I know, I know, but we have to call it something.

I was having the usual midweek ZoukFest freak-out. All that exposure to transcendental musicianship, wow! Or oy… On the one hand it was like swallowing holy razor blades, while on the other hand, the antidote for same. At first I started auguring in, like a fighter pilot in a spin — it wasn’t just the overwhelming musical talent, but all my friends were educated and erudite, too. I always thought I was, but somewhere along the line I gave up books for mapping my inner potholes — not that I ever had a choice in that, as I’d blown out all my tires and was riding on the rims. This exploration takes a lot of time, however, which is why my wife sometimes complains there isn’t any room for her. Books would sure be easier on the lady, I have to say.

Anyway, there I was, ready once again to send my parents’ wretched souls to everlasting burning hell for being so damned scared and useless and teaching me to fold. The way this thing isn’t supposed to turn out is that I think about my life at 62 and wonder if it’s all for shit: whom did I help, how did I make a difference, what did I have to show for it all? I could’ve been a Michelanglo, but everything is all fucked up, I’m getting old, and of course it’s someone else’s fault. It always is, except it’s NOT!

Jam session winding down (?) at 4:30 a.m.

And then the transcendental musicianship began to earn its name. The razor blades dissolved and went down easily. A giant relaxation seemed slowly to enfold me. I realized that maybe the purpose of this life for me wasn’t to paint or write a masterpiece but just to be okay. To HEAL myself, forgodssakes, to touch the flaming love of All There Is while the memories fall away. When this doesn’t get passed down with your DNA, when you don’t get zapped upside the heart with holy mojo goodness ’cause your mommy and your daddy love you more than life itself, then you have to find it on your own or take up ugly habits. What happened to me on Wednesday night was I felt like I was off the hook: if all I did from there on out was tell people how much I loved them (when I felt it), that was plenty. For me, I mean. The karmic debt was so enormous, paying it down was ring-the-bells HUGE. In other words, being happy was enough.

This was revolutionary. My God, what if everybody felt this way? The music moved me and I told the performers that it had. I walked up to others that I hardly knew and shared a friendly thought. Before I knew it, people were saying nice things about me as well. I emailed my wife to ask if this was how it was among the sane, and she said “YES!!!”

Yeah, yeah. I came home three days later, had a fit, and wrecked the car, so what.

I remember the last time I climbed a mountain, don’t I?

Just a heads-up that FotoFeed’s been updated. I have so many good ZoukFest pictures, I may run these for a while longer.

First of all, I’m here by myself. My wife decided a few days before ZoukFest started that what she’d like most in the world, even more than the fantastic music and hanging out with friends, was a whole week to herself. Honesty is everything, so I knew she meant it. I figure it’s an earth goddess kind of thing, too. No way I would ever mess with that.

Hands of Chipper Thompson and Chris Smith

There are advantages to doing this solo, or at least it seemed that way at first. I have my dorm room set up the way I want it, with my own stuff on both beds and desks. I need the space, too, because I brought everything I could think of in a crazed lust to be prepared. Almost everything I hauled up to my second-floor room will sit unpacked for the duration, naturally. One of the chairs had a nearly-broken back, which I discovered when it nearly did me in. One of the window blinds didn’t work either, so I just took it down and stacked it next to the suicide chair. There are few other advantages to having the room all to myself, like leaving the tequila bottle on the sink. I’ve also kept the blinds and windows wide open day and night, as if I’m camping.

Ah, dorm life… I’d say it’s amazing the way it all comes back, but maybe it just never went away. Very nice facilities, actually, though each sex shares a bathroom. I’ve also discovered that closing my eyes and putting my fingers in my ears can be gloriously liberating, so watch out. (It’s kill or be killed in there.)

There ought to be some mention of music in this narrative, but I’m still fixating on things like a half-eaten Mounds bar sitting on the desk beside me. What can I say, I was desperate for a snack on Sunday night and the machine downstairs gave me two when I punched the button. I still have another one.

Stanley Greenthal (Wednesday night)

Actually, I’m not very good at this. I just opened a can of jalapeño cheddar dip and realized I don’t have a refrigerator. How much of that can one man eat?!? I could give it to the party down the hall, but it might give them sustenance. Hell, I should’ve shared it with my gang.

Dang. Now I’ll have to go out and get another one, in case they look at the blog.

Here we go again: I’ve posted a series of photos from ZoukFest 2008, which starts just after another funny animal picture here.

There’s a lot going on at ZoukFest. Yours truly is taking a Cajun Ensemble class, audio to be posted soon. Expect more ZoukFest photos all this week at FotoFeed!

Well, it’s only taken a whole year, but I’m finally mostly done with a new website for a very talented musician, Stanley Greenthal of Seattle, Washington. You can see it in all its nearly-completed glory at StanleyGreenthal.com, of course.

Stanley counts a couple of excellent professional photographers among his friends, and I’ve used as many of their shots as I could in designing the site. Be sure to visit the Gallery of Strings & Drums to see what a hand-coded photo gallery looks like. I know, I’m a glutton for punishment. But the results blend in perfectly with the rest of the site, something a prepackaged gallery can rarely accomplish.

In the future, however, the galleries will be automated! ‘Nuff said…

I think I found my club or something.

My wife and I are going to ZoukFest next week, because I’m the Webmaster and everything is free, and because it’s cool. Last year’s ZoukFest World Music Camp at the College of Santa Fe was the best one yet, and this year’s should be even better. They’ve branched out from strictly Celtic and Middle Eastern to include a lot more musical styles this time, and I’m taking two classes: Cajun Ensemble and Jump-Start Bouzouki. The bouzouki class will tell me all I’ve ever wanted to know about my G.D. Armstrong resophonic bouzouki, which up till now I’ve only played in open GDGD tuning. That’s probably the best sound in the world, anyway. And then there’s the Cajun Ensemble class. I’m really getting excited.

We’re going to form a traditional Cajun dance band for a week. I’ve been listening to recordings of Cajun music from the 1920s and playing along on my Guild 12-string and the bouzouki. Sure, I heard Cajun music all the time back in Texas. It was always in the background somewhere, at least from Austin east, and I always loved the passion and the sound, for all the little I knew or understood about it. But I never really played any Cajun-style music, which makes sense, because unless you play an accordion, you can’t create that sound all by yourself. That’s what’s so cool about the class, that I’ll finally get to be in a group. The instructor, Doug Goodhart, is extremely versatile and a killer musician. It’s going to be an interesting ride.

The amazing thing is, I’m going to have some fun. I already play the guitar, etc. in my crazy self-taught way, I’m as musical as laziness allows, and these guys play just TWO CHORDS, mostly in the keys of C and D. Two chords! I’ve listened to some of the early recordings. They sound like accordion punk, just a bunch of guys with squeezeboxes, whooping and hollering and whumping along on TWO CHORDS!!! Well, sometimes three, but rarely. Being an intergalactic master of two-chord guitar, I’ll be in heaven. I’ll be able to relax, let go and cut loose.

Two chords! And I know right where they belong.

Oh man, Bo Diddley died today, and I’m sitting here with tears running down my face. What joy that man brought into this world. I finally got to hear him play in Santa Fe, back in January of ‘04, and wrote about it in one of my old GRACK! columns that I later developed into a full-length article for Horse Fly. What follows is that longer piece, by way of tribute.

Here’s to you, Bo: may you keep on rockin’ through those pearly gates…

Bad Seed Blessing
by John H. Farr

Bo Diddley at the Lensic?

I was broke and might die tomorrow, but no way was St. Peter gonna wave me through that gate if I didn’t grab a credit card and go: “You say you passed up your last chance to see Bo Diddley in person? GIT ON OUTA HERE!” So that was that.

At the very last minute, the Ford wouldn’t start. No buzz, no click, no nothin’. The last time this had happened, I was halfway across Cebolla Mesa. That time I’d gotten the juice flowing in the F-150 by banging on the battery posts with a wrench, so I tried it again and got the cab light to come on. This showed me I was on the right track, so I took off the cables and gave everything a scrub with a wire brush. When I refastened the clamps, I knew it would start. It did, and off I flew.

Getting from Llano to downtown Santa Fe in a little over an hour is possible, but it ain’t pretty. Once there, I took a quick walk to clear my head and then hurried to take my seat. Right away I recognized Bo’s famous custom-built “square” guitar resting on a chair. That also meant he’d be sitting down, old blues-man-style, but hey, the guy was 75.

Bo Diddley’s guitar, photographed at intermission

As it turned out, someone forgot to tell him. My boyhood idol came out and played for almost two and one-half hours straight, no breaks, accompanied by the very capable Alex Maryol Band, who’d opened for him as well. Bo played the old songs, some blues, even a rap number I swear he made up on the spot. He was loose and he was happy. “You got my back, right?” he’d say off-mike to Alex, then hit the special effects built into his guitar and take off into uncharted musical space, laughing all the way.

It wasn’t so much the music as the man himself that had me reeling through one wave of emotion after another. Twice I found myself all choked up and wondering why. Whatever it was that went through the heart and soul of the 10-year-old boy who first heard Bo Diddley on Armed Forces Radio in Germany in 1955 was special, all right. If I could put it in a bottle or a book, it would save the world. When he finally announced his last number and launched into a classic Diddley romp with his signature beat, I didn’t want the feeling to end. It didn’t, either.

Without explanation or intro, Bo changed his mind and jumped right into “Bad Seed,” a song about going through life his own special way and nobody else’s. In between verses he asked all the “bad seeds” in the audience to stand up, and some of them did. I was trying to take a picture and stayed in my seat. I already knew who I was, anyway.

On the way home I stopped at a Pojoaque mini-mart that was just about to close, nobody there but me and the law. My hair was flying in the breeze as I swung down out of the cab. Inside, I felt the tribal cops’ eyes on me as I put too much fake cheese on a cold hot dog and fumbled with the foam cup for my coffee. Shades of times past! Climbing back into the truck, I just had to smile: Man, do you think I’d look like this if I was holding?

All the way back, I never saw another car until I’d climbed out of the canyon. The three elk standing by the side of the road just past the Horseshoe let me pass but woke me up good, so I slid into Llano and played my electric guitar until four in the morning. I don’t think the landlord heard me.

He’s real polite though, and probably wouldn’t say.

I took other pictures at that concert, most of which didn’t turn out so well. This is the best one I have of Bo. It captures a certain energy, but of course you had to be there — and now none of us can anymore:

The one and only Bo

Back in ‘78 I bought an amazing album by Tonio K. called “Life in the Foodchain.” (Yes, he’s still around, and here’s his website.) Every song on it is loud, more aggressive, and hard-hitting than 95 percent of anything I’d ever run across since. To get you started, here’s a two-minute intro of one of my favorites (courtesy GadFly Records, where you can buy all of Tonio K.’s CDs). Once you have a listen, you can sing the rest of the lyrics by yourself!

[audio:funky_western.mp3]

THE FUNKY WESTERN CIVILIZATION
(Tonio K.)

come on everybody
get on your feet
get with the beat
there’s a brand new dance craze
sweeping the nation
and it’s called the funky western civilization

well there’s a riot in the courthouse, there’s a fire in the street
there’s a sinner bein’ trampled by a thousand pious feet
there’s a baby every minute bein’ born without a chance
now don’t that make you want to jump right up and start to dance?

let’s do the funky
the funky western civilization
it’s really spunky
it’s just like summertime vacation
you just grab your partner by the hair
throw her down and leave her there

they put jesus on a cross, they put a hole in j.f.k.
they put hitler in the driver’s seat and looked the other way
now they’ve got poison in the water and the whole world in a trance
but just because we’re hypnotized, that don’t mean we can’t dance

we’ve got the funky
the funky western civilization
it’s really spunky
it’s just like summertime vacation
you just drag your partner through the dirt
leave him in a world of hurt

you get down
get funky
get western
(own up to it boys and girls)
and if you try real hard maybe you can even get, you know, kinda civilized·

(mesdames et messieurs, bon soir. this is joan of arc. tonio has asked me to personally deliver a rather special message. he say he just cannot get enough of my 15th-century wisdom. he say he loves it when i talk with him like this. and after many a saturday night of doing ze funky western civilization together, i know for a fact he agrees with me when i say [in french]:
you can bullshit the baker and get the buns
you can back out of every deal except one)

this is the funky
the funky western civilization
it’s oh, so very spunky
it’s just like summertime vacation
all’s you gotta do is find some little kid somewhere
and throw him way up in the air
(never mind the parents)

yes it’s a funky
a funky western civilization
and it may seem kinda skunky, you know
but it’s hitting every nation (all across the universe)
that’s ’cause all’s you gotta do is grab your partner by the hair
throw her down and leave her there

©1978 Worthless Music and Propane Publishing Co. (ASCAP)

For the very latest on this outstanding songwriter and performer most of you have never heard of, here’s a recent article.

I think we all need some of this! I know I do.

Behold the Finnish rock band called the Leningrad Cowboys performing “Sweet Home Alabama” (in English) at a concert in Moscow WITH the Red Army Chorus. I suggest having a stiff drink first, and maybe a few other things. Listen all the way to the end for a fine Slavic finish!

Great shoes, huh? And how about them “mushrat” hairdos!

Yes, this is still on the front burner!

We’re looking hard for the right place, crunching Craigslist every hour, checking the paper, running down leads. Not looking to buy, but you never know. What we really need a long-term rental. I’d consider a lease with option to buy if the place were right. The main thing is, we need a deal… That’s what the best places are always like, something happens with a kind of mutual attraction. A personal relationship with a landlord is usually involved. Friendship, an exchange of energy. You stumble on it or it comes to you.

We took a drive to Las Vegas, NM the other day to help break in the new car and also just to get away. [Mouse over my photo above to see a chunk of the road.] There was a store that had a great selection of wind chimes and we bought one. It’s black, not shiny metal, one that would hang in the shadow of a tree and not be seen but only heard. I like that idea. We figured getting this now would help us find a house. It’s hanging inside now — not outdoors in this location! — and we give it a push whenever we walk by.

It’s time. I want to drive us to Iowa in the new car in the spring, so my wife can supervise the piano moving and get that sucker here. It needs a home, and so do we.