Far West Conference - Opening Concert - Thursday 10/21/2010

Down at the Santa Clara Convention Center on a Thursday evening. A ways to go for a weeknight show but I had an early work shift anyway - so managable. And it was a way to get a taste of the conference without actually being able to go. I decided that I couldn't spare the money to attend this year, even though I'd had a memorably good time when it was held in Sacramento a few years ago. And even though we'd just recently seen a full concert by Houston Jones, I knew that Jeff was interested in seeing Blame Sally perform live.

The cost: $10 bucks - the line-up: Blame Sally, Houston Jones, Kathy & Carol, Caren Armstrong and Stevie Coyle. Such a deal. Over early supper at home I noticed that the show was supposed to start at 6:30pm - oh no! But we got there in time, enjoying the benefit of the carpool lanes on 880.

I expected that attending just this show instead of the whole conference would be something like lurking in a chat room and that everyone around you would be there for the schmooze and not me. But of course I saw a few friends from CCMC right off - Melissa Dinwiddie sporting her one crutch "look," Midyne Spear, Nancy Cassidy who was helping with the event organization this year, and some friends of theirs. We ran into Toby Roodman who remembers "all" my names even though I haven't seen him for some time - that was nice. Talked to Tim of the Freight, Jeff got the Giants' final score from drummer Peter Tucker just before they went on and Chris Kee also gave us the nod of recognition. Chatted a moment with Caren Armstrong who remembered me and got nice smiling hugs from Stevie Coyle. The unexpected schmooze op was sitting next to a couple of KVMR djs for the show. They were friendly and really started getting chatty by the time Kathy & Carol came up. They liked their "old school" folk sounds - maybe too these women were more in their age range than Blame Sally and their modern rock looks and energies. So I jotted down Carol McComb's name and their band's name, and my name on my CCMC business card for both of them. And I got the invitation to send them my own CD for station consideration. Actually that was quite nice, I'm not sure I ever got to KVMR during the heyday of my Folk DJ-list hobby.

The show: our favorite of Caren Armstrong's three songs was the one she wrote on commission for a biker's big birthday and we got the chance to tell her so. It was interesting to see that she now has an upright bassist playing with her - think his name is Josh Zucker - he's quite good and sings harmonies as a bonus. I think its a good move for her.

Blame Sally - this was the new-to-him act for Jeff to see. We enjoyed their set a lot, overall. Whats really cool about these guys is how orchestrated they are - someone among them (or all of them?) has a flare for producing and arranging material in an interesting way. In a way, I like seeing how the put together the sounds in person better than I like the songs. Does that observation sound weird? Its when the guitar doubles as a percussion instrument during a moment when everything drops to just 4 women singing + all on percussion. Or when you see in person that the main percussionist/drummer is actually doing powerful lead or backup vocals at the same time as keeping the beat. In fact, Pam Delgado is kind of the "one to watch" in this band IMHO, along with guitarist/mandolinist Jeri Jones. And now they have a very able guy bassist who played a 6-string electric bass. So too bad for us to have an amp the corner of the stage blocking our view of the bassist and Pam's percussion kit. The amazing thing is how much she gets out of such small "drums."

More to come....