It took me a little longer than usual to get downtown last night: when I got within range of the Metro Centre the streets were suddenly full of people in hockey jerseys, which is when I remembered the IIHF World Hockey Championships are in town, and Team Canada was playing the Americans yesterday evening. Since nobody tried to thrown themselves under my Honda, I assumed the game had gone well.

( Adam and Rob and friends notes and setlist here. )

Also, Scotty mentioned that his other project, True Love Rules with Paul and Dave Marsh from the Joel Plaskett Emergency (okay, I guess that's technically Dave's other project, with Paul and Scotty) is playing a few songs on Thursday with Gloryhound. Which sounds like fun, so we'll see you there!

Well, not so much rain as fog, really. Actually, a lot of fog. Hound Of the Baskervilles fog, if we get right down to it. (Okay, slight exaggeration, and we know Halifax, especially down by the harbour, is prone to fogginess. But I was still alert for the sound of ghostly barking, and it was probably just as well the sidewalk was unable to retain the footprints of a gigantic hound!)

Why yes, I am still taking painkillers. Why do you ask?

( And this got long, so here is the cut! )

And after that, there really was nothing to do but call it a night. Well, I did. Dave let me out and we took a look around for gigantic hounds, and as you can see I got home in one piece. Cool.

Now, I should note this will be the only Tribeca report for this week, because on Thursday Skank Williams is playing at Gus's with Realiser, and you know I wouldn't take the night off for just anyone but two thirds of Skank and a third of Realiser are Kathy, Dawn, and Scotty, so if nothing else someone needs to go to their gig and report back to the group at Tribeca. How's that for a rationalization?

Anyway, Dave wrote me a note so it won't be held against me.

And now there's nothing left to do but record the set list. So here it is.

( Set List )

See you next time!

I nearly didn't go out last night: I ended up working late, got home at nine, and by that time I was sore and cranky and doubted that I should inflict my company on anybody else. However, I've noticed that the chairs along the bar at Tribeca don't bother my leg and anyway, after a good night's sleep that leg is really cranky in the morning. So I went off to see what Adam, Rob and the guys were up to, promising myself that if I started to get hateful I would go home. This seemed fair.

Well, I don't know what Adam was up to, but whatever it was he wasn't up to it at Tribeca--I arrived partway through the first song to find Jason singing and playing guitar, Rob playing keys, and Mike and Brian on bass and drums.

It was also, for some reason, a really quiet night. Possibly a lot of hockey fans stayed home to watch Calgary at San Jose (about which the less said the better, thankyouverymuch.) However, the smaller audience was enthusiastic, and interactive, and... I'm trying to think of a way to say "we were obnoxious" without coming right out and admitting it, and frankly not having very much luck. Fortunately, everyone involved was a good sport. And really, what country singer could possible mind being heckled by two-thirds of Skank Williams?

Since Jason was obviously the lead vocalist they did a few songs from his first solo record, and then a few more from the upcoming record, as well as a few covers--"Wild Horses" by the Rolling Stones, "All Right For the Shape I'm In" by BR-549, "Tiger By the Tail" by Buck Owens, and after considerable pressure from the peanut gallery Jason agreed to play something by Johnny Cash. Jason knows a bunch of his tunes. Speaking as a member of the peanut gallery I was reluctant to specify one (okay, I did yell for "Big River" at one point) just because I had no idea which songs the band as a whole knew.

There was one glorious moment when, based on his guitar work, I thought Jason was talking everyone into playing "Tennessee Flat-Top Box," but he didn't get traction from the others (and I may have been hearing things anyway.) However, they played "Big River" and "I Still Miss Someone," which I should have remembered Rob would know from the Chris Denny sessions.

It was a short evening (and this is a short entry) but definitely a nice one.

Yes, well, since my last post was about going out to shows, here's a directly relevant post. Yes, it was Tuesday. Yes, that means I was at Tribeca last night for Rob and Adam's regular set, which now includes Jason Heywood (ex-Divorcees, and now a fixture in the group, as you may recall from last week's post.) The band also includes Mike on bass and ordinarily Brian on drums (although you may recall Shaun has stepped in a couple of times.)

Last night things were pretty quiet when I arrived, and by "pretty quiet" I mean there was no sign of Rob or Adam or, actually, a drum kit. Apparently Brian wasn't around and nobody seemed to have heard from him.

It's just as well for Brian this wasn't a story written by me, because you know this scene would have ended in a grisly discovery by somebody...

( There are no grisly discoveries behind the cut. )

So: a full three sets, and I do mean full.

Incidentally: since the night didn't end until two o'clock this morning, I am ever-so-slightly toasted this morning. However! I hardly even limped as I walked into work this morning! When you only get three hours' sleep, there is a limit to how bad your sciatic nerve can stiffen up. Everything in life is a balancing act...

There were some changes last night at Adam and Rob's Tribeca set. The biggest was a change to the cast of characters: in addition to Mike and Brian being back on bass and drums, Jason Heywood has joined the fold. Jason was previously with The Divorcees and is working on solo material at the moment. Jason has played with the guys before, but I missed the show because the weather was appalling that night and I didn't want to drive in it. The really cool part is, Jason is apparently now a permanent part of the organization.

( Which is just one more reason to come out on Tuesday. )

So the joke was, I arrived late and missed the first three songs. Oops!

This week's lineup consisted of Adam on guitar, Rob on bass, and Shaun (and occasionally Scotty) on drums. It was one of those loose and jammy kinds of nights where the band seemed to be kind of experimenting or playing around a bit. I was the moderator for an internal professional development session today (which is why this entry is late) on teaching with analogies, and I remarked that, although I don't use it when teaching, in my own mind everything can almost always be related to horse training.

So I am going to say that last night's two sets reminded me a bit of the days when you put your horse out in the arena and sort of chase her around to get the kinks out, but eventually she's not just tearing around, she's working around you on a circle and you actually seem to be accomplishing something. (Hey, it happens.) This felt like kind of one of those nights.

( More on this and set list. )

A good word for the set might be "eclectic." It was definitely entertaining.

And, with that, I hopped off into the night. See you next time!

Rob is out of town for a bit so there won't be a musical report from Tribeca tomorrow. However, Adam's dad very kindly sent me some photos of the usual suspects a while back, and this seems like a good time to post them. (They're already up on the Facebook group so it should be all right.)

( The cast of characters! )

So that's it for this week. We'll see what next Tuesday brings.

Last night's Adam and Rob set at Tribeca had a particularly relaxed feel, even for them. I am a little pressed for time at the moment but it was a really nice set. I may come back to this one later but for now here is the set list.

Set List
Set #1--Rob and Adam

Leanin' On the Wind

Star (Stealers Wheel)

Empty Streets (I think)

No Stone

Means To Fly

"Sun don't shine anymore

"Fell in love with Mother Earth"

Light at the End of the Tunnel

Break
Set #2--Adam, Rob, Mike, Brian

Desperately Dreaming (which may illustrate one potential peril of not having a set list--this is one of those songs that kind of puts the cap on the night, so it feels funny to start the set with it. I wasn't the only person who thought that. Adam: "Sorry, folks, that's about as good as it gets.")

Walks Away

Can I See You Again

Dark End Of the Street

The Shape I'm In (The Band, and at this point the band onstage sounded like more of them then there were)

Drive (The Cars, for Dave and Kathy, and there might have been dancing)

Lady In the Cold

Break
Set #3

Won't Back Down (Tom Petty, with a guest bass player whose name I didn't catch)

The Weight (The Band, with guest bassist)

Hey Joe (Jimi Hendrix, Mike on bass, former guest bassist on vocals)

"Take a look at yourself" (bluesy thing I cannot identify off the top of my head, Evan: guitar and vocals)

Hoochie Coochie Man (Muddy Wayers/Willie Dixon, Evan: vocals)

Colours of the World (really pretty version)

Maybe

No Telling When

Desperately Dreaming (which we've already noted would be a good note to end on. So they did)

The weather predictions for last night were so bad that I half-expected CTV to resurrect Lorne Greene to read them, which may have been one reason the evening got off to a slow start. And then when the apocalypse was apparently delayed (in fact, rather than a winter storm of any proportion, all Halifax seems to be getting is rain and that began after 2:00) people began showing up in bunches, special guests joined in, and the dance floor was, if not crowded, then at least significantly occupied.

( Set list and all behind the cut. )

For a night that began with such predictions of sleet and snow and gloom of night, it turned out really pretty cheery!

Okay--it has been One Of Those Days here at the library, with the result that this entry has been a long time coming.

But now that nobody is asking questions for a minute, here's a short post about Adam and Rob's show at Tribeca last night. Their special guest was Jonny Stevens, a guy whose name I have heard frequently, although I've never actually heard him before. As they generally do when there is a guest, Rob and Adam played one set as a duo, then Stevens played the middle set with a little help from his friends, and Adam and Rob finished the night with a band set.

( And here are the details. )

Fun night, quite a few people around, and the sound was very good.

And... I believe that brings us up to date!

This is actually a post about the second half of last evening's adventures, but I'm posting it first because chronological order is for sissies. (Or for people who are good at those math problems involving sequences. I was an English major, myself.)

Anyway, after providing a lead to the MacDonald Bridge (don't worry, that will make sense later) (well, for a given value of "sense") I turned back around and made my way to Tribeca. Adam and Rob played a set as a duo at first and then were joined by Shaun on drums (I dunno how long he's been playing those songs but he sounded pretty comfortable) and then on the second set they were a four-piece with Mike on bass.

It was a pretty low-key vibe, but the interesting thing was that a few of the arrangements were... I don't know, heavier? than I seem to recall. The evolution from the demo stage is an interesting one anyway, and this kind of thing keeps you paying attention.

Rob mentioned at one point that Chris Denny is hoping to come up to the Maritimes and play a few shows sometime in the reasonably near future. (Please God, not the last week of May!) so although you can't see me right now you can imagine me spinning around in excitement in my chair. I can only imagine how great he'd be live.

Anyway, set list. It was truncated slightly when problems occurred with a guitar that has as far as I know never caused any trouble for anybody ever. It was like Coney biting someone. Even so, it was a good one.

Set List
Set #1
Adam: guitar & vocals, Rob: keys

Leanin' On the Wind

Means To Fly

Ballad of Dan Mattie

"Mother Nature walking by" (I know this song but can't remember the title for the life of me!)

Lover Sweet Lover (with Shaun on drums)

"You and I were meant to be" (w/Shaun)

Light At the End of the Tunnel (w/Shaun)

Break
Set #2
Adam: guitar & vocals, Rob: keys, Shaun: drums, Mike: bass

No Telling When

Desperately Dreaming

Walks Away

Drive (The Cars)

Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues (Bob Dylan)

Walk Of Life (Dire Straits)

(My return, that is--nobody else went anywhere.)

There were no adverse meteorological (man, does that word look weird when you type it) conditions last night, so I didn't miss Adam and Rob's Tribeca show this week. I was late, but that was nobody's fault but my own. As a result I missed a song or two at the beginning of the night but I was around for most of the fun.

The format for the evening was: Rob and Adam as a duo, then guest Christina Martin played a set, and then Adam and Rob played another one with Brian and Mike on drums and bass. It actually turned out that Christina pretty much joined the band, so at that point it was everybody-onstage and that was fun. Especially, as Christina pointed out a couple of times, since they'd had almost no practice time together. I'm not yet at the point where I'm not sort of gobsmacked at how fast a bunch of good musicians can get their collective act together. It was pretty cool.

It was also pretty crowded--I understand last week was slow, probably because there is so little sled dog parking downtown, but last night had to have made up for it because it was wall-to-wall for most of the evening. I did my best to keep my elbows to myself.

Set List
Set #1 (Adam and Rob)

I missed one or two

Leanin' On the Wind

With Or Without You

No Stone

Lover Sweet Lover

Light At the End of the Tunnel

Break
Set #2 (Christina, Adam, Rob, Mike, Brian)
I've actually heard Christina a couple of times, once at One World Cafe a few months ago, but I don't know her stuff. I don't think I'll get around to sleuthing out a set list, but I will say that she has a lovely sort of husky voice. I see where I remarked on one song that she was reminding me of Stevie Nicks, a little. Again, if the band really did pull this together on practically no practice I am all sorts of impressed. I especially liked the last two songs--they really got rolling and ended the set with a bang. She'll be joining Gloryhound on Thursday for another acoustic set, so that should be worth staying up late for.
Break
Set #3 (Adam, Rob, Brian, Mike)

Can I See You Again

Desperately Dreaming

Lady In the Cold

Witch Doctor

Dark End Of the Street

Walks Away

Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues (in which, much like the video I posted in my last entry, Adam got a little tangled up in the lyrics for a second. In his case, though, he just called Evan up onstage to lend a hand, so there were even more special guests than originally expected)

Colours of the World

No Telling When (at which point I noted that this set, too, really picked up steam as it went along)

Working Man's Blues (Merle Haggard, a much more laid-back version than Gloryhound's interpretation)

And I'm out of time here so I'll just note--good night, good crowd, good to be back!

So it turned out that, despite my neighbourhood's record of not getting side streets cleared until a couple of days after any significant snowfall, the only issue I had with getting to Tribeca last night was clearing my own parking space. (I take the bus to work, because I don't have to stress about where to park a bus downtown, which means my parking space is never plowed out for me because there's a car in it at the time. On the up side, that led to my having a snow shovel in my car all evening which would have been handy if I'd gotten hung up on a snowy curb or something.)

So this week's Adam and Rob and Friends show consisted of one set with just Adam (guitar and vocals) and Rob (keys), and then a second featuring them with a drummer and bass player.

( More details behind the cut. )

I understand that last week things ended with a big jam that sounded like a lot of fun, but you picks your battles so I didn't stick around just in case or anything. I'd already had plenty of fun for a Tuesday at that.

This is the first Tuesday @ Tribeca report in a while--I think I mentioned before that Adam and Rob's project is playing there every Tuesday and last night was the first show. It started and ended earlier than the Gloryhound ones on Thursday, for which I was grateful. Scotty was behind the bar, which was nice, along with Dave from Gloryhound (we both did the "well, this is a different perspective!" thing.) And there was what I'd call a decent crowd for a Tuesday in early January. Not as many people as for the show just before Christmas, but on the up side that meant it was a lot easier for me to hear.

Adam and Rob played the second set--the plan is to have a different musician play the first set every week, and then the guys follow them. This week the the special guest was Al Tuck, who often performs with his band No Action (I am ashamed to say I didn't get that one until I heard someone say right out, "Al Tuck and No Action"), and who I've been assured by countless people is a songwriter I need to check out. The best recommendation I've heard for him was not a personal one--at his Symphony Nova Scotia show a couple of years ago, Matt Mays introduced a cover of Tuck's "February Snow" by calling him "the best songwriter that anyone who's ever heard of him has ever heard of," which you have to admit is pretty brilliant. I'd been feeling like an idiot for not having heard him yet (he used to play at Gus's every Sunday afternoon, but I somehow always seemed to be at the barn) so it was nice to have a couple of people who know much more about music than I do confess they were in the same boat.

So the opening set was Al on guitar and lead vocals (mostly), Adam on keys, and Rob on bass. Really nice stuff, although I don't think I would choose it as driving music, both because it was beautifully low-key and dreamy, and also because I have a feeling I'd get thinking about the lyrics and lose my focus. (I can't listen to Stan Rogers and drive, either. No, I don't listen to audiobooks in the car, why do you ask?) I think I have heard someone describe Tuck as sounding a little bit like Tom Waits, or maybe I dreamed it, but that's the best I can come up with. There seemed to be a hint of Waits.

I'm sort of in the process of figuring out which song was which by the lyrics, which are posted on his site but not easily searchable, so there is no set list at this time for Al. I'm definitely going to look up his stuff and may update this entry later if I do match titles to go with the songs. There was a guest vocalist on "February Snow," a guy named Thomas Matheson, who I've pretty much only ever seen as a guest of of another artist but who's probably worth looking up himself. At the very end of the set Al played one song by himself, then remarked that it seemed like a bit of a downer to end the set on and asked the rest of the band, who by now were in the audience, "Did we rehearse 'Brother From Another Mother' the other day?"

Everyone else: "No."
Al: "Oh."
Adam: (getting to his feet) "How many chords does it have?"
Al: "A lot."

In spite of which, they played the song and it sounded just fine to me.

Edited because I now have the set list!
Set List

Buddha

Six Strings

Nine Lives

5-0

February Snow (Thomas Matheson: vocals and guitar)

Big O' Me

I Can't Pretend (Al: solo guitar and vocals)

Brother From Another Mother

After a very short intermission, Rob and Adam took over. The lineup was slightly different from last time, with Mike Farrington (I think I have that right) on bass rather than Serge Samson. Apparently Dale Murray is suffering from "the plague" (don't you hate it when that happens?) so he was unable to attend, but his brother Brian played drums, with Adam on guitar and vocals and Rob on keys.

I'm getting much better at recognizing these tunes and Adam introduced a bunch of them so I have most of the titles.

Set List

Colours Of the World

No Telling When

Maybe

Desperately Dreaming

Walks Away

Sometimes

Lady In the Cold

Can I See You Again

Witch Doctor

Drive (The Cars, a nice blast from the past and a good cover)

The sound was really good--Scotty was all over it--and overall I'd call it a good night. Rob remarked at the end of the set that they hope things would get tighter as they played together more. Which I am sure they will, and that's one of the nice things about going to see a particular band over a period of time: it's fun to hear that kind of thing come together and see where they go.

Anyway: definitely a good use of my Tuesday night, and I was home by one so really I wasn't even out all that late!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had a busy evening yesterday. And by "busy," I mean that first I went over to a colleague's house and joined in on the food and nonsense. (I brought cheesy garlic mushroom bread, which always goes over pretty well. Actually, when I arrived one of my colleagues yelled at me that I was late--I wasn't, much--and I had better have brought the mushroom bread. Which is kind of flattering considering I am not exactly whatsisname from Hell's Kitchen. I do like idiot-proof recipes!)

And after the food and nonsense I continued downtown to Tribeca for Adam Baldwin and Rob Crowell's show. The links list on the left (say that five times fast) will take you to demos of their material, and going over there to have a listen would be time wisely spent. In fact, go listen now. I'll wait for you.

* waits *

See?

( And since this has gotten long in a hurry, here's the cut. )

It was a really nice evening. And the up side of the relatively short set was, once again I managed to go home early, as these things go, so I am not nearly as wrecked as I deserve to be after being out late on two school nights in a row. Bonus!

According to an update on one of Rob and Adam's pages there's a possibility of more regular gigs in the New Year. I may have to start taking vitamins...

Those with sharp eyes have have noticed that I've updated this list a couple of times in the past few days. I've included links to Adam Baldwin and Rob Crowell's MySpace site, and also to their SoundClick page. It's definitely worth visiting both of those--in fact, since both sites limit the number of songs you can have up at once, and since they have a whole bunch of songs, I'd suggest that if you like their stuff you visit regularly.

At the moment I particularly like "Light At the End of the Tunnel" on the SoundClick page, and "Desperately Dreaming," which I think is on both sites. It'll be very cool to hear how they sound with a full band at Tribeca on December 19th.

No, not me. I've just been directed to a MySpace site for a project by Rob Crowell (formerly of El Torpedo) and Adam Baldwin (of Gloryhound & the Skyhawks.)

There are a bunch of demos up. I don't know if you need a MySpace account to listen to them. Quite often it's not necessary, so do try it. I think the songs are lovely. That's Adam singing.