Spent yesterday evening at the Montlake Ale House, where I met up with Jon and Laura. We were there to hear Mudcat, the band in which my friend Eve Maler plays. 
I had a very good time, kicking back to… well, I guess the current term for the style is “roots rock”, but to me it drew upon the rock, R&B, jazz, bluegrass, and blues that I associate with folks like the Jerry Garcia Band, Bill Withers, and Neil Young. For me, the three stand-out performances of the evening were “Deal”, “Use me”, and “Down by the river” (by the three aforementioned artists respectively). Good times, good beer, and good company.
Of course, all of this came about because I’d emailed Eve to see if we could get together to discuss work matters. Obviously last night wasn’t the right time to discuss the finer points of XML and JSON, so we still need to schedule that meeting….
P.S. Oddly enough, I don’t own a recording of “Down by the river”. In fact I only have one Neil Young album in my collection: the powerful, though flawed “Live Rust”, and that doesn’t include “Down by the river” or “Cowgirl in the sand”, or “Ohio”…. I think I’m going to wander across to Starbucks to get my usual quad espresso macchiato, and while I’m there I’ll pick up the new “Live at Massey Hall 1971” CD. It’s all your fault, Mudcat!
P.P.S. I’m back home, listening to “Live at Massey Hall 1971”. What a wonderful recording. With the simplicity of these stripped-down arrangements – solo piano on “A Man Needs A Maid/Heart Of Gold Suite”, acoustic guitar on “Cowgirl In The Sand” – it’s like hearing the songs for the first time. (And it’s been 36 years…..)
