BlitzBlog

So after our time spent at Mid-Ohio Raceway in Lexington, Zac and I drove the hour and a half to Cleveland. We checked into the Hampton Inn Downtown, just a few blocks from the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, at about 5 o’clock.

Now I’d looked at all the info for the R&RHOF online, and what surprised me the most were the hours operation. 10am-5:30pm. Yes, my friends, a Rock & Roll place closes in time for the Early-Bird Special. Something is just not right. I mean, if it’s going to be authentically Rock & Roll, it should open at about 4pm and close at 4am. You know, drinking hours. Okay, maybe that’s a stretch. I guess on weekends, drinking hours could start at 11am.

So I’d hoped we could check out the HOF that evening, but alas, we’d have to get up at the ungodly hour of 9 in the morning to get there when the place opened at 10 on Sunday.

In the mean time, two boys with time to kill took a stroll in hoppin’ downtown Cleveland, to get some eats and see what’s what. So we head out the door of the hotel on East 9th, make a left and walk towards Euclid Ave. The first thing we notice is how clean Cleveland’s downtown is. Sparklingly so. We comment on this to each other, but then realize the reason for the street’s pristine state.

On this beautiful, cool autumn evening, a Saturday night, at 8 o’clock, there’s nobody else on the street! Of course the place is clean! There’s nobody to make a mess fer’cryin’outloud! I mean, new York may have some of the most disgusting sidewalks in the country, but at least there thousands of people walking on them on any given Saturday night.But, no, not here. In the 6 blocks we walk to the “restaurant row” of the city- East 4th Street, we pass perhaps a dozen people, one of whom was a panhandler. I fund this all a shame, as the downtown area has been revitalized and is obviously on the comeback. Lots of cool architecture, kitchy bars and restaurants. Just a nice city. Hopefully, it’s got more life to it in the summer.

I should mention that yes, as it got later, a crowd did start to form around the entrance to the theater for The House Of Blues, consisting mainly of the 20-something crowd, so there IS hope.

Zac and I walked down East 4th, which is a cute alleyway with lights and cobblestones. Lots of outdoor restaurants (empty on this cool evening) but inside, doing a decent business. Since we’d never actually been in a House of Blues- amazingly there is none in NYC- we went in and scarfed down some authentic corporate Southern-style cuisine. The food was at least as good as that which could be found at, oh, any Hard Rock Cafe.

We braved the crowd (yeah right) back to the hotel and sacked out for the evening. After all, we had to be up early to Rock & Roll!

After a quick buffet breakfast, we made the short walk to the R&R HOF.

We’d gotten our tickets at the hotel, so we stopped to take this photo, which, as it turns out, was the only photo we could take at the R&RHOF, as cameras are strictly forbidden inside. Apparently, taking a photo of oneself in front of Elvis’s purple Lincoln is a financial threat to the integrity of the museum’s collection.

The building itself is a spectacular pyramid, even nicer in person that the pictures suggest. We walked inside the bright airy atrium, and headed downstairs to the coat check and into the museum. We were in the lobby checking out a couple of guitar displays, and one of the docents came over, saying, “I notice you’re checking out that James Burton Telecaster. Isn’t that an amazing instrument?” He went on to talk about the guitar and its owner, the history of it and Burton’s career (lead guitarist for Elvis’s TCB band, played with Ricky Nelson, John Denver, many others, was inducted into HOF by long-time admirer Keith Richards). The docent was really knowledgeable and friendly, and his enthusiasm made me really look forward to going inside and seeing more.

We went in and sat down in the theater that begins the experience. The movie began with a nice homage to R&R’s Blues and Jazz roots, then continued to a quick history in interviews and film clips. About 15 minutes long, it was a good primer to get us in the mindset to tour the place.

The HOF has it all covered. Virtually every aspect of R&R’s history is covered, with just about every influential group you could name given its due. It’s possible Zac and I missed them, but the only groups we felt that were given “short shrift” were Led Zepplin and The Who. That being said, the “tour” begins with a walk through of the earliest history of R&R, proceeding to a large room of Elvis memorabilia, the centerpiece of which is a purple/white ‘75 Lincoln Mark IV, the requisite guitars sheet music, hotel bills, poster and such. From Elvis, we moved on to the 60s room, with an extensive Jimi Hendrix display, then on to a room that was divided by geography- showing the Rock scenes from New York, LA, Seattle. I was impressed with the New York one, of course, as I grew up here, and I was taken back to my teenage and early 20s years prowling the clubs in NYC. Seeing the NY Dolls, The Clash, Talking Heads, Blondie, The Ramones and the whole Punk era come back to life was a trip. There was some great video from what looked like CBGBs, of the Sex Pistols and Patty Smith on stage, and I was compelled to tell the story to Zac of one of the times I’d spent there. The place (CBGBs) was crowded, and I was able to get to the front of the stage as Patty Smith sang (sort of) and read her ranting poetry. What I recall was her armpit hair and the fact that, - well, let me preface this by saying I’d been spit on from stage by Johnny Rotten, hit by tossed sweat from any number of acts, but for the first time ever, I could actually smell the musical act’s body odor onstage. Patty Smith was truly Nasteeee!

Anyway, we walked through the place, coming to a nice large diorama of Beatle artifacts, and the same of The Stones. There was a small electronic section covering radio and Deejays, and it was fun to go back to hear Allison Steele (that voice!) Scott Muni, Dave Herman and Carol Miller on the headphones. Blasts from the past.

On to the other smaller dioramas of stuff from everyone from U2 to ZZ Top. Bowie, Tom Petty, Allman Brothers, Aerosmith, even Madonna. At the very top of the building pyramid was the actual Wall used by Pink Floyd in Concert, along with the giant blow up balloon of Teacher, hanging high above Pink in his motel chair in front of the crappy TV (from the movie of The Wall). Also hanging in space in the pyramid were a bunch of the Trabants from U2’s concerts.

Some more movies that they showed with various poignant moments: Chrissie Hynde talking about drugs and the road, and that so many musicians grow up as outcasts and then when they get successful, young and quickly, they’re thrust out into the world, in unfamiliar places far from home, lots of cash, hangers on and free drugs, and it’s no wonder a lot of them never make it to old age. Another was Pete Townsend opining: “Jimi’s dead, Janice is dead, Kieth, John, all these people are dead. To you they’re all icons, But to me, these people were my fucking friends. I knew them. I played with them. I miss them. It just makes me    sad.” Both these statements really humanized the whole Rock Star death syndrome.

All-in-ll, the R&RHOF is a great destination. It’s well done and covers all the bases. From history to memorabilia to technology and the music, I wasn’t disappointed with anything, except the inability to take pictures. I recommend anyone who’ into music to get there.

So Zac and I finished up in, where else? The gift shop, where I spent way too much on crap and t-shirts, but hey, ya gotta have something to remember the trip by even after the credit card bill is paid.  From there, we walked back to the hotel, got the car and headed for The Road, for the 8-hour drive back home.

If you haven't heard, they've paved Paradise and put up a parking lot. Interestingly, Paradise in this case, is the site of the 1969 music festival known as Woodstock, in Bethel, New York.

A gentleman named Alan Gerry has been the driving force behind Bethel Woods Center for the Performing Arts. And what has been built on the original site of the Woodstock festival is nothing short of spectacular. An outdoor, 15,000 seat covered natural amphitheater, with a lawn area at the rear. I took the hour-long drive to Bethel Woods earlier this week, with my 16-year-old son Zac and my buddy Doc, to see The Allman Brothers play, preceded by Bob Weir and Rat Dog as the opening act.

The place is bucolic as ever, situated in the rolling Catskill farmland. The parking lots are paved and well marked. The traffic control on the way in, is cordial and efficient. The venue is a pristine campus of natural wood-and-glass buildings surrounded by lush lawns and wide brick paths and patios.

We arrived early, a little before 5pm, for the 6:30 opening act. We stopped to see an acquaintance, the Mike Quick Band, playing at the band shell near the main gate. Sometime around 5:30, the sky started crying for about 5 minutes, and shortly thereafter, a full 180-degree bright-bright rainbow stretched over the grounds. How appropriate that above the scene of Woodstock, where the East Coast hippie movement coalesced, where now 5000 tied-dyed aging Dead Heads and their descendants (not to mention the the equally hippified Allman fans) all looked skyward as one, with glazed eyes and mouths agape, all moaning hushed “Ooooohs” and “Wow mans.”

As for Mike Quick and his band, they were awesome, and at 6pm, a woman from the Center gave Mike the “cut” sign, so that folks would start heading toward the main stage about 1/4 mile away. Mike begged to play just one more, and the crowd of about 200-300 or so all joined in, loudly cajoling her with chants of “One more!”

Well, 45 minutes later, when an exhausted Quick finally wailed his last note, we could hear Bob Weir and Rat Dog playing in the distance. Quick has crashed the opening act, and the crowd had stayed, only reluctantly making their way to the Main Stage.

The scene was a fun one to watch, with a mixed crowd of Dead Heads there to see Bob Weir and his band, and those Allman Brothers fans there to see the main act. The Dead Heads were in full regalia; lots of tie-dye, lots of flowing sun dresses, sandals and flowered (although graying) hair. My son was especially amused by all the “wasted old people” (his words) and I enjoyed the irony of watching a paunchy, balding gent heading up the aisle, in his brightly colored, brand new tie-dyed t-shirt that was tucked in (huh?) to his crisp khaki Dockers (huh?), and as he got far enough up the aisle, he reached around his back and pulled his Blackberry from it's holster and started talking furiously, undoubtedly with his stockbroker. Ah, the times they are a-changin'.

At one point during the Allman's part of the show, Zac and I went for a run to the men's room. On the way back, a 20-something be-spangled bra-less, sun-dressed spinny-girl (sometimes known as acid-twirlers) jumped in front of Zac, looked at him and cooed, “Oooooh you're cuuuuuuuuute!” Zac kept on moving, but she persisted. “What's your name?”  “Uh, Zac.” he replied, trying to up his pace. “Feel the love Zac! The world is like a balloon filled with love, man! Check out our balloon, Zac. It's filled with love…”

We kept on walking, leaving the young lass to spread her gospel to someone who'd appreciate it.

Needless to say, I've enjoyed turning to Zac every few hours over the past few days, and cooing ,” Oooooh you're cuuuuuuuuute!”

Came across this link, and for anyone who loves the Blues, you gotta check it out.

The Blues Cruise 3 is now history; and as we have described in previous submissions, it was a lot of fun; one thing for sure we could not have asked for anything better. Okay, maybe the Temperature could have been
a few degrees’ cooler. At one point on Saturday as we climbed into our van, the temperature control indicated that it was a blistering 113 degrees. Surprisingly, we did not make use of the hotel pool; perhaps we thought of it as a potential cauldron of blues cruiser stew.

Over the years I’ve visited a lot of places with vibrant music scenes; Cities like Austin TX, and New Orleans LA. They have a lot of great music venues and attract a fair amount of tourism because of it. New
York, Philly and LA have a lot of great venues for music also, although I believe that they are more noted for other things that attract the tourists. Sadly a few places that are identified with music are somewhat disappointing to me, Memphis and Nashville in particular. Both cities have a storied musical history and they have the music venues available; but they seem a bit contrived and a whole lot sterile. It’s not that the music isn’t great rather the sense that some soulless corporate entity has taken control and replaced the authenticity with a fairy tale version of authenticity.  I’m not some misguided purist who thinks that a dilapidated Beale St. would be better than a clean one. It’s just that they could have done better with it and not made it so damn touristy.

Speaking of purists, I ran into one while getting ready for the T-Model Ford performance on Saturday near the Riverside stage. He was a middle-aged man from Memphis and a nice gentleman, but he had very strong beliefs about what he considered to be real Blues and real music for that matter. Now I respect everyone’s opinion for the most part but I will never truly understand the notion that music has to be played a
certain way for it to be legitimate. He expressed his displeasure that an artist who would incorporate Hip-hop beats to Blues music was somehow defaming it. We went back and forth on this issue as I not only
defended the artist, but also would encourage more artists to incorporate other elements and genres of music into the Blues form. My basic point to him was that even the most basic changes to the music
were not only viable, rather necessary to its survival. Muddy Waters plugging in his guitar going from acoustic to electric radically changed the music. He replied that was necessary to be heard in the larger Chicago clubs, and thus it was okay. My point was that it changed the fundamental structure of the music and under his theory should no longer be referred to as Blues.

We live in an era of unprecedented blandness in mainstream music, and I do not want to go into a mindless rant about the sorry state of affairs that music seems to be mired in today. There is in fact plenty of great
innovative music being made today; it just doesn’t get played on mainstream radio. Even worse it rarely gets any media or press coverage. Be that as it may, I find it hard to believe that when someone does something that does not follow the script or goes outside the bubble to create a new sound would be considered a blasphemer and thus demonized for being creative.

I guess Bob Dylan should not have plugged in at Newport or Jimi Hendrix should not have employed feedback or Les Paul should have left well enough alone before he bastardized the acoustic guitar. I’m glad I know better than that and I love the fact that music is forever evolving. The need for new voices and new idea’s is vital for music of any kind to survive and flourish. When the Rolling Stones and the other British
bands came hear in the early to mid sixties, they covered a lot of the old blues classics that had been forgotten here in the States.  They put a new spin on the great songs of Willie Dixon and Elmore
James. They not only revived the music, but the careers of the artists who created the music decades earlier. The artist’s who are playing with the form today do so with the utmost reverence, even if they
incorporate Hip-hop beats or whatever other influence they deem necessary to create great music.

Okay I’m going off my soapbox now, I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to some of the folks who made our visit to Clarksdale so special. Before I do I want to make mention of my traveling companions who mean so much to me. Ricochet, Doc, Deacon and Gas-can are all incredible people who make the Blues Cruisers a special group of world-class gentlemen. I am a fortunate man to have friends
like these guys and I want to tell them that I appreciate every moment shared with them. The laughter and joy that each of you bring to my life is most precious and I want to say to you all; Thank You.

And Now without further adieu; my deepest appreciation and Thank you to –

David “Dub” Dunavent: Dude, I can’t thank you enough; you made this
last trip so special for us all. You’ve got real talent young man and
one day the world will hear you.

Tater: You are the “Man” sir, no doubt about it. You bring pure joy to your performance, nobody can ask for more.

LaLa: You are our favorite woman in Clarksdale; you play with such passion and fury that it boggles the mind. But you owned me with your solo performance at Ground Zero, and that was with your voice. I just
listened to your Demo CD You touched my heart

Ronnie Drew: Blues town Music is a must do when we visit, you’re the reason why.

Ellis: A visit to Clarksdale is not complete without seeing you dude. Besides we need you, Must have Hat sanctification.

Marylyn Fontenot: Thanks for allowing us to come on WROX and making us feels at home there. That was a whole lot of fun and you made it that way.

The Depot; Charles, you and your entire staff could not have been any nicer to us. We ate there four times; the food was fantastic, and you made us feel so welcome. We are all wearing our Depot T-shirts with
pride.

Daddy Rich: Your music is infectious, your lyrics are even more infectious and you are an incredibly talented artist. The blues cruisers are going to spread the Gospel of Daddy Rich. Thank you also Rich for being so nice to us.

Nellie & Dorothy: Wow, Wow, Wow, Wow,!!!!!!!!! Can I get another Wow!!!! God bless you both. Thank you.

Miss Sarah; You, are a legend in the Delta, now we know why. We love you Miss Sarah, Thank You.

Dan and staff at the Comfort Inn: We can’t thank you all enough for the personalized care that you gave us. You went above and beyond in making sure that we were safe and comfortable. I gave you guys the highest
marks on any Hotel survey I’ve ever done. And Dan, you’re friendship and kindness to us meant a whole lot and we truly appreciate it.

Big T Terry Williams: Big T, you should be the natural heir to B.B. King and Buddy Guy. You have the talent, the stage presence and understand the legacy. I can think of no one else more suited and talented enough to carry the tradition forward. You also have a reputation of giving your all, not just in performance but to your
community and to the other musicians you have given guidance too. I also want to thank you for your kindness to all of us since we met you four years ago at Ground Zero.

I hope in my haste to end this that I did not leave out anyone, if I did it was due to my sometimes-poor memory.

This is my final entry on Blues Cruise 3 and I hope anyone who read my stuff enjoyed it. If you are new to the Blitzblog please continue to read Matt’s great work as he manages to stumble his way through life with a silly grin on his face. I would also encourage anyone who would like to participate and join us on our next visit to Clarksdale, to get in touch with us, as we would be delighted to have you along.

I come from Clarksdale
Straight down from Memphis
Just South of Elvis
In Mississippi
All across the nation
Station to station
Like an education
Talking the way I feel

Daddy Rich

Mr. Blue Frog
August 2007

World faous lyricist The Mighty Blue Frog penned the follwing. Add harp as desired.

Drinkin’ beer and whisky
Sippin’ on sweet tea
Dear God I’m prayin’ that the blues don’t swallow me
Cause I’m headin’ back down
All the way to Clarksdale town
Gonna play that devil music
Till Ol’ Satan comes around

I’m gonna wait at the station
Gonna bide my good old time
Sippin’ on dark whisky
To ease my worried mind
I’m waitin’ at the station Lawd
Trouble so easy to find
I’m so broke and hungry
Ain’t even gotta a dime

When I gets into Clarksdale
Gonna call upon my friends
Gonna need someone to save me
Before I meet my end
Comin’ back to Clarksdale baby
Before I meet my end
Lawd I got dem lonesome blues
I need to see my friends

So how are you Ol’ Gascan
How is Riccochet
Have you seen Doc Holdamayo
I hope he still okay
So tell me Mr. Gascan
What do you have to say
I need to go to church on Sunday
Get on my knees and pray

He said “Hey there Mr. Bluefrog
One thing that is a must
You go to church on Sunday
And speak to Deacon Dust
Oh my friend Mr. Bluefrog
Go pray with Deacon Dust
Your soul is bare and naked
Like bread without the crust”

I went to church on Sunday
To confess my unholy sins
Deacon Dust he just listened
Then said with a wicked grin
Bluefrog I cannot save you
Even if I tried
It’s to late to save you
Bluefrog you’re gonna fry

He said we all are sinners
In that we are the same
I have my own temptations
Salvation is just a game
Like poker in the backroom
You win if you have luck
Like a mouse and a glue trap
You go in and you get stuck

So have a sip of whisky
And save a sip for me
Then go out to the crossroads
That is your destiny
And when you see Ol’ Satan
Treat him really nice
Ask him if he’s ready
And then roll out the dice.

So I’m standin’ at the crossroads
I’m feelin’ mighty fine
Reach in my back pocket
And pull out my jug of wine
I drink from my bottle
As I say my toast
And say so long to all my friends
My soul is gonna roast