Monday, February 23, 2009

Austin--->Memphis (647 miles)

Day 11 (Tuesday, Feb. 17th) Lanny, Christina, Jade, and I headed out to a attempt to play an open mic at a really cool bar/venue/coffee shop called Ruta Maya in Austin. This was the first time in over a week that I have given any energy to thinking about music, which has been a nice mental break. I was really hoping we would get a chance to play a bit because both Lanny and Jade Day are two of the finest and most talented vocalists I know. They are both incredible song-writers as well. I hope that you have a minute to check out their music.

Lanny Boyer
Jade Day

I've known Lanny for 4-5 years now and have played music off and on with him over that time. Lanny's album, "I'll Shine" is due out sometime in the next few months, I'm very much looking forward to the album finally being released as it's been a loooong project, spanning the entire time I've know Lanny... plus some. I performed on 5 or 6 tracks and I must say that I'm very happy with the way everything turned out.

In May of '08 Lanny was brave enough to accept my invitation to pretend he was Thom York for a night. A incredibly daunting task that no person should ever be asked to do once, much less do it again, which I've asked him to do. Here is a video of Lanny killing "Exit Music For A Film" from Trima's (my band) reconstruction of Radiohead's landmark album, "OK Computer".



After we were unable to hit the stage at Ruta Maya (impossible!) Jade suggested that we check out the Elephant Room(?) Austin's best jazz club. It looked like what a good jazz club should look like... a little seedy, dark, dank, and cramped, with just enough glow from the neon signs behind the bar to shade everybody's profile in a mysterious red hue. The band was smokin (of course--it's Austin) and it wasn't until we left the club and headed back to Lanny's place that I learned the drummer was JJ Johnson, who spent some time as the drummer in John Mayer's blues trio.

I tried to get an early start on Wednesday morning as I had a 10 hour drive ahead of me but I was having difficulty getting the Honda to fire up. After trying unsuccessfully for a couple of hours, I waited until Lanny woke up and asked for some help as I was pretty clueless on what to do. He obliged, came outside, popped the hood, blew the condensation out of my distributor cap hoses and the car started right up. Lesson learned. Thanks Lanny.

On to Memphis...





2 comments:

  1. Good God... whenever I think "Memphis," I remember making the 3 1/2 hour drive one-way to get there from Murfreesboro--oftentimes alone--to see random, often shitty concerts just because there was a shortage of random, shitty concerts in Nashville.

    Enjoying the updates from the road, Damon... please make a stop in Bucksnort for me while you're in Tennessee.

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  2. Whenever I think Memphis, I think getting tear gassed at a KKK protest. We then went to a Memphis Tigers basketball game at the pyramid.

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