Volume 13 – #9 – September 2010

MAKE DENTON YOUR DESTINATION. Big things are happening in this town. One faction wants this and another wants that. Power to the people! Unless the people are stupid. Then what? Well, there’s enough discussion about that on TV these days, so my opinion would be, well, just another opinion. But, I do know this. Brave Combo and Wisconsin’s polka darlings Copperbox, featuring Danny Jerabek, will be doing a show together at Dan’s Silverleaf in beautiful, controversial, downtown Denton on Wednesday, October 13. And two hours of the event will be streamed live around the world. This is involving a coordinated effort of lots of folks, so I think we can pull it off. In the best case scenario, it will look great, sound great and start on time. This is about one night, but it’s also about a much bigger picture; the picture of possibility. The world of live music must move into a new dimension because everything is moving into that dimension. If what we’re doing is exciting, we can show you as it happens and perhaps you can even be there in person. But if you live in Ghana or Siberia or New Zealand or Chile you may not have a chance to see us live all that often. But you can watch us stream live and maybe you’ll decide that you must have the BC experience so badly, you’ll make Denton a vacation destination. What if Dan’s in conjunction with other factors starts to regularly live-stream good technical quality concerts around the world? Maybe lots of people will long for the real taste of a beer actually in Dan’s. I’m rambling, but this is drum I’m beating right now. Whatever, our first attempt to reach the moon will be Wednesday, October 13th at 8:00 PM Central Standard Time. Come to Dan’s in person, if you can. But, if you can’t, please tune in. Watch our site for details as they develop. We’ll make this as easy as possible. And, if it doesn’t work we offer no apologies, cause it will work someday and we’re doing this for human survival anyway.

Oh, yeah, and we’re performing in my hometown, Texarkana, Texas, at my old high school, Texas Senior High (Go Tigers!) on Thursday, October 7. I understand this will take place at a brand new 1200-seat performance hall right there on Summerhill Road, around the corner from the house where I grew up, on Kennedy Lane. The Texarkana Police Department now owns our old house, I think. That’s very weird. I hope they don’t decide to take down the paneling in the east bedroom.

THE VOICE CAN’T BE STOPPED. I spend a lot of time in motel rooms late at night surfing TV channels, catching bits and pieces of things I wouldn’t make time for at home; trancing out. One night I stopped briefly on a channel and caught a few seconds of the rerun of that day’s Rachel Ray Show. She cooks food. Anyway, she was throwing some chicken parts onto a skillet or a grill and just said, as a close-up of a thigh filled the screen, that she would be a vegetarian if she had to slaughter her own animals, then I believe I heard her sigh. I was stunned. This was a moment of revelation. I realized that awareness of the fate of factory farm animals is growing. I believe more and more people are swallowing a bitter taste of guilt with each bite of meat, whatever it is, and that many of those people will eventually be unable to ignore the truth any longer. Former President Clinton has announced that, for health reasons, he’s going vegetarian. This is a big deal. He’s choosing sanity because he wants to feel better, and animals will benefit from his announcement. The man still has a lot of influence. I saw things and knew things, as a kid, that bothered me, but I thought I would mature and outgrow those unmanly, soft-hearted feelings. Apparently, I didn’t outgrow the feelings. They intensified and continue to do so. Now the whole world is starting to understand that it takes 1000 gallons of fresh water to make a pound of beef. It takes about 25-50 gallons to make a pound of vegetables. I have said it before, good friends, and I’ll say it again! Today’s meat eaters are tomorrow’s smokers, meaning that being a human carnivore could become socially and politically incorrect in an enlightened society. It’s unhealthy, environmentally damaging and unspeakably cruel. A cow is a dog is a cat is a pig is a hamster is a monkey. You know, I’m not surprised that Rachel Ray couldn’t kill a chicken and I’m pretty sure it’s not just because it would be gross.

BAD NEWS/GOOD NEWS JOKES. I’ve invented a new kind of joke. It’s called a bad news/good news joke and goes like this.

Mailman: Hey, did you hear the bad news?
Pedestrian: No, what?
Mailman: I bought some cookies at 7-11 this morning and they were old.

Housewife: Hey, did you hear the good news?
Complete stranger: No, what?
Housewife: My aunt’s doing fine. It was just a pencil eraser.

POLKA THROUGH THE AGES. Okay I will now continue my year-by-year overview. We’ve covered 1979 -1999. Here comes the new millennium.
2000
POLKASONIC wins Grammy in February.
Tour Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany, including an alternative polka fest in Berlin in July.
Brave Combo appears on Jerry Lewis Telethon in Los Angeles with Jerry and Ed McMahon.
Paul Stivitts replaces Alan Emert on drums.
Headline Click and Clack’s Halloween Spectacular in Boston.
2001
Release ALL WOUND UP on Rounder (children’s album with Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer).
Release KICK ASS POLKAS on September 11.
Both new releases receive Grammy nominations, in two different categories.
2002
The entertainment world reels from the events of 2001. Everything slows down and pulls back. Brave Combo keeps a lower profile than usual.
2003
Release BOX OF GHOSTS on Rounder
Meet Lady Bird Johnson at performance at her Wildflower Center, in Austin.
Alan Emert returns to the drum throne.
Perform at Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
Record the song “Happy Birthday” with the Japanese band, Shonen Knife.
2004
Brave Combo appears on THE SIMPSONS on March 21. Episode is called Co-Dependents Day.
Record and release LET’S KISS on Dentone Records
Record tracks for HOLIDAYS throughout the year at TM Century in Dallas.
Perform at Canmore Folk Festival in outside Calgary, British Columbia, Canada in August.
LET’S KISS is nominated for a Grammy.
2005
Brave Combo wins a second Grammy for LET’S KISS.
Release HOLIDAYS on both Rounder and Dentone Records.

Okay. That gets us through 2004 and up to our Grammy win in February, 2005. Despite the hit we all took on September 11, 2001, we continued to play like crazy throughout the first part of the new century. I’ll wrap this up next month, I promise.

So, polka season marches on. Please check our itinerary often. Dates are added weekly. So, until we meet again, keep a song in your head that plays over and over and over. Peace, bro!