peel out!

One (many) of the great memories of my youth in Omaha was going to see the Harlem Globetrotters just about every February at the Civic Auditorium (RIP). Their schedule always seem to bring them to town around my birthday so my Dad would often take me and maybe a friend or two to the 'games'. These were mostly the Meadowlark Lemon and Curly Neal days - the golden years. These were such wonderful pieces of entertainment, whether of not you were a YMCA youth basketball player. I defy someone to come up with a better family-based bit of sport entertainment. Until now.

I've been following the growth of the Savannah Bananas craze and it's stunning. I think they are getting ready to expand the 'league' to six teams. It's rooted in Globetrotter legend, but they've added some more dancing and baseball-specific trickery. They are filling major league stadiums on tour and playing at college football stadiums with 70,000-80,000 fans. So great. Some of the player backstories are excellent.

Long live the Bananas.

folder of dreams

Not long ago I pulled out a CD booklet (a big one...see ^^^^) to take to my car for my rockin' and rollin' needs. It was shocking to flip those pages - there is not a tighter review of my musical tastes, and maybe my life from 2000-2002 in existence. I'm not being overly emotional here; as an equivalent in fashion you'd need something to tell you exactly what pants, shirt, and shoes you were wearing on October 8th, 2001 (rando date for our purposes). That period covered my full conversion to alt.county and Americana music, stuff I still love. A folder created now as a future CD folder time capsule would more heavily lean into Americana (a now much broader scope) and string bands. For every Bellwether there's a Molly Tuttle, for every Waco Brothers there's a Parsonsfield (RIP), for every Buddy Miller there's a Jason Eady.

At that point in time I was still in England - which had a strong Americana scene. I fell particularly hard for Redlands Palomino Company who I'd seen at The Borderline in London (also RIP0. There ain't no video of so long ago, but here's a later shooting of them doing a Springsteen cover - you get the idea...and you get the lap steel representing with a Farmer Jason t-shirt. 

This of course brings up another English-American powerhouse of the times. Oh my, I loved them and this song, in particular. 

I feel my days of live shows are waning. I don't like long drives anymore and my venue taste is more limited. I still have stuff on the books this year. I'm still cool.

upcoming

The 51 has one more (both of us) show on the agenda this year: Eilen Jewell. I've long had an interest in her - "she's someone I'd like" - but hadn't done a real jackknife into her music. A few years ago I was at The Burren in Somerville MA for Amanda Anne Platt and the Honeycutters (who've I've listened to around a gazillion times) and my tablemate asked if I'd seen Eilen Jewell. I hadn't, but he let me know she's fantastic (his favorite) which is high praise for someone who drove his wife and kids up from Hartford for the Honeycutters. I finally order some CDs (yes) and have been listening to get up to speed on her large catalog, but today I hit "Santa Fe". Okay, I'm all in now. All. In. If you knew me and loved me you'd know this song would get me.

There'll be more talk of solo shows with Kasey Chambers, Mipso, Billy Strings, Ordinary Elephant, Gabe Lee and Jason Eady, and I'm With Her.