Volume 4 – #2 – February 2001

Hey, fellow humans, we are so off course. Happily, off course, maybe. But who am I to say? I make perfect sense to some people and look like a frivolous waste of time to others. I guess that’s okay. There are so many people anyway that finding like-minded spirits shouldn’t be too hard. That’s why it’s cool to say what you think. Someone will agree with you. And if you find that you don’t like that someone, you might consider changing your opinion. Or better yet, you might decide to try having no opinion for a change. You get power from having no opinion. All options are open to you. You don’t limit your choices. You know, like, Thai noodles with spaghetti and jelly beans, slow-cooked in a crock pot all day, served with some stuff you found under the refrigerator. Don’t call it delicious. Don’t call it anything. Just accept it and experience the essence of it. I’m sorry. Those last few sentences may have been a frivolous waste of time. But see, I’m not a chef. I’ll leave that up to those who intuitively know how long to cook brussel sprouts and how much salt to use. I guess music is my thing. I play music for several reasons. But, mainly, because it feels good. Sometimes it feels really good and on the best nights it feels like nothing; a glorious, euphoric nothing. At times I like to bury myself in the volume and intensity and just roll and tumble with it. Usually I can feel when the audience is in tune with the band’s energy. Not just enjoying the sound of the music, but actually sensing that thread of connection. We’re all at a pretty primitive level with this, but it seems real enough.

We are having a hard time keeping ALL WOUND UP (new “family” album) in stock. The news from Rounder is that it’s popular right now and is selling very well. This is good news for sure, but we do apologize if we don’t have copies at all of our shows.

We’re wrapping up work on the new live recording. This started out as a simple documentation of an interesting event (Brave Combo at The Croatian Hall in Cleveland, Ohio) and has grown into a full-blown album. Tracks include, “Wooden Heart,” “Violins Play For Me,” “Kenny Bass Medley” and “Mickey Mouse Polka.”

There’s a new movie out, called Hannibal, about a man who climbs mountains with elephants and has to eat portions of his own body to survive. There’s a particularly touching scene where he rides into a village on the other side of the mountain, fingerless and noseless, but happy. From this experience he acquires a taste for human flesh and eventually opens a deli, catering to cannibals. Unfortunately his nose wound never quite heals and stuff is always oozing out of his face onto the patron’s food. The health department has to close down the deli, so Hannibal kills himself. No, wait, I mean he joins a “CD of the month” club and regrets it. The climax of the movie is when he successfully lands an elephant on the runaway asteroid. It stars Jimmy Walker, Delta Burke and Anthony Hopkins.

Speaking of exciting movie stars, did you know that when I was a kid I had a serious crush, as did many of my contemporaries, on Hayley Mills. Oh, I loved her so much. That British accent was just too much for a Texarkana boy. I used to write her letters. One time I wrote to her and got a huge picture of Walt Disney in the mail. I remember having a dream that Hayley and I were hanging out together and I had money just pouring out of my pockets. That’s probably why she was with me. I had posters of her all over my room. I still have a bunch of teen magazines with articles about her and her (boo, hiss) love life. It truly hurt to imagine that she might be dating someone. I hoped that somehow, magically, she would wait for me, even though she was about six years older. I figured that would be a problem. You know what? She never knew I existed. And I hardly think about her at all anymore. I guess we’ll just be like ships, not even close to passing in the night. Actually, she was a ship and I was an air mattress. Or something like, she was an upscale men’s clothing store in Denver and I was a piece of aluminum foil wrapped around the tip of some rabbit ear antennae at my hillbilly aunt’s house. Who knows? Maybe I’ll get to meet her someday and tell her something she’s heard a million times. What a thrill that will be for her.

More true “brush with greatness” stories:
1. I used to see Don Henley’s band, The Four Speeds, play in the record section of a department store in Texarkana about once a month when I was in junior high school. I talked to him a few times, but he wasn’t very friendly.
2. About fifteen years ago I went to see Lou Christie (“Lightning Strikes”) perform. He was part of some washed-up rock and roller review, but I really liked his music, so I didn’t care. Anyway, I approached him after his show and asked if he would sign my albums. He quickly invited me backstage, to his dressing room. When we got into the room he did something that made me uncomfortable and I left immediately. I don’t know. Maybe I misread his intentions, but I didn’t stay long enough to find out or get my albums signed.
3. Boz Scaggs came over to my house once to listen to Latin music. A mutual friend suggested that he give me a call and come over.
4. Around the same time I started working on the movie, TRUE STORIES and David Bryne came to Denton and I took him to local church that had a great gospel choir.
5. John Goodman, Bruce Willis and Weird Al Yankovic came out to one of out first shows in Los Angeles.
6. Julie Newmar (Catwoman) and I hit it off at a party one night. She’s much older than I am, but also much taller and more beautiful.
7. Some friends threw a group birthday party for me and a couple of other people in Austin once and Todd Rundgren showed up with a girl I knew. We were all singing “Happy Birthday” at one point and he said something humorously derogatory about my voice. He seemed uncomfortable the whole night. I really liked his music in those days.
8. After a show in Los Angeles a couple of years ago, Robbie Benson and his wife, Carla Devito came out to discuss the possibilities of Brave Combo working with Carla. She was the girl in the Meatloaf video, “Paradise By The Dashboard Lights.”
9. We did an album with Tiny Tim once.
10. Kurt Loder invited me to the ROLLING STONE office when he worked there and I met Bill Murray in the elevator.
11. John and Bo Derek were eating lunch at Mazatlan restaurant in Denton one rainy Wednesday afternoon about ten years ago. I introduced myself to them and congratulated them on their success. They were cordial.
12. One time Matt Groening invited us to his house for lunch and POLKATHARSIS was on the CD player in his exercise room.

Okay, this is starting to sound like cheap bragging. I’ll continue in a later newsletter when I’m feeling a little shameless. Have you ever noticed that almost everyone likes to tell stories and almost no one really likes to hear them? You may think the coolest thing has happened to you and you can’t wait to tell your friends. But, you know what? They’re just waiting for their turn to talk. This, of course, doesn’t apply if you have some scandalous gossip to share; another sad fact about the nature of humanity. Maybe we should all shut up for a while. I’ll go first.