(Charisse Sciuva offers another advance view of the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend July 30 and 31 at Lestat’s Coffee House and Bar Pink, respectively.)
Monday night, Lestat’s-goers were awestruck by the appearance of Thomas E. Ward, who will be kicking off the Che Underground show this weekend. Ward took the stage with his 12-string Guild and pounded out “She’s Not Just Anybody” with vocals to match.
While most sit back casually and drone out their love songs, Ward stood tall over the audience as he sang, a rock-‘n’-roll bassist back from New York City, grounded once again in San Diego. All eyes were glued on this fresh and crisp performer, waiting for what he would deliver next.
“Thoughts and Words” deepened the connection. The appreciation was unanimous, from seasoned veterans to the musically inept. While Ward gave us only a taste of his vast talent, the Friday night opener promises satisfaction and renewal.
Read the saga of Tom Ward and the Nashville Ramblers!
A DaveFest 2 rendition of “What Goes On” opened the next set, featuring Dave Fleminger, Dave Rinck and Kinch Degrate. Rinck’s vocals carried the classic tune, accented by Kinch on keyboards, and featured a tender and delicate Fleminesque guitar solo. The second number, “High Society,” beautifully outlined by
Kinch’s sensitive, rich trumpet playing and highlighted by an exquisite solo, reflects the identity of San Diego youth in the music scene years ago. Dedicated to “growing up in San Diego and being in the shadow of our overlords of Los Angeles who we resent very much,” Rinck fades into song.
The audience is unaware that these San Diego youths didn’t have places like Lestat’s to flesh out their creativity.
On the corner, a tall and skinny, pale-skinned youngster with a slight southern drawl pulls up, extends a hand to Dave Fleminger, “I just want to tell you … I needed to tell you … You’re the best guitar picker I ever seen.” Fleminger nods in thanks and returns the compliment. This kid, just arrived from Alabama weeks ago, timidly showcased his stuff last week. Alone, along banjo-like accompaniment, he tells the tale of moonshine, with a natural off-beat tempo, which lapses into commentary. “This is a big city,” he
pauses, “Down there we play on porches.” Fleminger welcomes him to San Diego.
Get your flyers for the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend!
The musical expression and life experience converging at the sidewalk café on Adams & Felton is a gift to the community you won’t want to miss when the Che Underground Rock-‘n’-Roll Weekend begins Friday 9pm at Lestat’s.
— Charisse Sciuva
I’m looking forward to the show. Glad to be the opener; less pressure that way….
What a glowing review! Thanks, I hope I can live up to it. I’ll be doing maybe seven-eight-or-nine songs on friday night, a short set and then out of the way for the other acts. They may not (or only nominally) be punk rock, but none of them is much over two minutes long. “Thoughts And Words” is something by the Byrds from 1967, the other tune I sang is by the Dovers, a Ventura County act also associated with the twelve-string guitar thing.
Then again, Dylan Rogers just branded me a ‘garage punk folk singer’ on Facebook. It’s true I know songs by The Bad Seeds, the Choir, and the 13th Floor Elevators…as well as Fred Neil….
Corduroy: it’s of the king, you know! But it’s not just for kings any more.
I can’t do that particular “…Burned” at the drop of a hat, but I do know “Burned” by the Buffalo Springfield. Will that do for now?
“That’s the bag I’m in” is both one of my favorite folk songs and one of my favorite garage tunes as well,so I think the ‘garage punk folk singer’ thing works pretty well.I’d love to hear you do some Fred Neil,but my choice would be “Blues on the ceiling”,also done by a group known for garage punk,the Bintangs.See you tomorrow!
Tom,
Welcome back, period. I haven’t had a chance to see you since you’ve been back to Southern California, but I sure remember those days playing in your folks converted shed. You wrote your first song, with the line “My friends are saying I should fall for you” about all I can remember. Anyway, I’m glad to see you out and about playing guitar (nice twelve-string by the way!) Both your musical taste and talent is impeccable, so I’m sure you’re a great act. Sounds like the covers you’ve chosen are the very same ones I’d pick if I could play the guitar worth a damn! Best wishes for a great show Friday.
Nicely done, Tom! Always a pleasure to see you.
Thanks for those words, Ray, glad to be back, and Bobby--you got me pegged pretty nicely with Fred Neil--I admire him much and can perform at least two of his songs (they’re in the main queue of songs I practice)--“Dolphins” and “Everybody’s Talkin'” (much prefer Fred’s vocal on the original to Nilsson’s more playful hit cover version). “Blues On The Ceiling” was on a record we had around the family home somehow when was a kid--the Elektra “Folksong ’65” record which was also where I first heard the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. It also had Dick Rosmini’s version of “900 Miles” which is instrumental only and features a knockout 12-string guitar. That was my favorite thing on that record.
Chris Mathes had nice words after the show, said he felt like he was in Newport while I was playing. I took it for a very generous compliment, although he momentarily confused me because actually he said “Newport Beach.” Chris--thank you! And Newport, Rhode Island IS a beach town. I just had to make a mental leap.
Thank you, Matt! And Tony. It’s good to be singing, though daunting to be alone up there. Awkward start, a little. But it’s good for me to go through it. Somebody said that song by song, it was getting smoother as it went. I felt that way, too.When playing bass, I have no stagefright whatsoever. But kicking off a show as a solo performer, with the feel of the night and the room still unformed, requires a kind of self-possession that I am still acquiring….
I guess that I could also mention here that I’ve formed a trio to try to perform some vintage R&B, a little early rock & roll and maybe even some welterweight jazz…we hope to have some horn players and keyboardists sit in, too, so it might be more than a trio soon. Dave Klowden is on drums, and Jon Erickson is on guitar; I get to play my more familiar instrument, the bass guitar, and I’m singing. Our debut may be at the Riviera on University Avenue on AUgust 13th. We’re using the name “The Fairmounts.” The material is more in a Sam Cooke, Don Covay, Ray Charles, Alvin Robinson kind of moded, also a little Chicago-style blues and some unexpected things like an Althea Spencer two-chord jam (“Take Me Baby’) and the Baby Washington / Timi Yuro soul ballad “It’ll Never Be Over For Me” (also recorded by Thee Midniters). I think, given who I am, this pretty much qualifies as “experimental music.” Well, I am no soul shouter, but I hope to get by, and at least, this time out, I’ve got some back-up. It’s great to work with Dave Klowden again (we worked in this field backing Romy Kaye years ago), and Jon Erickson is a very capable guitarist with a great flavor for what we hope will be a dance band with feeling. Anyway, unless you hear otherwise, it’s “The Fairmounts.”
with the feel of the night
and the room still unformed…
look forward to hearing
your compositions
although i must say
on a personal note
when you ended with burned
by neil young
it was a moment that ive waited for
for years
thanks
you were great Tom, The Bad Seeds tune was haunting. Dig.
About this “Fairmounts” thing (with Dave Klowden on drums), it is definitely on. We’re booked for this coming friday the 13th of August (2010) at the Riviera (7777 University Ave., in La Mesa). We’ll be playing two sets’ worth of rhythm & blues and soul numbers by the likes of Alvin Robinson, Major Lance, Roscoe Gordon, James & Bobby Purify, Freddy King, Irma Thomas, Kenny Burrell, Don Covay, Slim Harpo, and Eddie Bo.
Matt, any idea how I might publicize this event within the list, beyond posting it right here, as I’ve done?
I might mention the guitarist on the gig is Jon Erickson, a founding member of Ron Silva & the Monarchs (1993 -- ’95) in the San Francisco Bay Area. He married a San Diego girl (Jane Battle), and together they run Jayne’s Gastropub, which is brightening up the 30th St. corridor, just off Adams Avenue.
The band is a trio at its’ core, but will be augmented with some saxophone--possibly a lot of saxophone--at the debut this friday night.
Dylan R., thanks for those kind words above!
Postscript: start time is nine o’clock at the Riviera (Tim Mays’s other joint after the Casbah)--and the music will wind-up by eleven-thirty or midnight; but it’s just us, no other band on the bill: The Fairmounts.
Here’s the flyer for the Fairmounts’ debut:
>>Matt, any idea how I might publicize this event within the list, beyond posting it right here, as I’ve done?
Tom: Since I’m sitting out in the Michigan woods, my ability to craft posts is limited this week … Can we get photos/video/audio from the gig and a description? E-mail it to me, please, so I can share it with our readers!
God, this sounds like a great gig. Sure wish I was on the West Coast!! Play NY or Boston!!!
Thanks, Bruce! And Matt, thanks for posting our poster. I hope you will enjoy our questionable (i.e. illegitimate) use of quotation marks, and so on. Needed a little pizazz. Also please be bemused that we are “sensations” and have not yet played a single gig! Of course, a little hyperbole always plays well on the street. Ha.
Michigan woods, Matthew? Upper Peninsula?? I’m glad you have an internet connection. I’m picturing a canvas tent; maybe a mule train picketed nearby. Or perhaps it’s a cabin by a lake; are you fishing?
Dave Rinck says he may try to get some video. And it looks as if some people will be starting out the evening at the Riviera with the Fairmounts, and winding up just down the road at the Tower Bar, where the newer incarnation of the Morlocks will be playing a set at an event run by international DJ and personality Tony the Tyger (Tony Sanchez). I’m glad the two events are so reasonably close together; both are on University, although it’s thirty blocks between them--a bit further than Studio 517 and Greenwich Village West! The Riviera Supper Club is 7777 University in La Mesa, while the Tower Bar is 4757 University in San Diego’s City Heights neighborhood.
Go see the Fairmounts, San Diego!