A very busy few days. We left Charlotte after the show and drove to Chestnut Hill, a very tony suburb of Philadelphia, where we had a day off to wander the main drag and browse the antique shops. The next day we drove a few miles down the road to Keswick, another suburb of Philadelphia, where we hooked up with the Mountain Stage folk who have taken their radio show on the road. We did a twenty five minute spot along with Ryan Adams, Martin Sexton and a few others.

We then hopped back on the bus and did a long, sleepless, over-night drive to Boston. I-95 should be condemned. Once in Boston, Margo and I hopped off and did an in-store performance at the First Act guitar store, which was taped for a later airing by The River. Then over to the Somerville Theater for soundcheck (sometime between the in-store and soundcheck the weather turned from early Summer to late Fall, the temperature plummeted about 20 degrees and a we were hit by some kind of New England monsoon).

By showtime we were pretty wiped out. Luckily the audience was a typical, generous Boston crowd, which injected a bit of life in to us. It was a pretty good show, not great, it had some very good moments and a few not so good moments, but over-all not bad.

The next day things picked up where they left off. Margo was up early for a Boston Globe piece and then she and I hooked up to tape an interview and performance for NPRs Weekend Edition. After that we hopped on the bus and hightailed it north to Maine, where the pace of things, thankfully, tends to be a little slower.

*****

We have played many excellent venues over the past twenty-some years and we have been treated like royalty by many promoters and venue managers/owners, but I don’t think that we have ever been treated as well, or come across a venue as perfectly tuned to the touring musicians sensibilities as is The Stone Mountain Arts Center. This place is in the middle of nowhere Maine (we needed an escort to help us find the place), it is owned and run by Carol Noonan who in a former life was a touring musician so she knows the wants, needs and desires of our tribe. She and her husband have converted a barn on their property into a very beautiful and comfortable performance/dinner space.

The performers lounge (calling it a dressing room doesn’t do it justice) is without a doubt the most comfortable and best equipped that we have ever come across. Never mind that there is a regulation size pool table, plenty of clean and comfortable couches and armchairs, never mind that there is an enormous double-door that opens up on to a forest, or that the food and drink that they serve is top notch, never mind that there are all sorts of instruments laying about for one to goof around on, never mind all of that stuff, because, most importantly and most uniquely of all, there is a working turntable and vinyl. I’m talking vinyl albums, complete with pops and crackles and warmth and depth. It brought us all back to our basement in Montreal in the early 70’s where we and our neighborhood friends would take refuge and listen to tales of a world that we had yet to explore. I may just be an old fart (well, I know that I’m an old fart), but we all got sold a bill of goods by the music industry when they took the vinyl LP away from us. Not only does vinyl sound better, more human, richer, friendlier (like a big comfy armchair as compared to an aluminum, leather designer stool), but what is missing from today’s digital listening experience is the tactile, active engagement that takes place when one plays a vinyl record.

You literally get your hands dirty when playing vinyl, you’ve got to tend to the surface of the platter, clean the needle and gently, skillfully, drop the stylus on just the right groove, a lost art-form. These days you hit shuffle and let the computer chip do the work and thinking for you, there’s no engagement. The record companies wonder why everyone is stealing from them, well, part of the reason, a big part, is because they have stolen from all of us, they stole the sound quality, they stole the artwork, they stole the communal experience of sitting around a turntable and spinning discs….call it karma, call it a comeuppance, call it just desserts…..at least they haven’t been able to fuck with live experience.

Speaking of which…we enjoyed a terrific evening of music.