It feels like we’re living in the first 30 minutes of a bad 1970s end-of-time disaster movie, right about the time everyone is figuring out that something very bad is happening. You know, a stupid, sideshow barking wanna-be dictator has a grip on a hostage nation, a deadly disease for which there is no medical cure is circling the globe, the stock market is tanking, and, of course, there’s global warming. Starring Burt Reynolds, Dom Deloise, Rip Tayor and Angie Dickinson. The part of the wanna-be dictator is being played by Tor Johnson. If you’re younger than 45 you might need to Google some of these names, especially Tor Johnson. When I was a kid, I bought many, many, many monster movie magazines. I still have most of them. One movie, featured occasionally, was THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS. It starred Tor Johnson as a Soviet (Russian) scientist who had some secrets, and he was defecting to the USA. Anyway, he was being followed by the KGB, and Tor, while avoiding his pursuers, stumbled right into an area where atomic bombs were being tested. Poor Tor. He got a big ol’ dose of radiation and became the beast. He couldn’t run very fast, though (large and out of shape), so he never seemed like much of a threat to me, but he somehow found a scantily-clad woman to carry around, monster-style. Many film buffs consider this to be one of the worst movies ever made. You should go to your neighborhood Blockbuster Video store and rent a VHS copy for your next family movie night. Anyway, back to the real-life disaster movie we are all seeing unfold daily. Seriously, it’s also not well-written and full of clichés. Is this the best we can do? Our 2020 disaster reality movie is not any better than THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS? Now THIS is depressing! As a species, we’re a pretty big mess right now. Everyone is all nervous and jittery and we don’t know who to trust. The unknown is scary. It always is. But it’s also potentially exciting and full of possibilities. Nothing will ever be settled, so you can choose fear or not fear. You can choose hate or love. You can choose empathy or self-centeredness. You can give or take. You can also shrink-wrap yourself, move to a remote part of the country and stockpile guns and delicious survival food. Geographically, most of the country is remote, so finding isolation should be pretty easy. Man, this has to be a great time for all the doomsday preppers around the world. “Finally,” they sigh, collectively!

THE BRIGHT SIDE. If civilization lasts, we are piling lots of gigs into this crazy year. Just get some nice-looking designer face masks and come on out. Our music will address the needs of the moment. Brave Combo has always tried to provide a unique perspective; an alternative viewpoint. And we’ll continue to do that. Check our itinerary often. Dates are being added weekly.

The new album is finished! This is great news for Eric, our recording engineer. I’m sure he’s enjoyed as much of it as he can stand. But that just lets you know how finely we have crafted this release. Of course, there is still much to do. The album needs a title. The jacket isn’t finished. The CDs have to be manufactured. The videos are only about 1/3 finished. But the music is mixed and mastered and ready to be presented. Overall, it’s a somewhat different sound for Brave Combo. One might call it Brave NEW Combo, as we have been mistakenly called, on occasion, for decades. You know, Aldous Huxley’s novel, BRAVE NEW WORLD? People have sworn to us that Brave New Combo was the name of the band in the beginning, because they were there. Whatever, it might be appropriate now. The band officially turns 41 in a couple of months, so we can call ourselves anything we want. Get out of our way, whippersnappers!

In the early days of Brave Combo, we played all up and down Dallas’ Lower Greenville Avenue. We regularly rocked Nick’s Uptown at one end and Tango at the other, eventually settling into a more rootsy vibe at Poor David’s Pub. But one night we started to notice the crowds dropping off, dramatically. It was happening up and down Lower Greenville. The scene was moving to Deep Ellum in downtown Dallas, so we had to move, too. Our home club soon became Club Dada, where we performed for years. We loved it and had some of our most amazing moments at that club. Everything was super exciting. Deep Ellum was just starting to get noticed by the general public, but the cool cats were already there making it happen. One of the coolest cats I ever knew was the doorman at Dada, John “Beard” Brewer. I spent lots of time talking music, musicians and musical instruments with the guy and always dug it. Beard was the ultimate supporter and very protective of his musician friends. I never thought of him as a bouncer, although I did see some crazy stuff go down at the club a few times. To me he was the club’s greeter; the calming maître d. He had a gentle raspy voice. I can easily hear him in my head telling me some obscure fact about my Telecaster (guitar). Beard died recently, at 67 years old.
He was cremated and had his ashes scattered over his cats’ graves at a pet cemetery. Now THAT’S my kind of guy. RIP peace, Beard!

Okay, I gotta go stock up on a bunch of canned goods I’ll never eat. Have an exciting, nail-biting month. I like it when one of my cats stops cleaning itself but doesn’t pull its tongue back in all the way, then looks around, with it partially out, acting like everything’s normal. If you’ve seen this, you’ll know what I mean. If not, go adopt a cat. Or a dog. Dogs do it, too. Whatever you do next, good luck! You will probably need it. POLKA ON!

Here we are, you and me, well into 2020. I have heard almost no references to this being the year of good vision, you know, “20-20.” I thought advertisers would be all over it. Seems like a perfect promo angle for selling stuff. Maybe I’m just not looking in the right places. I never see Facebook unless someone shows me a cat video, so, perhaps I’m just clueless. That’s okay. I’m used to feeling clueless about many things. But I’m learning all the time, too. Did you know that Hitler took the Nazi salute from Mussolini, who started using it ten years before Hitler did? Mussolini got it from some images depicting soldiers in ancient Rome. One painting in particular, THE OATH OF HORATII from around 1780, by Renaissance artist, Jacques-Louis David, depicts three Roman soldiers extending their arms and pointing their hands. And the Italian Fascists (a term Mussolini made up, referring to a staff from ancient Rome) got all worked up about restoring the glory of the Roman empire to modern Italy, saw images like that painting and adopted the salute. At the time, it was commonly called the Roman salute. I did not know this just a short time ago. Mussolini wanted to “MAKE ITALY GREAT AGAIN” and duped a good hunk of his fellow countrymen into believing the rest of the world was laughing at them, seeing Italians as mandolin players and spaghetti eaters, certainly not warriors. So, of course, as any good dictator or wanna-be dictator does, he closed the borders, convinced his followers to hate immigrants, destroyed the free press and declared himself the only one who could save Italy and its dwindling glory. It’s comforting to know this is just history and that no one can imagine something like that happening again. Besides, that was on the other side of the world. It could never happen here, in the United States of America, especially in the “year of good vision.” Our Constitution is all about the balance of power to protect the American people from such a thing, right? That’s what makes us different and, actually, great, right? The balance of power thing? Good. I feel better now.

Whatever, as I said earlier, here we are, even further into 2020 than when I first pointed that out a paragraph ago. And there’s nothing we can do about it. Where it goes, we all go. That’s not a bad thing. It just is what it is. Que Sera Sera! But it’s also good to think ahead and be prepared for the possible tsunami of shit headed our way. And in your frightened frenzy don’t forget about music. Music goes well with anything. Even panic attacks. The next time you worry about the world coming to an end, listen to “The Magnetic Rag” by Scott Joplin. It’s a marvelous composition and if you play it loud enough, it should enhance your anxiety plenty. You know, as a soundtrack to your misery. Ragtime is hard to ignore, especially when it’s really loud. It’s the music of saloon shootouts. Scott Joplin grew up in my hometown, Texarkana, and played piano in shady places, but composed some ridiculously amazing music. Check this out.

Speaking of music, I have a band called Brave Combo and we have a bunch of brand-new tracks ready to unleash, I mean, release. Overall, the sound is unlike any Brave Combo album before it. The songs are insanely catchy.…to me, at least. But I also think you will really dig it. We have been making videos for most of the tracks, as well. It’s a YouTube world. First there was MTV and 24/7 music videos, about the time Brave Combo started. Then one thing led to another and now we can all make our own videos and anyone can be a star, just like Andy Warhol predicted. Exactly as he predicted! Any ideas about what might happen next? I think we are a species experiencing radical change, forced on us by ourselves. Pandora’s Box is wide open, and we can’t close it because we don’t want it closed. So, we either go with the flow or move to a remote part of the desert, if we can find it. I love the desert. Denton is where the North Texas desert begins. Trees start thinning out quickly as you head west. I breathe easier in the desert. But I don’t want to live in an isolated part of any desert and never see anyone and have to drive a couple of hours to find a hospital or get my accordions fixed. That would be a tough existence, day in, day out. Not for me. Plus, I like rain, too. So, I gotta go with the flow if I don’t want to totally exclude myself from everything else. Hence, the new recordings. We must still have some degree of hope that there will be a future, or we wouldn’t have gone to the trouble (and expense) to record yet another Brave Combo album of fabulous music. Good news for modern man. Congratulations to all of humanity!

It’s an honor to be honored. I write often about my relationship with my animals and I share that joy and responsibility with my wife, Jane. The two of us have snagged our a whole bunch of cats and dogs from bad situations over the years, but things have really picked up since the middle of 2018. Tending to this side of our lives is often the main thing we do. It’s a lot of work, and sometimes heartbreaking, but if we see an animal in need we can’t turn away. It’s a serious affliction and we both have it, but the rewards are worth the trouble. Nothing feels better than saving a creature’s life and changing it for the better. And by creature, I mean animal and human, since we’re all the same. Anyway, Jane and I are among a group of honorees to be recognized by the Denton Animal Support Foundation at the annual Sherman Appreciation Awards in February. This means a lot to both of us, but we’re just doing what we can’t control. For us, it’s a lot easier to just save a cat, and go to all of that damn trouble, than to worry about it being eaten by a coyote or freezing to death. I’m better at doing than worrying. I still think about dogs from 20-30 years ago which I tried to save, while touring, but wasn’t able to. That all stays with me. It kinda sucks, in a way. But, what’s the point of being here, taking up room on the planet, otherwise. At least that’s how Jane and I see it, even if our house is a rather challenging environment. Believe it or not, we don’t really enjoy cleaning litter boxes all day long.

Brave Combo is still on vacation from gigs but things will start revving up sooner than you think. Please check out the itinerary often. New performance dates will be added weekly. In the meantime, keep the faith, Baby, and hold your head up. Even when you’re lying down. It’s a good stretching exercise.