumming the D-major
chord in "Margaritaville"
with a little flourish
or adding a touch
of vibrato to your
already shaky voice
on the chorus of
"Coconut Grove";
under soft lights,
beside round tables,
children eating
ice cream cones
and cake,
the scent of
coffee fills the air
as loud as
the applause
and it is so
wonderful
that anyone
here
can be
beautiful
with just a song
Outward Bound
"I had such company outward bound" - Robert Frost
I wrote today's departure date
in the flyleaf of my book,
an actual hard-cover paper book,
a copy of the collected works
of Robert Frost;
it's something the others
joke about when they see me
carrying it down the passageways,
heading for the aft observation room
that is very small and unusually
cold compared to the rest
of the ship, but there's a good
couch there facing the window
so I can look out at the stars
between poems and whisper
his antique lines to them
because he loved the stars too;
he would have loved a trip
like this, in the ultimate forest
reaching halfway til Doom, or
maybe even all the way,
we haven't gone very far yet
ourselves; but this is my
fourth time out, leaving Earth
far behind, and I can turn
to the flyleaf again to where
I've marked the dates of my
previous departures, in pen
if you can believe it, I still
use them in spite of
all the gifts of techology around me,
because part of me still clings
to the old-fashioned ways,
to walls of stone, pastures, and
the stars rising up around
this ship like birch trees
just aching to be bent
to reason.
(... I thought I would post this poem here... that Aussie publisher that had contracted me for poems has had some personal problems arise, so she cancelled the contract for poems on sci fi/fantasy themes... so, that leaves me with a few poems hanging around... so why now post them... these were a departure for me to write, tho I thought with this one I found a way of carrying the classic into the future...)
