Gig Report (kinda) June 16, 2019

A couple months ago BassCliff filed one of his great reports, albeit in a smaller venue he referred to as a dive bar. Cliff and I exchanged a few humorous private messages about dives and our experiences playing them. The one in his report looked "Cadillac" to me and I promised to soon file a report on a play date in my neck of the woods.

So, Cliff....here is a promise kept.

Background: Des Moines, Iowa has a very robust music community, rich in sharing and fellowship among musicians. Part of the result of this is there is a very active jam session scene, with two weekly sessions dominating the scene on Tuesday and Sunday evenings. There is a handful of internationally touring artists that call this area home. Most of them are at least semi regular on the jam scene when they are not touring.

One of my great musician friends, Kim Mason, and I began hosting the Sunday session in February of 2016 at a venue that had experienced declines in attendance over the couple of years before we began. The, idea was to rebuild interest, perpetuate the jam and, of course, sell adult beverages. So we got started. The venue has a capacity of about 85 souls and the majority of Sundays we fill it with music lovers. Many nights we will have 25 - 35 jammers take the stage. Many are experienced, some are novice, but everyone gets stage time with 3 - 4 songs in their set. Kim and I also endeavor to mentor those that welcome that from us.

in the spirit of good disclosure, I took a break from hosting beginning in November of 2018 to have some corrective surgeries to my hands, wrists and one elbow, so am just now getting back into the swing. This past Sunday was my second host slot since my hand fixin' began.

An aside....Kim and I also work with several other wonderful musicians to play at the Central Iowa Homeless Shelter to entertain constituents there every other Saturday, late December through the end of June. This is most rewarding work (volunteer for us all) as it helps give these folks a sense of humanity and really brightens the day for them. The smiles are wonderful, they are incredibly thankful, and we have even discovered some pretty good musicians among their ranks to make some music with us.

The Report: I don't have photos from the road, but take a 55 mile drive through rolling Iowa, agricultural ground to arrive at the venue.

The Hull Avenue Tavern, in operation since 1910, the longest continuous operating venue in Central and Southern Iowa. We say it is one of the top 10 dive bars in the universe....and damned proud of it!



The stage as set up begins....my buddy Kim in the photo....great guy....great blues guitarist.



Their poster.



Our poster.



You can order about any domestic beer you like, as long as it's Bud, PBR, Coors, or Miller. A few well drinks too, if one prefers something harder.



Just like Cliff's gigs we are always offered a mouth watering gourmet meal.



My rig for the evening. Bergantino Forte with an HG 410. The bass is a Drake Custom 33" fretless PJ.



My little corner of the stage.



We had several musicians join us for our opening set.



Kim on guitar.



Jason on Drums.



Rob on keys.



Kathryn plays a mean blues fiddle.



Jere on Mississippi saxophone.



Josh on guitar....a real up and coming young player.



And, yours truly....everyone's favorite septuagenarian on bass.



My photos are blurry because I always seem to be moving!

I mentioned earlier that we get touring musicians joining us from time to time. This past Sunday, we were joined by Kent Burnside, grandson of Mississippi Hill Country Blues pioneer, R.L. Burnside. Kent is in off the road for a short time, and it's always fun to have him as a part of our show. He's a great traditional blues singer and one hot guitarist. He asked me to play bass for him at our session, as he did last Tuesday in the other Des Moines blues jam. Kent is a warm and gregarious guy and it's always my privilege and pleasure to play bass for him.

Below are a couple of his songs from Sunday. Please excuse the quality, they are cell phone videos taken late in the evening...but you'll sorta get the idea. In the first, he told me to lay down a groove in C and we'd figure it out from there. The second is a take off on Muddy Waters' Catfish Blues. Rather than being like Muddy's version, it is more like the Gary Clark, Jr. version recorded in concert a few years ago.

Kent is the tall guy to the left of the video. I'm the old guy playing bass on the opposite side of the stage.

And, before any of you comment on Kent's guitar being a toy....it isn't. It's one of Kim's St. Blues guitars about the size of a Gibson Les Paul. Yup, Kent is that big, about 6' 8" and powerfully built.

The vids:

Access to the Facebook embedded videos has become more of a technical problem than I can resolve.

Please see post number 28 for my latest suggestion about seeing them, if you're interested. Sorry for this....guess I'll have to message Mr. Zuckerberg.

Hope you all enjoy the report. We sure had a fun night of music.

And, Cliff, this is what the dives are like in my neck of the woods. LOL!

Best to all.....

Koog

 

I don't think the videos are sticking. Not sure how to fix that. If anyone can't view them and has suggestions about how to fix this, I'm listening. The links are to Facebook postings.

Well....as of 8:40 CDT 6/18, the videos are viewable. Please Drop me a note if you can't view them and I'll try and figure out another way.....

 

Thanks, Cliff. I'll have some time to address it in about an hour. If anyone has not been able to view the videos, please check again a bit later.

 

Sorry for all the confusion about the videos. I think they are viewable now....after Cliff's advice. Please see the black boxes in my original post and click on the "Watch on Facebook" option.

Thanks for your patience.

Koog

 

This is my last post on the subject of the videos. They seem to be viewable on laptops, but not on Android devices. I've tried everything I can think of, including trying to convert the FB images to mp4. I'm not going to devote any more time to working on this. FB is just difficult to work with in these circumstances. They have to protect those images that become their property after they are posted. The person that shot them had the opportunity to send them to me via email as mp4 attachments, but elected to not do me that favor...."I'm too tired"....and instead was satisfied to post them on FB. Anyhow....My apologies to everyone who is not able to view the videos....and yeah, I know....it didn't happen.

Thanks for viewing my post and for all the kind comments. I hope you enjoyed what I was able to share.

Best to all.

Koog

 

Hey Tony,

Stop by and see us. I will be hosting bass on July 21. Be glad to get you up to play. Backline is provided and l'll have a fine fretted bass for you to use if you're not traveling with one.

And, having you on drums will be great too.