Music - The Great Rustler of Jimmies

It blows my mind a little bit that I don't watch more live music. I mean both big ticket shows and cozy little strumalongs. Those are the best ones, really. I'll give you an example.  

My friend Stefan Prigmore hosts a songwriter's showcase at this unassuming little hole-in-the-wall bar on E. Lancaster. From the outside, it reminds me of how I sometimes dream my grandmother's house. Wooden. Painted white at some point in its life. No windows. The sort of familiarity that doesn't necessarily equal comfort, you know? Anyways, you walk in and the entirety of the bar's humble innards are spread across your 180 degrees of vision. Really, you could look straight ahead and see damn near everything without even having to turn your head. On the right is a 6' pool table. Red felt. Or at least, it was red as some point in its life. On the left is where the songwriters do their thing. There is a mic. A small drum kit (I'm seeing a 3-piece in my head, but it may have a floor tom). An acoustic guitar at rest. Firewood without human touch. A useless blunt object without the able minds who have gathered there to purpose it. There is a neon light in that left corner. It feels even more like my grandmother's house, for some reason. 

Walking past the pool table and "stage" area, there is a wall on the left and the bar on the right. A long, skinny bar, the kind that make me think of pretty girls flocking to the public pool, then getting shiftfaced after. There is a security monitor behind the bar and, for the first time, the fact that I am parked on E. Lancaster doesn't seem so distracting. Past the bar, still on the right, is a small seating area with a few guitars hung up on the wall. There is one missing. Beyond this, to the furthest right corner is an exit. I ask the bartender for a Bud Light and make my way through the exit. 

Around the corner from where that door spits you out is a little awning with a couple wooden tables and benches beneath it. Seated at these tables are a ragtag group of individuals, all seemingly within their 30's. One has a beard. Another chain smokes. A woman takes a hit of a joint being politely passed around. Another man chooses to stand. He looks like a less successful Tom Petty. A much older woman arrived wearing a black funeral dress. Her face is painted. She reminds me of what Marla Singer might look like now. They are talking and laughing and several are holding guitars. I assume one of them belongs to the vacant spot on the wall inside. There is a silent count. There must have been, because when he starts to play, the others react in perfect harmony. The woman sends her signal of smoke up to the roof of the awning and with it, a fucking siren rings out. Not from any smoke detector. No. Her lungs are a squeeze box. Her voice is the bell of a powerful instrument. The man strumming the melody fills her with air and she lets us fucking have it. And she is not alone. The other two, unphased by the majesty of what is taking place, put down their cigarettes, either on the table or in the corners of their mouths, and they begin to pick along with this contagious melody. It feels rehearsed - but it isn't. It couldn't be. Faux Marla sits stoically. Had she produced a tambourine from her bodice, I may have called shenanigans. 

There are smiles here and there. The creative and capable mind can be unimpressed all it wants to, but the ear knows when something amazing is happening. They are all participating in a silky, sound-driven orgy and I am holding my beer like a limp dick at a lesbian convention. They climax together. Everyone gets a piece. They applaud themselves and resume their smoking, and laughing, and talking, until someone else decides to pick a little something, then they are writhing in unison again. 

All of this takes place away from the neon light. What must be reserved for it, I wonder... 

It is no exaggeration to say that I fell in a very specific sort of love with every person beneath that awning. Music is like that for me. A musician's mind is a beautiful place and when I find myself suddenly implanted into that cozy, gushy place, well gosh, I get all antsy in my cozy, gushy pantsy. 

Well! I think I'd like a cigarette and a nap now.

Here's to making a more concentrated effort to see more live music in 2016!