Al Stewart - 18 July 2009 - Redondo Beach, Brixton
I've got a few hours to kill today, so I thought I'd try to get my review of Al Stewart's Brixton show up, which I saw July 18th with babel. This one was in Redondo Beach, right on the water. A beautiful location that would probably have been lovely to spend the day at, but we were so tired from the show the previous night we slept in and arrived just slightly before doors opened.
Brixton was definitely a different setting than The Coach House. The Coach House was a rather large building with rows and rows of long tables, crammed with people, as well a bar in the back. It was very loud and felt rather southwestern to me. (The tables were almost like long wooden picnic tables.) I'm awful with number estimates but I'd say there were at least 500 people in the audience, if not more. By comparison, Brixton was very much a club. There were maybe a dozen to twenty small round tables that could seat four or five barstools comfortably around it, a large bar on one side and $100 minimum red booths on the opposite wall. It seemed very much the sort of place people went to just to be seen, regardless of who was playing that night. The admission for Al's ticket was $20, there was a no drink minimum and they validated parking, so it's easy to see how someone who wanted to go out on a Saturday night could enjoy spending the evening there even if they'd never heard of the headlining act.
This meant that while the venue was extremely intimate, it also had several rowdy drunks who got progressively rowdier and drunker over the course of the night. These people didn't know or care about Al at all, or if they did knew only Year of the Cat, Time Passages and, unfortunately, Song On the Radio.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. babel and I arrived before doors opened and went down the stairs into the cellar-like underground club. Several of the tables closest to the stage had already been selected, but one near the front had only a single woman sitting at a table for four. Never one pass up a potential opportunity I asked if she was saving the seats and if not, if she minded if we joined her. She graciously welcomed us to her table. A short time later, JimB appeared, this time sans his better half, and as he was solo and we had an extra seat, he joined us as well. In many ways, it helped pass the night. Jim kept us . . . amused with some of his . . . clever jokes and the woman, whose name was Ilene, told us all about her admiration for Laurence Juber (who was the main reason she was there), and how she'd once followed Paul McCartney's tour up the west coast. Possibly Jim and I frightened her with our Al fanaticism (babel was very mild mannered, I thought), but hopefully we kept her entertained and interested throughout the night. I'm fairly certain Jim convinced her to check out some of Al's work, at the very least, and she seemed quite impressed with the show by the end of the night.
Let's see. We had a very friendly waiter named Steven who attended us wonderfully despite the fact that all we ordered that night was water, which was free. (Free water at a concert! What a concept!) I didn't think about it at the time, as it was free, but I wish we'd thought to leave him a tip. The opening act was a large six or seven piece band billed as "The Couchois Brothers." They started out decently enough, but very quickly grew to be not to my taste. They pandered happily to the drunks, encouraging them to drunkenly dance in front of the stage, and their music seemed rather bloated. I felt there were far too many people on stage, few of whom actually were talented enough to be there. Their cover songs were passable, but their original stuff was extremely grating. The most absurd of which was about being drunk in Australia one night and watching a bunch of cattle and thinking that if you put brake lights on them, it'd look like the LA freeway during rush hour. How they then decided to turn this concept into a six minute song and then perform it live is beyond me, but we endured it. I at least found the beat to be something to tap my foot to, and I always enjoy seeing what instruments guitarists use, but I know Jim and babel very much disliked them. The songs seemed trite and meaningless and opening for Al just made them seem more trite and more meaningless. Still, they did seem to enjoy themselves and the rest of the audience seemed to enjoy them well enough. I imagine if I was drunk and not expecting the musical excellence of Al and LJ, I may well have too.
Suffice to say, our little table clapped loudest when they finished their last song. I'm not sure if it was before or after the Couchois Brother's performed that Jim spotted Al, but he did and approached him with the scroll of lyrics to "The Coldest Winter in Memory" in large font. They discussed briefly if Al might play it tonight, as they had discussed it some the previous night, where Al had declined. Al said he would consider it; that he had to see if a club of drunks on a Saturday night would be able to handle it. It was, at the least, not a no.
This night, to my surprise, LJ did not open with his own set. I'm not exactly sure why--if the Couchois Brothers ran too long, if Al decided the audience would rather a "full band" to come after the huge Couchois Brother's act, or if they simply wanted more group songs. Anyway, they launched right into their first song, joined on stage once again (to my delight) with Marc Macisso on flute/sax/tambourine/etc. and Kenny Herrera on drums. I didn't write a set list, as I knew JimB was, but most of the songs were the same from the previous night. The major change here was the addition of the Drunken Dancing Girl and Drunk Guy.
Drunken Dancing Girl, emboldened by the Couchois Brothers' encouraging of her drunken dancing, immediately went to the stage and started dancing to the opening song. I believe it was Angry Bird. Both Al and LJ pointedly ignored her, though the stage was only about three feet off the ground and not very big. It isn't like they didn't see her. They just didn't pander at all. She spent most of this song trying--and failing--to get her (probably less drunk) friend to go up there and dance with her. When the song finished, she retreated, at least for a while. Instead of dancing, however, she began shouting song requests, namely for Time Passages and Song on the Radio, both of which Al ignored at the time.
It is amazing to me what people, even very drunk ones, think is acceptable behavior. I've no doubt in my mind that certain bands performing there have welcomed and encouraged that sort of dancing. There was a screen lowered before the performance began, showing previous shows where the tables and chairs were cleared and the entire floor was something of a mosh pit. But this was Al Stewart and pretty clear from the get-go that it wouldn't be like that. I don't know if she thought the audience would suddenly erupt into insanity the moment he launched into one of his hits, or what.
In any event, Al eventually addressed the audience, somewhat on her behalf. He said his songs were not the sort you really danced to, and if there was ever any song he'd written that was meant to be danced to, this was the one. (He then played A Child's View of the Eisenhower Years Night Train to Munich. She did not dance to it.) To my surprise, though, the rest of the audience seemed very warmly receptive to his songs and even his sometimes lengthy introductions. His intro for Down in the Cellar probably took the longest and was least paid attention to, but he did a French accent for Jean-Louis Chave and that seemed to make the audience laugh, and they listened rather attentively after that.
Truthfully, with the exception of Drunken Dancing Girl and Drunk Guy, I was pretty impressed with the audience. The table directly in front and to the right of ours, however, had one rather impressive Important Asshole, his two Gold Digging Girls and a male friend. Important Asshole was definitely just there to be seen. Possibly he was connected to the band in some way, but he wasn't respectful about it. He talked loudly throughout almost all of Al's numbers, unrelentingly blocked the view for all the people behind him and attempted to get into an altercation with the people directly behind him who were utterly fed up with their rudeness half way through the show. I got pretty fed up myself, trying to dodge or take pictures around one big head--and the only one in my way! When Al went into performing The Dark and the Rolling Sea again, I gave up and actually sat on the concrete floor. My view was slightly skewed up then, but the show improved greatly by moving as I couldn't hear or see the Asshole anymore and had a completely unobstructed view of Al and the stage. I did have to endure Drunk Guy, who thought it'd be cool to head bang and take photos of himself "with Al" on stage pretty much non-stop through several songs, but he largely stuck to stage right and I could ignore him.
During a lull midway through the set, Jim shouted out "Coldest Winter in Memory" again and this time, Al said, "Yes." He then took Marc and Kenny off stage, presumably to give them a little head's up on how to play along to this, and left LJ on stage to entertain the audience. He did so with his rendition of Hendrix's "Little Wing" which the crowd absolutely adored. (Though really, who wouldn't? LJ is almost obscenely talented.) When Al returned, he explained what was going on. That he had a fan who had requested a song that he'd never even released on a record, and brought a large scroll of lyrics with him for Al to read while he played. Of course, Al had done this previously at a show in his UK tour, but it was still quite a novelty to us, and to the audience. I believe Al's exact words were, "How can I say no after that?" I do think Al was afraid that this long, somewhat slow song wouldn't go over well in a club of drunks on a Saturday night, but I think that they were so enamored by the fact that Jim was on stage holding the lyrics and that this was "really rare" that they sat patiently through it all.
Well, they all did, save for Drunk Guy, who insisted on head banging through it. (Yes. He head banged through Coldest Winter In Memory, and took pictures of himself/Al.) I managed to record Al's performance of this, from my comfy position on the floor. I did my very best to cut Drunk Guy out, but you can see him on a few occasions on the left. It's pretty embarrassing to watch Drunk Guy, but the rest of it is wonderful. Marc Macisso and Kenny Herrera are especially impressive, as I know for a fact they'd not rehearsed this one. You can see this performance on YouTube here (which Marc Macisso actually commented to later), or watch it embedded here:
Let's see, what else? Al did eventually say he'd play his "hits" for us, as it was clear at least Drunken Dancing Girl wanted some. I imagine a large part of the audience did too, as well. He performed both Time Passages and Year of the Cat. I'd never heard Time Passages live before, so that was actually somewhat neat. He did On the Border and Lord Grenville earlier in the show, as well, so it was a lot off those albums. But, his inclusion of The Coldest Winter In Memory, The Dark and the Rolling Sea, Down in the Cellar and League of Notions (for which he was joined on stage by someone who sang the counterpoint, both at Brixton and the Coach House, though I must admit, I preferred LJ singing the counterpoint more when he did in Santa Monica) really made it a nice balance from old to new. I certainly didn't mind sitting through YotC and Time Passages after he did CWIM. (I also recall he did Angry Bird, Gina in the King's Road and A Child's View of the Eisenhower Years, in addition to the others I've mentioned.)
As I had a great seat eventually, and the lighting was good and the venue rather intimate, I got some pretty good photos. Here are a selection of the best:
When Al asked the audience a question, the sound/light engineer would bring up a flood light so he could see the audience. That's why the lightning is so different in this picture.
Jim on stage for The Coldest Winter In Memory.
Al thanking and introducing his band.
They left the stage and of course then came back a short while later for an encore. As Al had already played YotC and Time Passages I was quite curious to see what the encore would be. There were more requests for Song On the Radio, of course, ugh. I called out Three Mules, I believe, as babel, Jim and I had been discussing that the night previously. To my surprise, he played Almost Lucy. Watching him singing this song live on stage definitely made me think on the lyrics in another way: Lucy, working a different club every night, for a pittance or a token. Lucy never bothered by the changing faces, just learning to rise above it all. Lucy, moving away to California, not regretting the past but saying it's behind her now. It all just made me wonder if he was Lucy and this song was something of an Al response to the changing club and drunken people he was performing to that night.
Probably more likely he had a friend in the audience who requested it, but it certainly made me wonder and reevaluate the song in a way I hadn't done before, which is always nice.
Anyway, after the performance the crowd thinned out, though we stuck around for another "meet and greet." I had brought an LP copy of Orange to get signed, but mostly I was hoping that I'd get the chance to have a picture taken with him. When Al appeared, he was almost immediately accosted by Drunk Guy (and his girlfriend!), who hugged him, took several pictures with him and threatened to make out with Al. Al was very polite to this drunken idiot, though I think the threat to make out with him really pushed Al to his limit. He actually said something along the lines of, "If you make out with me, I'll call security" but I actually didn't catch just what he'd do. It was said calmly, but I don’t think it would have been pretty. Eventually Al signed a thing for Drunk Guy and then gestured to the rest of us, patiently waiting for him to go away, and said he had to move the line along.
I have to admit that, while I always feel a bit embarrassed when approaching Al after a concert, after that I felt a lot better. He may not love signing and dealing with fans, but I imagine he'd rather twenty people like me, Jim or babel than people like Drunk Guy or Drunken Dancing Girl. Another benefit to this was the fact that it was a good show, it wasn't mercilessly hot and Al was in very good spirits afterward. When I finally approached the table, Al informed me that he thought tonight's show was much better than the previous night's. At the time I was rather baffled by this statement. I felt the crowd was much more respectful at the Couch House, and the larger audience definitely had more energy. But I think Al prefers to play to a smaller venue, and I think the heat in the Coach House exhausted him so he probably felt he didn't play as well, although he certainly did in my view. On reflection I completely see how he enjoyed the Brixton show better now, though of course both were excellent for different reasons. He signed my copy of Orange with a silver sharpie pen I've asked him to use at all the signings. It doesn't write as thickly as he'd like though, and he's traced over his autograph before to darken it. This time he said, "This just isn't working" and resigned it again in a black sharpie. He also personalized this one, to my surprise. (I guess he was too tired at the other shows to bother. Here he was obviously feeling better and more energetic.) Unfortunately, when he asked my name I said, "Van" (which is pronounced more like Von / Vaughn), and then spelled it for him, "V-A-N" so he'd get it right. He said, "Ban?" and I said, "Van!" and he wrote "To Ban" on the album, ahahaha. Ah well.
Al was in very high spirits after the show and had quite a few attractive 30-40 year old women (friends, apparently) greeting and hugging him in between signing autographs, which made me feel a little silly standing there with my LP and asking for a photograph, but he did eventually oblige, which pleased me immensely. I've seen some photos of Al with fans before, where he's looked quite exhausted or dazed and I was worried mine would be like that. If I'd asked for it at The Coach House, and he'd obliged, I think it would've been one of those. Instead, I'm quite happy for the wait, as he looks happy in it. (I look like the gigantic dork that I am.)
babel also got her picture with him, and had him sign the 8x10" picture of him I'd printed out back during the Santa Monica show. (I'd ended up having him sign the 5x7" version for me, but gave her the 8x10" as she didn't have anything else for him to sign and couldn't afford another poster--and of course already owned all the CDs). The picture is a fun one from the 70s, and both Al and the man selling his merchandise (named Ron, I believe?) were rather amused by it. Al showed it to one of the girls sitting behind him, and she marveled that he ever looked like that. When babel got her picture with Al, Ron held it up in the picture with her, even!
Ron later asked where she'd gotten it, and said he and Al wanted copies and could she email him so he could get some. It's all rather amusing as, truthfully, all I did was scan the photograph from Neville Judd's Lights... Camera... Folk Rock book on Al, take the digital copy to Walmart and print it out. All softly illegal, I'm sure, as I don't own the copyright, but I figured harmless for personal use. Having Al ask where I got this picture from is rather baffling though, as it's a picture of him posted in a book about him by someone he knows! Surely he can get to better negatives of the picture than I can. It was nevertheless quite amusing!
After the concert we said our farewells to Jim and Ilene and began the trek home. Both babel and I were quite in high spirits after the show, so much so that I got rather caught up in the conversation and didn't realize I'd been going the wrong way on the 405 for about half an hour. That was unpleasant to backtrack, as well as the fact that I had to stop and get gas around midnight. Still, we got home safe and sound in the end, just quite a bit later than I had anticipated. A bit ironic as well, as I'd just been saying how, despite my often terrible memory, I've got a pretty good sense of direction. Oops.
The following day was supposed to be our "day off" before heading to Malibu to visit the Getty Villa, but when I woke on Sunday she told me she'd just been to Peter White's website and did I know he was performing in Oceanside tonight and that he'd not be anywhere near her for the rest of the year? We were both exhausted, but it seemed pretty magical that Peter White would be performing so close while she was in town, so we made the decision to head out to Oceanside to catch him. I'll do a (likely much shorter) review of that... another time. Suffice to say though, it was excellent and I'm very glad we went.
One closing note, I recorded quite a bit of video at the Brixton show. I recorded all of Coldest Winter In Memory and all of The Dark and the Rolling Sea. I also have clips from Almost Lucy, Gina in the King's Road, Night Train to Munich and quite a bit of Year of the Cat. All combined, these files are over 1GB in mov files, but if you'd like them you can download them here. (Right / Apple click and "Save as..." please.) I apologize for the very large size, but my attempts to convert or compress them down went unsuccessful. If anyone has any tips on how to do so, let me know. Otherwise, enjoy the high quality Drunken Dancers! Ha!
Brixton was definitely a different setting than The Coach House. The Coach House was a rather large building with rows and rows of long tables, crammed with people, as well a bar in the back. It was very loud and felt rather southwestern to me. (The tables were almost like long wooden picnic tables.) I'm awful with number estimates but I'd say there were at least 500 people in the audience, if not more. By comparison, Brixton was very much a club. There were maybe a dozen to twenty small round tables that could seat four or five barstools comfortably around it, a large bar on one side and $100 minimum red booths on the opposite wall. It seemed very much the sort of place people went to just to be seen, regardless of who was playing that night. The admission for Al's ticket was $20, there was a no drink minimum and they validated parking, so it's easy to see how someone who wanted to go out on a Saturday night could enjoy spending the evening there even if they'd never heard of the headlining act.
This meant that while the venue was extremely intimate, it also had several rowdy drunks who got progressively rowdier and drunker over the course of the night. These people didn't know or care about Al at all, or if they did knew only Year of the Cat, Time Passages and, unfortunately, Song On the Radio.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. babel and I arrived before doors opened and went down the stairs into the cellar-like underground club. Several of the tables closest to the stage had already been selected, but one near the front had only a single woman sitting at a table for four. Never one pass up a potential opportunity I asked if she was saving the seats and if not, if she minded if we joined her. She graciously welcomed us to her table. A short time later, JimB appeared, this time sans his better half, and as he was solo and we had an extra seat, he joined us as well. In many ways, it helped pass the night. Jim kept us . . . amused with some of his . . . clever jokes and the woman, whose name was Ilene, told us all about her admiration for Laurence Juber (who was the main reason she was there), and how she'd once followed Paul McCartney's tour up the west coast. Possibly Jim and I frightened her with our Al fanaticism (babel was very mild mannered, I thought), but hopefully we kept her entertained and interested throughout the night. I'm fairly certain Jim convinced her to check out some of Al's work, at the very least, and she seemed quite impressed with the show by the end of the night.
Let's see. We had a very friendly waiter named Steven who attended us wonderfully despite the fact that all we ordered that night was water, which was free. (Free water at a concert! What a concept!) I didn't think about it at the time, as it was free, but I wish we'd thought to leave him a tip. The opening act was a large six or seven piece band billed as "The Couchois Brothers." They started out decently enough, but very quickly grew to be not to my taste. They pandered happily to the drunks, encouraging them to drunkenly dance in front of the stage, and their music seemed rather bloated. I felt there were far too many people on stage, few of whom actually were talented enough to be there. Their cover songs were passable, but their original stuff was extremely grating. The most absurd of which was about being drunk in Australia one night and watching a bunch of cattle and thinking that if you put brake lights on them, it'd look like the LA freeway during rush hour. How they then decided to turn this concept into a six minute song and then perform it live is beyond me, but we endured it. I at least found the beat to be something to tap my foot to, and I always enjoy seeing what instruments guitarists use, but I know Jim and babel very much disliked them. The songs seemed trite and meaningless and opening for Al just made them seem more trite and more meaningless. Still, they did seem to enjoy themselves and the rest of the audience seemed to enjoy them well enough. I imagine if I was drunk and not expecting the musical excellence of Al and LJ, I may well have too.
Suffice to say, our little table clapped loudest when they finished their last song. I'm not sure if it was before or after the Couchois Brother's performed that Jim spotted Al, but he did and approached him with the scroll of lyrics to "The Coldest Winter in Memory" in large font. They discussed briefly if Al might play it tonight, as they had discussed it some the previous night, where Al had declined. Al said he would consider it; that he had to see if a club of drunks on a Saturday night would be able to handle it. It was, at the least, not a no.
This night, to my surprise, LJ did not open with his own set. I'm not exactly sure why--if the Couchois Brothers ran too long, if Al decided the audience would rather a "full band" to come after the huge Couchois Brother's act, or if they simply wanted more group songs. Anyway, they launched right into their first song, joined on stage once again (to my delight) with Marc Macisso on flute/sax/tambourine/etc. and Kenny Herrera on drums. I didn't write a set list, as I knew JimB was, but most of the songs were the same from the previous night. The major change here was the addition of the Drunken Dancing Girl and Drunk Guy.
Drunken Dancing Girl, emboldened by the Couchois Brothers' encouraging of her drunken dancing, immediately went to the stage and started dancing to the opening song. I believe it was Angry Bird. Both Al and LJ pointedly ignored her, though the stage was only about three feet off the ground and not very big. It isn't like they didn't see her. They just didn't pander at all. She spent most of this song trying--and failing--to get her (probably less drunk) friend to go up there and dance with her. When the song finished, she retreated, at least for a while. Instead of dancing, however, she began shouting song requests, namely for Time Passages and Song on the Radio, both of which Al ignored at the time.
It is amazing to me what people, even very drunk ones, think is acceptable behavior. I've no doubt in my mind that certain bands performing there have welcomed and encouraged that sort of dancing. There was a screen lowered before the performance began, showing previous shows where the tables and chairs were cleared and the entire floor was something of a mosh pit. But this was Al Stewart and pretty clear from the get-go that it wouldn't be like that. I don't know if she thought the audience would suddenly erupt into insanity the moment he launched into one of his hits, or what.
In any event, Al eventually addressed the audience, somewhat on her behalf. He said his songs were not the sort you really danced to, and if there was ever any song he'd written that was meant to be danced to, this was the one. (He then played A Child's View of the Eisenhower Years Night Train to Munich. She did not dance to it.) To my surprise, though, the rest of the audience seemed very warmly receptive to his songs and even his sometimes lengthy introductions. His intro for Down in the Cellar probably took the longest and was least paid attention to, but he did a French accent for Jean-Louis Chave and that seemed to make the audience laugh, and they listened rather attentively after that.
Truthfully, with the exception of Drunken Dancing Girl and Drunk Guy, I was pretty impressed with the audience. The table directly in front and to the right of ours, however, had one rather impressive Important Asshole, his two Gold Digging Girls and a male friend. Important Asshole was definitely just there to be seen. Possibly he was connected to the band in some way, but he wasn't respectful about it. He talked loudly throughout almost all of Al's numbers, unrelentingly blocked the view for all the people behind him and attempted to get into an altercation with the people directly behind him who were utterly fed up with their rudeness half way through the show. I got pretty fed up myself, trying to dodge or take pictures around one big head--and the only one in my way! When Al went into performing The Dark and the Rolling Sea again, I gave up and actually sat on the concrete floor. My view was slightly skewed up then, but the show improved greatly by moving as I couldn't hear or see the Asshole anymore and had a completely unobstructed view of Al and the stage. I did have to endure Drunk Guy, who thought it'd be cool to head bang and take photos of himself "with Al" on stage pretty much non-stop through several songs, but he largely stuck to stage right and I could ignore him.
During a lull midway through the set, Jim shouted out "Coldest Winter in Memory" again and this time, Al said, "Yes." He then took Marc and Kenny off stage, presumably to give them a little head's up on how to play along to this, and left LJ on stage to entertain the audience. He did so with his rendition of Hendrix's "Little Wing" which the crowd absolutely adored. (Though really, who wouldn't? LJ is almost obscenely talented.) When Al returned, he explained what was going on. That he had a fan who had requested a song that he'd never even released on a record, and brought a large scroll of lyrics with him for Al to read while he played. Of course, Al had done this previously at a show in his UK tour, but it was still quite a novelty to us, and to the audience. I believe Al's exact words were, "How can I say no after that?" I do think Al was afraid that this long, somewhat slow song wouldn't go over well in a club of drunks on a Saturday night, but I think that they were so enamored by the fact that Jim was on stage holding the lyrics and that this was "really rare" that they sat patiently through it all.
Well, they all did, save for Drunk Guy, who insisted on head banging through it. (Yes. He head banged through Coldest Winter In Memory, and took pictures of himself/Al.) I managed to record Al's performance of this, from my comfy position on the floor. I did my very best to cut Drunk Guy out, but you can see him on a few occasions on the left. It's pretty embarrassing to watch Drunk Guy, but the rest of it is wonderful. Marc Macisso and Kenny Herrera are especially impressive, as I know for a fact they'd not rehearsed this one. You can see this performance on YouTube here (which Marc Macisso actually commented to later), or watch it embedded here:
Click to viewLet's see, what else? Al did eventually say he'd play his "hits" for us, as it was clear at least Drunken Dancing Girl wanted some. I imagine a large part of the audience did too, as well. He performed both Time Passages and Year of the Cat. I'd never heard Time Passages live before, so that was actually somewhat neat. He did On the Border and Lord Grenville earlier in the show, as well, so it was a lot off those albums. But, his inclusion of The Coldest Winter In Memory, The Dark and the Rolling Sea, Down in the Cellar and League of Notions (for which he was joined on stage by someone who sang the counterpoint, both at Brixton and the Coach House, though I must admit, I preferred LJ singing the counterpoint more when he did in Santa Monica) really made it a nice balance from old to new. I certainly didn't mind sitting through YotC and Time Passages after he did CWIM. (I also recall he did Angry Bird, Gina in the King's Road and A Child's View of the Eisenhower Years, in addition to the others I've mentioned.)
As I had a great seat eventually, and the lighting was good and the venue rather intimate, I got some pretty good photos. Here are a selection of the best:
When Al asked the audience a question, the sound/light engineer would bring up a flood light so he could see the audience. That's why the lightning is so different in this picture.
Jim on stage for The Coldest Winter In Memory.
Al thanking and introducing his band.
They left the stage and of course then came back a short while later for an encore. As Al had already played YotC and Time Passages I was quite curious to see what the encore would be. There were more requests for Song On the Radio, of course, ugh. I called out Three Mules, I believe, as babel, Jim and I had been discussing that the night previously. To my surprise, he played Almost Lucy. Watching him singing this song live on stage definitely made me think on the lyrics in another way: Lucy, working a different club every night, for a pittance or a token. Lucy never bothered by the changing faces, just learning to rise above it all. Lucy, moving away to California, not regretting the past but saying it's behind her now. It all just made me wonder if he was Lucy and this song was something of an Al response to the changing club and drunken people he was performing to that night.
Probably more likely he had a friend in the audience who requested it, but it certainly made me wonder and reevaluate the song in a way I hadn't done before, which is always nice.
Anyway, after the performance the crowd thinned out, though we stuck around for another "meet and greet." I had brought an LP copy of Orange to get signed, but mostly I was hoping that I'd get the chance to have a picture taken with him. When Al appeared, he was almost immediately accosted by Drunk Guy (and his girlfriend!), who hugged him, took several pictures with him and threatened to make out with Al. Al was very polite to this drunken idiot, though I think the threat to make out with him really pushed Al to his limit. He actually said something along the lines of, "If you make out with me, I'll call security" but I actually didn't catch just what he'd do. It was said calmly, but I don’t think it would have been pretty. Eventually Al signed a thing for Drunk Guy and then gestured to the rest of us, patiently waiting for him to go away, and said he had to move the line along.
I have to admit that, while I always feel a bit embarrassed when approaching Al after a concert, after that I felt a lot better. He may not love signing and dealing with fans, but I imagine he'd rather twenty people like me, Jim or babel than people like Drunk Guy or Drunken Dancing Girl. Another benefit to this was the fact that it was a good show, it wasn't mercilessly hot and Al was in very good spirits afterward. When I finally approached the table, Al informed me that he thought tonight's show was much better than the previous night's. At the time I was rather baffled by this statement. I felt the crowd was much more respectful at the Couch House, and the larger audience definitely had more energy. But I think Al prefers to play to a smaller venue, and I think the heat in the Coach House exhausted him so he probably felt he didn't play as well, although he certainly did in my view. On reflection I completely see how he enjoyed the Brixton show better now, though of course both were excellent for different reasons. He signed my copy of Orange with a silver sharpie pen I've asked him to use at all the signings. It doesn't write as thickly as he'd like though, and he's traced over his autograph before to darken it. This time he said, "This just isn't working" and resigned it again in a black sharpie. He also personalized this one, to my surprise. (I guess he was too tired at the other shows to bother. Here he was obviously feeling better and more energetic.) Unfortunately, when he asked my name I said, "Van" (which is pronounced more like Von / Vaughn), and then spelled it for him, "V-A-N" so he'd get it right. He said, "Ban?" and I said, "Van!" and he wrote "To Ban" on the album, ahahaha. Ah well.
Al was in very high spirits after the show and had quite a few attractive 30-40 year old women (friends, apparently) greeting and hugging him in between signing autographs, which made me feel a little silly standing there with my LP and asking for a photograph, but he did eventually oblige, which pleased me immensely. I've seen some photos of Al with fans before, where he's looked quite exhausted or dazed and I was worried mine would be like that. If I'd asked for it at The Coach House, and he'd obliged, I think it would've been one of those. Instead, I'm quite happy for the wait, as he looks happy in it. (I look like the gigantic dork that I am.)
babel also got her picture with him, and had him sign the 8x10" picture of him I'd printed out back during the Santa Monica show. (I'd ended up having him sign the 5x7" version for me, but gave her the 8x10" as she didn't have anything else for him to sign and couldn't afford another poster--and of course already owned all the CDs). The picture is a fun one from the 70s, and both Al and the man selling his merchandise (named Ron, I believe?) were rather amused by it. Al showed it to one of the girls sitting behind him, and she marveled that he ever looked like that. When babel got her picture with Al, Ron held it up in the picture with her, even!
Ron later asked where she'd gotten it, and said he and Al wanted copies and could she email him so he could get some. It's all rather amusing as, truthfully, all I did was scan the photograph from Neville Judd's Lights... Camera... Folk Rock book on Al, take the digital copy to Walmart and print it out. All softly illegal, I'm sure, as I don't own the copyright, but I figured harmless for personal use. Having Al ask where I got this picture from is rather baffling though, as it's a picture of him posted in a book about him by someone he knows! Surely he can get to better negatives of the picture than I can. It was nevertheless quite amusing!
After the concert we said our farewells to Jim and Ilene and began the trek home. Both babel and I were quite in high spirits after the show, so much so that I got rather caught up in the conversation and didn't realize I'd been going the wrong way on the 405 for about half an hour. That was unpleasant to backtrack, as well as the fact that I had to stop and get gas around midnight. Still, we got home safe and sound in the end, just quite a bit later than I had anticipated. A bit ironic as well, as I'd just been saying how, despite my often terrible memory, I've got a pretty good sense of direction. Oops.
The following day was supposed to be our "day off" before heading to Malibu to visit the Getty Villa, but when I woke on Sunday she told me she'd just been to Peter White's website and did I know he was performing in Oceanside tonight and that he'd not be anywhere near her for the rest of the year? We were both exhausted, but it seemed pretty magical that Peter White would be performing so close while she was in town, so we made the decision to head out to Oceanside to catch him. I'll do a (likely much shorter) review of that... another time. Suffice to say though, it was excellent and I'm very glad we went.
One closing note, I recorded quite a bit of video at the Brixton show. I recorded all of Coldest Winter In Memory and all of The Dark and the Rolling Sea. I also have clips from Almost Lucy, Gina in the King's Road, Night Train to Munich and quite a bit of Year of the Cat. All combined, these files are over 1GB in mov files, but if you'd like them you can download them here. (Right / Apple click and "Save as..." please.) I apologize for the very large size, but my attempts to convert or compress them down went unsuccessful. If anyone has any tips on how to do so, let me know. Otherwise, enjoy the high quality Drunken Dancers! Ha!