Monthly Archives: April 2013

Man Singing Rock

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I am so over this winter weather. It’s spring and you would think it would be warmer and it is, but it’s in the low 40’s and damp out. Not very pleasant at all. Grey skies all day. I had lunch with Juan, just some pizza on Washington Street. He got a job at a place that I interviewed with. It’s a card shop and I walked by last month to drop off a resume. To my surprise it turned into an interview with me in torn jeans and smelling like cigars. The interview lasted about an hour, 45 minutes with the owner and 15 minutes with his wife.

I thought it went well but apparently it didn’t. I even suggested Chaz apply there which he did, but since Chaz and I are in that age group that no one wants anymore, they went with Juan who is half my age. Turnabout is fair play since I did snatch the Maxwell’s job from under Juan. Well probably Juan and several other applicants. I used my history with the principal players as well as the club itself. Juan might have been annoyed but I told him that he was the one that employers want these days. He can speak 3 languages and is in that desirable age group.

I did attempt to get Juan a bussing position, as a way to get his foot in the door at Maxwell’s but he was snatched up by a tony restaurant down the street. So he has 2 jobs, the card shop during the day and the restaurant at night. It’s not 7 days a week and the schedule is a jumble but he works it out somehow.

Once again a lot of laughs were had with Juan. I do love having him around. Bill enjoys him too and they both gang up on me when they’re together. I take consolation in the fact that it takes 2 of them to attack little old me. It may happen again tonight, Bill is out and about and Juan might stop by on his way home after work. I wouldn’t mind if it did happen again. I can dish it out and I can take it. So can the two of them, up to a point I reckon.

I stopped by the Guitar Bar and had a nice chat with Mr. Wonderful Jim Mastro. We talked about Bob Dylan coming to Hoboken in July which is very exciting. Unfortunately it will be a Friday night and I will likely have to work. I already made arrangements to have off this Friday to see Bill sing at CitiField and also the first week in May when I am attending a lecture by Brian Eno at Cooper Union.

I was definitely in Eno mode last night, watched a couple of documentaries on Brian Eno on YouTube and thought about having those 8 Eno albums re-autographed. I met Brian Eno at Skyline Studios when he was producing Laurie Anderson and asked if he wouldn’t mind signing his first four solo albums as well as his first four Ambient releases. Unfortunately he signed them with a thin sharpie which doesn’t really show his signature very well.

But after what happened in Boston during the marathon I suppose security will be tight and I don’t want to be ‘that guy’ carrying around a bunch of stuff which may or may not be signed. Still I am very excited at the prospect of hearing just what it is that Brian Eno will have to say. No matter what I am sure it will be interesting to say the least.

And my friend Jimmy Seltzer was briefly glimpsed on the Colbert Report.
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I Touch Myself with Hands of Time

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I think I was so caught up in winding down when I last posted that I neglected to mention my brother Brian and his wife Karen coming to Maxwell’s on Friday night. Friday was the better night anyhow and of course I focused on the ‘less than’ night. Brian and Karen were heading home after seeing ‘Not In It For My Health’ a movie about the late Levon Helm from the Band. Brian has been going to Woodstock once a month to see the shows at the Ramble and was upset when Levon passed away. Brian and I were lucky to see Levon perform on Elvis Costello’s Spectacle a few years ago.

They were dismayed at the price of parking in Manhattan, a nearby garage gouged their wallet but the universe seemed to even that out when they nabbed a spot right outside the door at Maxwell’s. It was a pleasant surprise to see them both and I was even more surprised at how much weight Brian had lost. Truly amazing and inspiring. He looks great and now wears a 36 waist in trousers. A new wardrobe is in order. It was great to see them both and I wish I would have been able to talk to them both but I was working and it was a bit busy.

They left a while later after and headed home and I continued sitting people at tables on the Lido Deck. And like I wrote, the next night was even busier. Yesterday was alright. I met up with Juan and ran around Hoboken trying to fax some documents on Bill’s behalf. Juan of course was so damn funny. He knows how to get under my skin and tickle my sense of humor. I hadn’t walk down the street in Hoboken laughing like I did in a long time, and that was thanks to Juan.

At a friends office I tried to use their fax machine to no avail but while we were there I sang a little bit of 10CC’s The Things We Do For Love, as I was doing this for Bill. Juan paid me no mind and I hoped I had the song on my Android but I didn’t. Juan played the latest Phoenix song on his iPhone which I thought was ‘meh’. I’m not much of a Phoenix fan. Last night when going to bed I turned the radio on and heard 10CC singing The Things We Do For Love.

I can’t say I was much of a Divinyls fan, but their singer Christina “Chrissy” Amphlett died after struggle with breast cancer and multiple sclerosis at age 53. And then after that came news that Richie Havens died this morning. I never saw Richie Havens and I remember getting a phone call from Julio while he was working at Maxwell’s telling me that Richie Havens was putting on an excellent show. I was too lazy in Weehawken to make it down to Hoboken.

I did work with his daughter Dahlia at Murdoch Magazines with Pedro and Harpy back in the 1980’s. She was a handful, and difficult to get along with sometimes. Some people doubted that she was Richie havens daughter but I believed her. Why else would someone say they were the daughter of Richie Havens if they weren’t?

Last night I dreamt that I had a Cadillac which I think was owned by the Crowley family, friends of my parents. It was parked in the parking lot of the VFW where my father was a member and I drove off in the Cadillac, past the Saddle Brook Diner where I slid while applying the brakes into the car in front of me. They didn’t stop so I guess it was alright. I was behind the other car in traffic on the bridge over the Saddle River which was surging underneath.