I See Hawks in L.A.

June 29, 2006

LAYING LOW IN L.A.

June 24, Safari Sam's with Dave Alvin

It's late June, the longest day of the year has passed, and the Hawks are laying low. We've played almost every night, Phoenix to Richmond in 21 days, and didn't escape 100 degree + weather till the last week of the tour, but then the humidity stepped in. We're lounging with the wives and families, resting up for Tour round II.

The Hawks reunite on Saturday night in the Southland, our maiden voyage at the brand new Safari Sam's in East Hollywood, and we're curious. West on Los Feliz, south on Western, oops, east on Sunset, just past the mega-99 Cent store and into the parking lot, park at the giant Tiki face and load in.

Safari's Sam's just might be the best club in L.A. It's big but not too big, dark with many dark corners, funky but with good sound and lights. Steve Zepeda is a long time booker and a musician's friend (not to be confused with the Guitar Center magazine, which local wit Doten has rechristened "Musician's Acquaintance"). He knows how to treat bands and thus has a great lineup on the calendar.

We're opening for Dave Alvin, who has kindly requested us, and his gear is set up, soundchecked, and ready to go. We do our humble opening band tribute to a sound check and head for the beers, hanging with Drac in the back, as the public pours in. The sun is still setting. Ah, summer.

If time on the road teaches you anything, it is to ignore hideous onstage sound and keep playing. Don't whine, don't grimace, even if the monitor is feeding you ear splitting midrange sludge. Which greeted our first song, but we plowed through, and the packed house was perhaps none the wiser.

Soundman got it together, and we got a great reception from the roots rock audience, packed with vets of L.A.'s first golden age of clubbery, the late 70s/early 80s when X, The Blasters, Plugs, Los Lobos, and many semi-forgotten but great bands played Wongs east and West, the Hong Kong, Cathay de Grande, Blackies. Young people went to Flip and Aardvark and bought thrift store suits and jackets and 50's dresses and packed the clubs. If hippiedom was dead, this wasn't such a bad alternative. And these folks are still rocking, with an infusion of youngsters in the crowd.

Rick Shea (whose name means "hawklike" in Irish) added his soulful pedal steel and then guitar to the Hawks set. It gets hot in Safari Sam's, hot and dark like Austin or Memphis, and that's a good thing. A great L.A. welcome home.

Dave Alvin and his mature Guilty Men hit the stage and played with fire. It's Dave's record release party for his brand new West of the West album. The crowd was borderline worshipful for such a hardnosed bunch, and Dave's lead guitar was stinging and on the money. The Hawks mingled with old and new friends. A shoutout to our publicist Susan Clary, in attendance with her artiste husband Hudson Marquez, the guy who buried the Cadillacs in the middle of the Texas prairie and called it Cadillac Ranch. In America money buys you not only justice, but press coverage, and Susan has been kind enough to help us out at her Second Tier Country Rock rate, because she loves music and odes to altered consciousness.

More greetings inside and out Sam's, to the Coles family (rumor has it Coles is no more more! Alas! Alas!), Jeff from Santa Barbara, Chris Morris, Randall and his rocker mom Evelyn ("I know this sounds ridiculous, but have you seen my mom?"), as Dave and Men cranked out the hits of bygone California, including the best of the night, Dave's own "Fourth of July." Get yourself a copy before the weekend.

After staying out way too late, next morning Hawks Paul, Paul, and Rob gathered at a coffee house at Wilshire and Hauser, greeted by Chris Morris, pillar of L.A. rock criticism, who's also the salvation of Indie 103.1's Watusi Rodeo, taking over the show with wit, encyclopedic knowledge, taste*, and enthusiasm.

Chris escorted us upstairs and led us through a charged up interview, despite having half the sleep we got (last night he taxiied over to Cinema Bar to catch Randy Weeks and get his dose of Tony Gilkyson guitar--FYI, it's a $40 dollar ride). We played "Raised By Hippies," "Grapevine," and something else and were told it sounded great. We're still waking up from that one.

It's almost 4th of July, and then we hit the road again.

*Overfunded westside "public" radio station DJs, take note.

For more on the Alvin/Hawks show check out what these fine publications have to say:

Daily Variety

L.A. City Beat

June 21, 2006

THE ARCHITECTURE OF A MODEST GOVERNMENT

Raleigh, North Carolina

It’s Monday June 19th and the Hawks have scattered. Shawn and the Pauls are steaming toward Washington, D.C. to catch a 7 PM plane back to L.A. RW and family are headed back down the I-40 to Memphis and a night in the Waller Compound.

We had our last show in Raleigh last night. Like many shows on this tour there was a small but enthusiastic crowd. Our dear friend Mona brought her father and several other members of her family for a Father’s Day night with the Hawks. Pour House booker and all around sweetheart Marianne cooked a ham for these hungry and travel weary souls. The show got a good preview from Philip Van Vleck, a wise and forward thinking writer from the Durham Herald Sun. Check out the full article here. As usual, North Carolina was warm and welcoming.

The Pour House sits on the old town square just down the street from the capitol. The square was dedicated in 1740, and has a large copper sculpture of an acorn at its center, a modern addition. The capitol itself is genteel in scale. Constructed in 1840 of granite slabs carried over the rolling North Carolina hills on an experimental railroad, the building is crowned with a small green dome. There’s a simple grace to the building which lacks the ornamental imperial arrogance of many other state capitals. This building comes from the era of limited government, before it became involved in legislating seat belts and cigarette smoking. From the era when government proceeded on a tight mandate from the people. Will we ever again see such an era?

Report from Paul: The drive from Raleigh to DC on the interstate is devoid of romance and southern charm. The Interstate system was designed to prevent, or perhaps facilitate, an armed takeover of the continental United States, but it also serves to funnel those of us racing faster than nature intended us to down time-defying corridors. It leaves the rest of the country picturesque and relatively unstandardized, although creeping Interstateism, like kudzu, may eventually have its way with all of this great land.

The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain is a southern institution. Here the rain falls, plants grow like weeds, green assaults the eye from every angle. So why the canned vegetables?

Paul L dropped Paul M and Shawn at Dulles International Airport. watched them disappear into the glass 1970's modern terminal, and drove down a long highway past endless brand new tract-home-and-the-corporate-malls-that-serve-them intrusions into green earth, to Lee's Ferry, a brick and wood frame little town dating from the 1740's that is miraculously untrammeled by pastel makeover.

Paul's brother Gabe and his wife Deanna and their too cute baby girl Carlin spent a leisurely day visiting the Potomac River, where, upstream from the Pentagon, it is wild, full of rapids that swell prodigiously in winter.
The Powtomack Canal, instigated by George Washington himself, remains in ruins paralleling the river, its tiny width just enough for small cargo boats hand poled around the fierce rapids of the river. Beautiful woods still prevail in the cradle of American democracy.

A last DC to L.A. flight, and now all the Hawks are home. Peace in the Valley.

CIGARETTE COUNTRY

Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Winston-Salem is a city built on cigarettes. The RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company is still the city's largest employer. Second, interestingly, is the Bowman Gray Cancer Center. We are playing a gig at the Garage, a cool old punk rock club in the shadows of the city’s handful of skyscrapers.

The club reminds me somehow of Al’s Bar, the historic L.A. punk rock venue downtown. The inside is all graffiti and boxes and chairs are stacked up here and there. The seating is an assortment of old chairs and couches and mismatched tables. The attitude is relaxed and slow. Several box fans buzz in high windows barely cooling the humid still air in the former body shop.

Since our last visit they’ve built an actual stage. 2 X 4s and plywood rise about six inches off the floor. It’s carpeted and deep, a nice improvement. Tony and Kip play an inspired set, at home in this classic punk rock venue. The Waller family dances outside in the parking lot, the music loud and clear in the summer night.

Before the Hawks’ set, an old friend and fan from our last visit bestows us with a mason jar of genuine Wilkes County moonshine. No shit. She advises us not to mix it with anything and to chase it with cool water. The Hawks consider a life of blindness for a moment, then jump in. There’s nothing to fear here. Nothing at all. And it’s smooth, god damn it. Smoother than Wolfschmidt’s gin, that’s for sure. It tastes homemade and powerful and after a few minutes you can feel as if some kind of knob has been twisted in your brain. What a treat.

The set is relaxed and strong as the Hawks lay back into the old Carolina haze. Kip and Tony join for a big ass rock band closer of “Humboldt” and “Houseboat.” It’s a good night.

SON, STEP AWAY FROM THE DJEMBE

Charlotte, North Carolina

Fifteen or twenty years ago, the Charlotte, N.C. skyline was desperate for a style. New money and global banking had arrived for good in this city competing with Atlanta for financial capitol of the New South. Blueprints for banking towers stacked up on bankers' desks. What would they choose to skin the steel and concrete bones of their skyscrapers with? Classic art deco? Edgy modern computer shapes a la Frank Gehry? Straight and modest Minneapolis glass? No, they would choose the strange neo-gothic Batman like magic of a Tim Burton film. The result is a scary, cold, artificial skyline that just plain creeps the Hawks out.

The gig is far from the downtown center in a gentrifying section of the old industrial part of town. It’s better, much better, than downtown but it’s still a little freaky. There’s a mish-mash of restaurants and bars which borrow cultural themes from across the globe: fish tacos here, Cajun stews there, a Chinese restaurant seemingly owned and operated by 20-something white hipster kids. Outside, a drum circle has formed. Hot teen chicks in ‘80s style Madonna outfits stand on the edges smoking cigarettes in the black bras and white t-shirts as the ignore their amateur drumming boyfriends. Son, do you have a license for that djembe? We carry our amps and guitars by them, living in an entirely separate reality. Do these teens listen to acoustic music?

As we arrive the Evening Muse, our home for the night, is over flowing. A group of women with five or six acoustic guitars and one snare drum are on the stage singing to an entranced, nearly all female crowd. It doesn’t seem like this crowd will be hanging for our set. But we are wrong. Once again, we are reminded that we don’t know anything about anything. And there are Hawks fans there too. Some request songs before we play. A few tie-dyes are in attendance. The tough thing is the sound. It’s a big brick room with high ceilings and they like their music loud. We’re battered by the monitor mix and struggle simply to know where we are in the song. Communication between band members is nearly impossible. We have to land the plane on instinct and instruments alone. Luckily, our training has prepared us for this.

After the show we try to land some fish tacos but they’re closed. We follow some directions, scrawled on a napkin by a drunk, to an all-nite diner. When our waitress isn’t crying to herself at the table in the corner, she’s eerily maternal over at ours. But the biscuits are top notch. PM even boldly orders livermush. We fill our bellies and make it somehow back to our hotel downtown amid the freaky gothic scrapers. Weird night. Strange town.

THE HILLS OF TENNESSEE

Johnson City, Tennessee

Johnson City, TN is way up in the mountains just on the other side of the North Carolina border. The city is made up of old brick buildings and pretty two story wooden homes with classic porches. The air smells great and it’s actually cool as we unload the Yukon. The Down Home is celebrating its 30 year anniversary and we’re kicking off the weekend. The Gourds will be here tomorrow. The local paper has put together a nice bio sketch of the band piecing together all the things we’ve said about ourselves into one article. The place is made entirely of wood. Ed Snodderly, a folk music legend himself, greets us kindly. They feed us. Give us pitchers of beer. There’s cute tattooed waitresses and a good sound man. There’s even a quiet dressing room far from the bustle. Jaime, a friend of Paul's wife Victoria from L.A., surprises us with a greeting. This is a good place.

Firebugs light up the old, graceful neighborhood around the Down Home as Tony and Kip begin their set. It's getting near longest day of the year, kind of nice to play music with the sun on the horizon. Johnson City is down home.

DOWN AND OUT IN ANCIENT GREECE

Athens, Georgia

So we roll into Athens for the first time late as hell. We have a radio gig at 4pm. Not until we’re almost to Athens do we realize we’ve lost an hour thanks to our old friend the Eastern Time Zone. Shit, we’re going to be late. We listen to the station we’re scheduled to be on. Weirdly, it’s a classical music show. 4pm rolls around, we’re still not there, and WUGA is still playing classical music. The DJ comes on, says the four o’clock concert guests are running late. Then puts on a classical guitar quartet. So we’re stressed. We’re missing our radio gig, and we guessing they’ve misidentified us as a classical group. Could this really be? We bust ass across the campus of the University of Georgia and arrive at the station at 4:22pm. The DJ throws up a mic and hits the button. He's a pro. We’ve got 8 minutes. We play the Fern song, talk a little bit, and it’s over. The DJ puts on a Bach symphony and says goodbye as if this is all very normal. Maybe it is.

We’re a bit spooked as other than the DJ and a few plain dressed civilians, the campus is largely deserted. It’s summer. It’s hot. The students have headed for the beach or mom and dad’s air conditioned house. The only signs of life are around the club next door to the one we’re playing. Beck is there tonight and his big silver bus is parked out front like a big silver bomb. We suspect this is trouble for us as any surviving music lover in Athens is more likely going to see the Beck show tonight instead of coming to see us.

Our fears are confirmed as show time nears and the club, Flicker Bar, remains quiet. We flee the club for a high concept restaurant next door called Farm 255. All the food they serve is raised on their farm just outside of town. We eat beets and bread dipped in olive oil and Vidalia onion rings. There’s organic beef and shrimp and grits. It’s a great concept this farm to table thing. Can’t believe we ever got away from it. If Athens has taught us anything it’s to eat farm fresh foods.

Well the good news is, Flicker Bar is a great little room for acoustic music. A cool red curtained cave, with great sound. Tony and Kip do their acoustic duo, sound magnificent. Coles listeners, you missed a good one tonight. The Hawks do a very nice set as well.

Bad news: Pretty low turnout.

Are Americans staying home with their mega entertainment centers? Watching Beck and old Merle Haggard clips on YouTube, while today's country rock heroes toil in obscurity on $3 gas? Americans: abandon your Hi Def TVs, get in the car, accelerate slowly and brake infrequently, and come down and see the band!

SIDESWIPED IN NASHVILLE

Nashville, Tennessee

Holy shit, we’re back in Nashville. Somehow it’s not nearly as scary this time. It doesn’t feel like the Death Star or anything, just another desperate town of desperate entertainers not too unlike L.A. But we’re playing our good friend Billy Block’s Western Beat and that always makes for a good time. Billy is dressed in his own take on classic Nashville style: cowboy boots, jeans, cowboy hat with long white hair flowing out, bolo tie, and a hot pink t-shirt that says, “Got Bail?” He looks great. This guy is a real showman. And he can play drums.

As we wait for our slot, RW and family stand on the corner outside to escape the smoky bar. Suddenly a white Mustang comes flying around the corner and smashes right into the Waller vehicle. The Mustang backs up. Sits for a moment. Then speeds away. A partial license plate is all we got and the cops don’t want it anyway. Too much trouble. The damage isn’t as bad as it could be and it offers a perfect opportunity to sing “Stop Driving Like An Asshole.” Will our luck turn?

We stay at Kregg Nance's brand new tract palace perched on a steep embankment carved out of the Tennessee woods. Which are now a part of outer Nashville, they'll be happy to know. Kregg and Paul had a touring country rock cover band, Straight Up, in the late 70s, back when Cuervo was the only tequila, and you got $100 a night for doing six sets (at least some things never change!). Kregg has gone Nashville, has a song pitcher, writing partners, and a better voice than some of the artists he's pitching to. We hope he remembers those country rock heroes banned from inner Nashville when he hits it big.

CLOSE BY KATRINA

Lafayette, Louisiana June 11

The Blue Moon Saloon and Guest house is quite a place. Located in an old two story Victorian with a wide wrap-around porch and expansive grounds, it’s quite a bit different from the city club scene we’re used to.

Funky wood walls with found and forged art, the Virgin Mary prays under ivy in the back yard, and the band plays on the porch.

It’s hot and humid as we put our gear on-stage but we discover a cooler of ice and Abita beer is already waiting for us. They know how to welcome a band in Louisiana. The sound man tells us there’s a good write up in the paper and there is. Instead of being thrown in the cosmic burrito bag this writer calls up Townes Van Zandt and Ray Wylie Hubbard. We’re thrilled. Check out the full text here.

As Tony and Kip set up the folks start to roll in. There’s white folks and black folks and young folks and old folks. Frat boys and their girls. Serious dancers types who trade partners and keep their feet moving song after song during the Gilkyson/Boardman/Nourse power trio set. Military looking wives there by themselves.

On stage there’s a salvaged door scarred with the big red spraypaint FEMA “X” Someone has painted a New Orleans street scene on it in an effort to commemorate this great lost city and culture. You can really feel the loss and the pain just over the tops of the bayou trees.

We realize early this crowd likes loud, long guitar solos. So we serve them up one after the other. We bring Tony up and he adds his thundering Super Reverb to the mix. Humboldt is particularly stirring and suddenly there’s shots of whiskey being handed up on the stage. A dog wanders through and we sing him his tune. The owners have offered us accommodations in the band bunkhouse but we’ve got to get to Memphis to have the AC fixed the next morning. Reluctantly, we hit the road after a late night dinner of crawfish etouffee and rice. Paul L stays behind to enjoy the steamy Lafayette late night atmosphere.

Paul, Kip, and Kip's GenXYZ cousin go on a late night walk through back streets of Lafayette, walk on campus, where there's a 5 acre swampette complete with 2 alligators, surrounded by classroom buildings. Kip's cousin regales us with tales of his volunteer work in New Orleans, living in a crazed modern hippie den with dreads, outsized egos, and altruism in the soup kitchen. It's hot and humid at 2 a.m., but the mosquitos aren't bad.

Next morning we meet the owners of the Blue Moon, a beautiful Cajun queen and her husband and her child. Their other lodger is a geologist with Halliburton. He's hopefully moderate in his political views as we drink coffee, says he believes change can happen through the electoral system. "Hey," says Cajun queen. "They're corporations, right? Shoot 'em. Just shoot 'em."

"Just shoot 'em," repeat Tony, Kip, and Paul, as they drive north through a highway tunneling through endless woods, bound for Memphis under muggy blue skies. A discussion ensues on the decline of regional differences and accents, and as if to prove the point, we pull off the highway seeking food. A fish store proprieter gives us directions in a Mississippi accent so thick that we can only nod in fake comprehension. Regionalism lives!

June 12, 2006

SIX HOURS TO LAFAYETTE

We’re trucking down clear Texas highways towards our evening gig in Lafayette, LA. Shawn the trucker's son is at the wheel and we’re calm and confident we’ll make it to the show. We’ve been watching “Team America” on the computer. Jesus, it’s funny. Now we’re listening to “The Handsome Family”. Hands down some of the finest and most delightfully strange lyrics on the scene today.

BIG MOON OVER DALLAS

We roll into the city that killed Kennedy ahead of schedule for our afternoon appearance at Bill’s Records presented by KHYI 95.3 FM. Bill’s records sits quietly in a dying mall in the suburbs of Dallas. There’s several abandoned store fronts, a strange restaurant called simply “Chicken and Rice” and cavernous Bill’s warehouse. A big orange sign in the doorway announces they are preparing to move the store to a new, upscale downtown location. We’re glad we get to play at this one. When we walk in, it seems imaginable how they will move this store. In the same location for almost 30 years, Bill’s records is a Dallas institution. The place contains miles and miles of LPs, 45s, CDs, posters, bumper stickers and buttons. There is a piece of rock memorabilia from every moment in American pop music history. No of it seems to be organized according to any system we can identify. We linger over a poster of Tiffany and a original Doors sticker. There’s a freezer in the corner with free ice cream. We’ve heard about this freezer. Shawn has found it and unwrapped an ice cream sandwhich before any of us miss him.

Two other bands arrive, a curious mix of cowboy hatted young trailer park beauties and older guitar dudes, and the gear starts to stack up by the rear entrance. This wise and road-hardened band jumps at the chance to play first. We set up as a surprisingly thick crowd gathers. There’s a barefoot bearded guy near the front wearing a Jimi Hendrix t-shirt with flowers in his hair. He’s carrying a basket of more flowers. This is interesting. He’s an original hippie, for sure. We go electric and the room sounds good. Folks are smiling and even singing along to some songs. Everyone in the audience seems to have brought their own case of Natural Light, or Natty Bo’s as we used to call them in college. Do people drink in record stores in the middle of the afternoon other states? We just don’t know. Friendly Dallasonians offer us beer and smokes after our set. Bill himself, a kind white-haired man smoking Marlborogh Light 100s buys a bunch of CDs for the store. Where they’ll end up, no one knows. Bill was an early champion of Ben Harper, gets very emotional as he points out a gold record on the wall. What a guy. We pack up and wish our new friends farewell and head for our $39 Quality Inn rooms arranged by the finest club owner in the Southwest, Mike Snider of the Allgood Café.

After a quick check-in in the 100F Dallas heat we head over to the Allgood for dinner. The food at the Allgood is homey and filling. We order Chicken Fried Steak and Beef Short Ribs and mashed potatoes and green beans. Mike has the wisdom and good fortune to hire the kindest and most beautiful waitresses in all of Dallas, and that’s saying something. Devin and Haley take good care of us, filling our wine glasses and getting us whatever we need. Few establishments treat bands this way. We feel like kings at a feast.

Unfortunately, the night takes a bit of a turn. At show time the room is thinly populated. We just don’t get it. The Hawks got a good write up in the Dallas Observer and Tony got the big pick in the Dallas Morning News. Even the radio play has been pretty good. Yet it appears to be the lowest turn out of the tour. Perhaps it’s the stiffling heat and humidity of the Dallas night, the temperature still hovering in the 90s at 10 PM. Perhaps there’s some other big L.A. country rock outfit stealing our thunder. Perhaps we're purveyors of a dying craft, like jazz musicians grousing about the Beatles. Should we purchase samplers? We’re all a bit baffled but somehow Mike Snider and the staff of the Allgood Café make it all fun. We laugh and rock and drink more wine. The lucky folks who are there hoot appreciately. As usual, Mike takes better care of us than we feel we deserve. We leave the gear on stage and make our way past Dealey Plaza to the hotel. We could’ve had a worse day in Dallas for sure.

WITHIN AUSTIN'S CITY LIMITS

We left Geoff and Sally’s tranquil riverside estate almost too late to make it to our noon downbeat at KUT radio. We struggled to pack the Yukon in the rising heat but we did it quickly and got on the road. The winding hill country roads now familiar, we sped towards the station. Geoff’s directions were true and we arrived at the station in time. A formal and elegant man in his mid-fifties, John Aielli is a vocal and singing coach at UT who has been hosting Eklektikos for the last 25 years. Hearing stories of his sometimes curt treatment of bands, we were a bit nervous. Rob was bound and determined to sing every note dead on.

We set up quickly in the station studio and as the clock hit noon we were ready. John walked in, sat down at a table with microphone in front of us, and went through the pronounciations of each Hawks name, saying each syllable slowly and looking to us for acknowledgement that he was saying it correctly. When he got to Shawn he said, “How do you say your name, Shawn?” Shawn replied, drummerlike, “Shawn.” We were all laughing heartily as the red light came on. It was a good start to the show and things only got better. During each song John closed his eyes and listened closely to the words (and pitch of our singing). It felt like we were performing for a jury of one to grant us our Master’s in music. RW was concentrating so hard on pitch perfection he forgot a line in “Byrd from West Virginia.” Luckily, the words returned quickly, and only Kip Boardman noticed out in radioland. You can listen to this moment and the rest of the interview here. John didn’t seem to mind and politely and professionally neglected acknowledging the blip. Overall, it was a great time and a fun performance.

From the station we fought our way though the heat to our cheap south Austin motel on the Interstate. Trouble arose when only one room was available. We walked next door to an even more derelict under construction motel. Broken windows and a poorly lit parking lot almost didn’t scare us off. At the last minute we reconsidered and headed for the Clarion across the highway. It was twice as expensive but didn’t possess the air of potential danger and confrontation. The four of us camped out in the good room killing the afternoon before our late gig at the historic Cactus Café on UT’s campus. We watched cooking shows, emailed friends and family, sat in front of air conditioner, swam in the over chlorinated pool, slept.

At 9 PM we start the process of dressing for showtime. On the way to the gig we stop for the first of five meals at the Magnolia Café. It’s an Austin institution. Almost always packed, we’ve hit them at a slow time after the dinner rush and before the late night post-bar crowd rolls in. The Magnolia is open 24 hours. The Magnolia has a menu of southwestern favorites and good old hippie food. It gets a solid ***Four Chilies Hawks Texas*** rating. We order squash and brown rice and tofu and stir fried vegetables and pasta. Full and happy and momentarily feeling like we are treating our bodies with care and respect, we head to the Cactus.

Cactus Cafe is located in the Texas Union on campus. Parking is tricky. We opt to drive up on the sidewalk as close to the door as possible. We carry our guitars down the hall lined with posters of all the greats who’ve played the Cactus before us. Townes Van Zandt, Ralph Stanley, Bob Dylan, Guy Clark, and on and on. It’s got some of the same ghosts that live at McCabe’s. Despite some sound difficulties at first, the show turned out grand. The dark room of friends and fans came along on our ride, welcoming solos and silly lines with warm hollers. Folks came out who’d heard us on the radio, which continues to surprise and thrill us. After a couple encores, we packed up, threw away the parking ticket beneath the wipers, and headed to the Magnolia for a late night desert of cherry pie and penaut butter pie and ice cream. PM like his pie cold. PL likes it hot, although it melts the ice cream rapidly. There’s lively debate on whether or not the ice cream should touch the pie. Sleep comes quickly to the Hawks who arrive at their cross-highway motels around 3 AM.

Another day of motel time-killing arrives. PM takes the car out to the hills to visit his gold record winning producer and pedal steel playing friend Tommy Spurlock at his hilltop compound. It’s motel pool swimming time for the other Hawks. A few even venture to the workout room and overdo it on the stairmaster, driven hard to combat the deep sense of lethargy that can only come from riding in a car for 2500 miles and sleeping until noon. PM calls in the late afternon to report his flat tire on the outskirts of Austin. He heroically changes the tire by himself at the hottest time of the day. Drenched in sweat he makes it home as the Yukon air conditioner stuggles to cool him off. He comes through the motel room door looking weary but victorious and heads straight for the bourbon.

After cleaning up and cooling down we head to the late night gig at the Continental Club. This is the gig that got the nice writeup in the Austin Chronicle and we’re excited to be doing a good night at a great club in the big music town. Tommy Spurlock joins the Hawks and adds his Sneaky Pete-ish tuned pedal steel to the mix, like he was born to the band. Hire this man. It’s a rocking night at the Continental. We take the stage to a full room at midnight and people are still coming through the door. We open boldly with Humboldt and rock out. PL takes an epic outro (term coined by Paul Marshall) solo and actually levitates nearly six inches off the stage. It’s just that kind of night. Getting on stage at the Continental is like getting on a roller coaster rider. It’s as if the stage possesses a musical momentum of it’s own and you just have to hold on and try to match its energy as best you can.

People want to dance so we play our danciest songs. Pretty Texas girls in flowy sun dresses spin around the floor with their well-trained cowboy partners. It’s fun to watch from the stage and we stretch out solos and let the couples shuffle and two-step and sway. Our good friend Johnny Fargo is with us. The X-Taix lounge booker has wisely relocated to the best of Texas cities. We drink shots of Jagermeister at the bar and reminisce. We miss you Johnny.

Back to the Magnolia for one last late night dessert. We get it right this time. Brownie Ala Mode. Damn it’s good. Austin treated us well.

June 06, 2006

DAY OF SNAKES

This day of Satan, 6/6/06, was indeed portentous. A hellpuppy has been nipping at our heels.

The Hawks awoke and breakfasted with Sally and Geoff, jammed with Geoff on mandolin, and jumped in the Suburban, down highway 290 to visit Hill Country guitar shop in Wimberly, a long Texas drive through pastures, scrub and oaks, thence to our live performance on Ray Wylie Hubbard's radio show.

Judy Hubbard called us on cell phone--their engineer had left town, didn't tell them, and they have to cancel the radio show. Judy invited us to come down anyway and get Mexican food, and so we drove onward down 290 and a side road into very picturesque Wimberly, another great hill country hamlet with old buildings and even some great looking new ones. Modest. The scarring of the American landscape comes from the arrogant size of the new buildings--McMansions, outlet centers, malls, gated communities. It's all too big.

But we digress, and the devil wants his due. The Hawks and Geoff tried out every guitar in the Hill Country shop, some great old Gibsons, new Collings, and soon enough we were doing what every guitar shop owner dreads--jamming. Ray Wylie and Judy came by and took us to a Mexican joint nearby, and we had a grand old time, gave Ray and Judy the long version of how I See Hawks In L.A. got its name. The Hubbards invited us over for coffee, and we followed them over hills, down gravel roads, across a narrow concrete levee that crosses a creek and floods with every rain, to their house, an amazing log house built by a Conoco heiress and then abandoned. Ray and Judy have beautifully restored the house, which has a spectacular view of hill country. Like everyone else we've met in Texas, they are good and kind.

Ray made everyone cappucinos and Judy showed the Hawks around the house, and then we watched Ray's new "Snake Farm" video, then a new one shot at the Salton Sea, both very innovative and colorful, then watched the Hawks "Motorcycle Mama" video (coming soon to a website near you). A good time was had by all.

At the Wimberly supermarket, two young female high school grocery checkers straight out of Ghost World were talking about trying to recover a stolen car. Use your psychokinetic powers said orange haired Ghost Girl I, sardonically. Better be careful using those powers today, we said, attempting humor. Oh, yeah, 666 day, said Ghost Girl I. She rang us up and called out as we left, Merry Christmas! With a mock (?) demonic leer.

Back at chez Sally-Geoff, a celtic guitar jam in near darkness was interrupted. Sally hollered, and Geoff and the Hawks all ran over to the pool, where Sally had spotted a deadly coral snake in the pool. After much prodding, Geoff and Shawn managed to catch the red, yellow and black snake in the pool net and toss it into the brush. Paul L. thought about his last night's swim in the darkness and shuddered.

Satan's day is over, and none too soon.

June 05, 2006

A SHOUT OUT TO THE WIVES/PERD'NALES

Our wonderful wives read these diary entries, so we try to post them daily. We love you, wives. If you are not a wife, we love you too. We hope everyone enjoys this thin slice of life carved through the vast American Pie by our green Suburban. Here are some photos of the Pedernales River (pronounced "Perd'nales" down here) down the bluff from Geoff and Sally's house near Dripping Springs adjacent:

WALMART GAS, OUTER LUBBOCK

We'll sleep anywhere. We sleep on couches, outdoors in hammocks, in Motel 6's wedged between the tracks and the onramp. And there's nothing like the occasional escape to the Hampton Suites, where an inside connection gets us a sweet deal on the corporate comfort zone. Yes, they're a bit sterile. Yes, the AC will kill you if you fall asleep with it set on HIGH COOL. But they have workout rooms, and free breakfast, if you rise early enough.

Paul M always rises early enough. If you stagger out of bed and down the long, long hallways in time to snag buffet eggs and cereal as they're being carted away (Paul L often does, Shawn and Rob often don't), Paul M will look up from his USA Today with a smile that tells you that things are more than a little all right.

It’s mid-afternoon, we've been working hard driving, and it's just about picnic time for the roving Hawks. We’re on Highway 84 near Abilene, Texas, that’s not TX, that’s Texas, brick and stone farmhouses, some abandoned, cows, oil derricks and lots of drilling rig trucks, probably drilling new water wells. We pass a big wind farm, giant turbines spinning madly on a distant ridge.

The Texas highways are dotted by picnic areas right at the roadside, in mowed grass bounded by barb wire holding back the prairie or scrub. Concrete and steel shaded picnic tables. We’ve got some cold cuts, Muenster cheese and salsa, and we’re going to pull this off.

This morning there was a huge hawk circling the parking lot of the Homestead Suites (which is code for Home for Suits), a pink monolith containing overnight human storage units, carpeted, of which we occupied two for the hot and windy night of Sunday, June 4, 2006. The hawk was battling several crows and smaller birds, for several minutes, before he fled out of view.

The other Hawks, the ones in the Suites, revitalized by their overnight storage, grabbed the luggage cart and exited into 102F heat, packed and drove, patronized Best Buy (Dazed and Confused DVD) and the post office (mailed posters to distant clubs), jumped on Highway 84 and headed southeast.

We filled the Yukon with $2.78 gas (ever think you'd be thrilled to see such a price?) at the Walmart gas station at the entrance to the vast parking lot, in Outer Lubbock. Under noon sun Walmart seemed like a sensible solution to lonely distances and brutal heat. The bathroom was spotless, and the previous occupant had turned out the light. Here was order and common sense. South and east under pale blue skies past plowed red earth, alfalfa,

and big old silos.

Now, mid-afternoon, we choose a picnic spot about 60 miles southeast of Lubbock, a very nice picnic table under a concrete and steel awning, make sandwiches while the wind howls. Don't sit downwind from Paul L dipping chips into salsa. Is it possible that Texas picnic roadsides are built in windy areas on purpose? 104 degree heat feels good when the wind blows, and you’re in the shade. Here’s to shade appreciation. Standing in the shade is a dying art in Los Angeles. The plums and oranges are delicious.

Well, that was great. What a picnic. PM said it was the best picnic he'd ever attended.

We continued south and east, zig zagged through Abilene, Paul Marshall sang a verse of the song. This is a big state, even chopped up into two days; more red earth, farms, solid limestone block old houses, wood frame houses, abandoned houses and crumbling stone fences.

Here's a handy travel tip: Has your Snickers bar melted in the Texas heat? Tape it to the AC vent for about 45 minutes. Check frequently for desired hardness.

We stole free wi fi from the closed café in Fredericksburg, where we all agreed would be a good place to settle down. Now we're heading due east on 290, just passed Lyndon Johnson’s ranch, the sun’s casting very long shadows on the cows and round brown hay bales in the green pastures ringed by mighty oaks. We’re going to turn north on MacGregor and wander the narrow lane through Texas hill country scrub to our friends Geoff and Sally, who have a no doubt magnificent salad waiting for us in the House That Sally Built.

The heat down here feels good. No smog. It’s good.

We arrive at Geoff and Sally's in Dripping Springs adjacent hill country as darkness descends.

Jeff lets us in the massive iron gate built by Sally, we re-bro with the barking dogs, and eat a salad, bread and cheese feast prepared by our too kind two friends. We fall asleep, Paul L sleeping outside under a mosquito net. It was hot all night, and the bugs buzzed.