August 18, 2015 8:06 PM PDT
Hi, I’m Mike. I live in Florida. They never come to Florida. The last time I saw Dave and Gillian, I gave them a record. I first found the album Lester “Roadhog” Moran Alive at the Johnny Mack Brown High School at a junk shop in Davenport Florida. A crumbling storefront on a nearly abandoned main street, THRIFT has been the point of discovery of nearly all of my most interesting finds like the ’48 Stromberg Carlson tube amp and David Lindly album. When I first saw the cover it was like the house lights went out with just a spotlight on the sleeve, the band inviting me to board the truck and accompany them on a tour of Johnny Mack Brown County. The back of the sleeve referenced the Statler brothers and I wondered if it was the same group I had heard on the radio as a youngster. I had to pull over 2 or 3 times on the way home to check out the cover art some more. When I got home and gave it a listen I found it deeply disturbing. Out of tune, broken meter, and lacking in both thematic continuity and fundamental musicality, it was the worst record I’d ever heard……. the worst record in the world! I checked the label against the sleeve again and again. I hung it on the wall for a year or so and it found its way under the bed for another year or so.
My ex broadcasted from her blackberry how awesome it was to behold the Gillian Welch show on the water in San Diego. I had seen them only once in ‘98 or ’99 when she turned me on to them and have since bought all their CDs and DVDs repeatedly. I think their great. I think it would be great to go see ‘um. So I go to poking around to see where they’re touring and it looks like a long way from Florida. If I have to fly I’ll be holding out for good seats I thought, and I found them in Butte Montana. A little decisive action and 5 week later my sweetheart and I found ourselves motoring to Missoula for a bonus show. It had been a while, making up for lost time I suppose. A few days before we blasted off from Florida I decided to gift old Lester "Roadhog" Moran to Dave and Gillian. I thought they might get a kick out of it and I might get to say hi.
The morning after a great show in Missoula we drove to Butte, checked into our room at the Copper King Mansion and walked to the theatre to straighten out our tickets. I ran out of ink just as I was printing them. Maybe we’ll see Dave and Gillian and we can give’m the album and say hi. That was the first of several laps around the Mother Lode Theatre that day. We finally handed ol’ Lester off to the T- shirt girl to be delivered to our favorite stars and resigned ourselves to another great show. Sometimes you really just can’t lose.
At the apogee of some of our orbits ‘round the theatre we learned of an open mic at the Silver Dollar Saloon, scored some rental guitars, arranged a tour, got on the open mic list, and then just barely got ourselves fed by show time.
The show was great, and afterward we hiked to the room to get the guitars for our slot at the open mic. On our last lonesome lap by the theatre we stopped and said hi to Dave and Gillian, shook hands, talked about the record for a minute or two, and said goodnight. Priceless!!!
Open mic was great, the tour, the ghost town, and dinner were great, even the flight home was great. On the following sunday the wires that carry electricity to my house melted down when I plugged in the coffee pot. That was flippin great too.
