Tag Archives: Mermaid Avenue

Go Down to the Water Where the Oil Floats By

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Coney Island. Sunday, September 23

“Little boys and girls trotted up alongside of me, jerking out from their parents’ hands, and kept their ears and noses rubbing against my guitar’s sounding board. While I was beating the blues chords and not singing, I heard side remarks:

 

“What is he advertising?”

“Isn’t he a card?”

“Quaint.”

“A Westerner. Possibly lost in a subway.”

- “Crossroads” from “Bound for Glory”

 

I can’t read a transit map. While sitting on my hotel bed, eating the crullers delivered with my late-night dinner last night, I study Google Maps on my iPad. The modern commuter: incapable of deciphering the tables and charts listed in the hundreds of pamphlets available … where? I’m not even sure where to find these unreadable brochures.

My odds of being murdered to death in the big city are significantly lower now that I can sit in my hotel room and figure out how to get where I’m going, instead of standing in front of a graffiti-covered public map, sobbing in frustration while being assaulted by everyone who walks by.

I could take a car service to Coney Island, but that seems wrong. I’ve decided to get over myself and take the bus, the closest stop five blocks from my hotel. Not only are the fabled NYC cabs a myth, but so are the subways and the idea that there are bus stops everywhere.


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I can do this. I’ve navigated unfamiliar cities before. I can do this. Even though I don’t know how to pay bus fare, when to pull the cord, or any of those rules. I can do this. If I fuck it up, I have the number for Foofie’s car service on my phone. Foofie will save me, even if she’s not here.

Did I mention I can’t read a transit map? I somehow didn’t catch that those letters indicate trains, not buses. Trains, I can do. Going down the stairs, buying a $10 Metrocard (“My! My! Metrocard! Of fuck Guilliani! He’s such! A fucking jerk! Closed down! All the strip clubs!” – Yes, I sang this under my breath the whole time I was at the card machine, buying my card. Another perk of cities this size: I don’t have to suppress my constant out-loud conversations and concerts with myself.)

Surely getting from South Slope to Coney Island isn’t as easy as hopping on the D train and getting comfortable for 40 minutes.

Actually, it is.

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Ain’t Nobody That Can Sing Like Me

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“I’m with yuh, brother!” A lady walked up with a big black purse and a gallon jug of wine, ready to be broke over somebody’s head.

 

“I ain’t a-movin’, neither!” A little old skinny man was flipping his belt buckle. “Let ‘em come!”

 

“As the last two or three flat cars of men rolled down the street and kept the wild mob back for a minute, I grabbed my guitar up and started singing:

 

“We will fight together

We shall not be moved

We will fight together

We shall not be moved

Just like a tree

That’s planted by the water

We

Shall not

Be moved.

 

“Everybody sing!” Cisco grabbed his guitar and hollered out. “Stormy Night” from “Bound for Glory”

Even though I haven’t written about the Billy Bragg concert in Chicago last month, I covered his songwriting workshop. And I’ll get around to writing about the Chicago concert, because I have a lot to say about that night.

I’ll refrain from posting the photo of me in full-on jackass bray from my Billy Bragg meeting in Chiago. But I’ll continue to post this one all over the internet until I’m at 93 years old, because I love it.

My cousin-in-law commented that I look like a little girl on Christmas. I had some pretty great holidays as a kid, but I never got a five minute conversation with one of my favorite musicians. So this was Christmas morning times a thousand in terms of excitement.

I was most impressed that Bragg had taken the time to have actual conversations with the fans who hung out after the workshop that day, asking what brought each of us to see him. I told him a little bit about my project and he asked if he’d see me in Okemah. I was still trying to pull together the details of the trip at the time.

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A Hot Old Dusty Highway for a Dust Bowl Refugee

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By Robin Wheeler

And so the week of centennial celebrations is over. I’m a little sad, but I’m also happy to rediscover these things I’d forgotten. Namely, my family, and this blissful thing called “sleep.” Have you tried it? It’s awesome! I partook in around 14 hours of it on Sunday.

Lots of you are coming here for the first time after hearing me blab about my project at Woodyfest on Thursday, Corey Woodruff’s photo exhibit on Friday, or the KDHX benefit on Saturday. I appreciate the growing interest in this project so much, and I love hearing what others have to say about Guthrie and his influence. This project didn’t start as a way for me to run my mouth about my experiences; it was originally a way for as many people as possible to express their thoughts about Woody and his work. Got something you’d like published on the blog? By all means email it (boundforglory100 at gmail.com) and I’ll post it. It started out as thoughts on his book “Bound for Glory,” but I’ll gladly take anything you have to say. One of the many things I’ve learned: Guthrie can’t be surmised from one single piece of his work.

I’ve been really lazy about pointing out our Facebook presence. Of course we have a Facebook page, and I’ve been posting a lot of extra goodies on it. As have the people who’ve followed the page. Perfect example: this weekend a fan from the Netherlands posted that a local band played “Worried Man Blues” for Guthrie’s birthday at a gig on Saturday, then posted a video of the band on our Facebook page:

Want to see exactly how music transcends language, countries, continents, genre? There it is.

Where we we last? A hotel room outside Tulsa, last Thursday. I started writing this at Woodyfest Thursday night.

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Happy Birthday Woody

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By Robin Wheeler

I’ve been thinking about what to write all day. Nothing will be enough. Or it’ll all be way too much. But today, on the 100th birthday of Woody Guthrie’s birth, I can’t not at least articulate why the arrival of an infant a century ago means so much to me.

Lately I feel like I have to tell people that I’m not obsessed with Woody. I’m not. And no one’s accused me as such. This project has taken me into a deeper focus than any writing project I’ve ever done. I’m not completely sure why. Maybe I’ll know by the time I finish. Even though my Guthrie travels and research mean that my friends and family have been neglected (I’m sorry), I haven’t picked up my knitting in over a month, I’ve only read five books so far in 2012 (I’m usually up to 15 by now), my house is a mess, I can’t remember the last time I cooked a meal for my family, and it’s been well over a month since I’ve taken on any paying freelance work … okay, in that perspective, maybe I am obsessed. But I think I need to be right now. Not just in a fangirl way, but because learning about Woody has taught me things about myself that I don’t think I would have learned otherwise.

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“The Scribbling Really Did Stay” – Billy Bragg on Songwriting

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By Robin Wheeler

I shook hands with the lumberjack and we went our opposite ways. I never did get a real close look at him in the clouds; and when he walked away, his head and shoulders just sort of swum away in the fog of the morning. I had made another friend I couldn’t see. And I walked along thinking, Well, now, I don’t know if I’ll ever see that man again or not, but I’ll see a lot of men a lot of places and I’ll wonder if that could be him. “The House on the Hill” from “Bound for Glory”

While strangers might not have been so friendly (or interesting) in the hotel bar on Friday night, my decision to do some time in there was a good one in the long run. The emotional prophylactic of that sterile environment prepped me for the heart-bursting level of emotion that was Saturday.

Saturday morning, none of the issues that plagued my travel attempts to Lincoln Square on Friday night reappeared. Pretty sure the universe really wanted me to stay put that night. Arrived at the Old Town School of Folk with plenty of time to stake out a good spot for Billy Bragg’s workshop: “Why Write a Song?: Protest Music in the Digital Age.” Not that there was a bad spot; the audience was kept at around 100 people, hosted in an acoustically-perfect room, going 90 minutes instead of the allotted 60.

All that for $35. And I never would have known about it had I not called the box office, begging for concert tickets two weeks ago. Sometimes it pays to be a pest.

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The Sausage Queen of Chicago Fails

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Sent from my iPad

On Jun 22, 2012, at 10:21 PM, Robin Wheeler wrote:
I’m supposed to be at a sausage party. Instead I’m 15 stories above the Chicago River,watching the sun set on one of the longest days of the year, listening to a woman, buzzed on Prosecco, rattle to her mate about… I can’t even tell. Or care. She likes the smell of cut limes. Who doesn’t? 
I’m drinking a $9 can of beer, so I have no room to judge.
The sausage  party – it’s not that kind of sausage party.  My friend

Sam invited me to have join her friends on the roof of a sausage shop in LincoIn Square. 

 

How perfectly Chicago.

I tried to go. Left my Merchandise Mart hotel for the Brown Line, keeping an eye out for a quick dinner option in case there wasn’t any sausage at the sausage party. Despite knowing the way to my train stop, I ignored my instincts, setting my trust in my phone’s GPS, which immediately panicked when faced with tall buildings.  
One hour, one chicken roti plate, and one rubbed blister on top of my foot later, and countless wrong turns later, I gave up on sausage and returned to the hotel.  
I can’t even hop the L. I’d make a terrible hobo. 

I really wanted to see Sam, to see if she’s as vivacious and music-driven as I recall. We met at a Wilco fan party in Winnetka four years ago. When
“Monday” came on she erupted in a bounce of pure, unashamed joy. I always did the same to that song, but never in public. Tonight, I wanted to leap and squeal with Sam. Being on the roof of a sausage shop just adds to the magic. 

 

But I’d reached my limit. A few short nights, trip pep, five hours on a bus, and my typical Chicago comedy of errors… I could have gone, but my gut told me to save my reserves for tomorrow. Said gut is doing the “I Told You So” Dance (Which is also done to the tune of “Monday”), so I begrudgingly heed.  

 

You wouldn’t think a place with alcohol and this view would be depressing.

Watching “Man in the Sand” on the Eve of Billy Bragg’s Woody Guthrie Tributes

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There’s no reasonable excuse for me taking 11 years to watch “Man in the Sand,” the documentary about the making of “Mermaid Avenue.” It’s been on Netflix streaming for years. The 3-CD “Mermaid Avenue” re-release that I bought in April includes a DVD of the film.

I love music documentaries. Why haven’t I watched the one about the music I love the most? Because I’m avoidant. That’s the only excuse I can conjure. Fear that it’ll disappoint, or ruin the myth.

But today, I’m watching it, since I’m leaving for Chicago early in the morning. On Saturday I’ll be seeing Billy Bragg performing Woody Guthrie songs at the Old Town School of Folk. That morning? A songwriting workshop with Bragg.

I need to brush up.

In the first few minutes of the movie, Nora Guthrie narrates that she asked Bragg to do this project to “look for the man behind the myth with me.” And then she utters what has become my favorite words from Woody: “My dad would only say, ‘All you can write is what you see.”

Okay, I’m in.

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Billy Bragg Tours For Woody’s Birthday

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Billy Bragg‘s worked so hard to breathe life into Woody Guthrie’s unfinished songs, and kept his rebel spirit alive through his entire career. So of course he’s not letting Guthrie’s centennial go unnoticed. He announced earlier this year that he and Wilco will be re-releasing their “Mermaid Avenue” albums, along with a new collection of Woody Guthrie songs recorded during the sessions.

Last week I heard rumblings about two Billy Bragg tributes to Woody at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk in June.

Just the tip of the iceberg; Bragg’s doing a short summer U.S. tour featuring his take on Guthrie’s songs, including the second night of the Woody Guthrie Free Folk Festival in Okemah, Oklahoma on July 12, according to Bragg’s website and Slicing Up Eyeballs.

Appropriately, he’s calling it “The Ain’t Nobody That Can Sing Like Me Tour,” taking a line from Guthrie’s composition, “Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key”. During our recent visit to Okemah, my friend Aimee and I entered the town singing the song’s first line: “I live in a place called Okfuskee,” a nod to Okemah’s county.

I’m planning to be at the Chicago and Okemah shows. Here’s the other places you can catch him:

Billy Bragg’s The Ain’t Nobody That Can Sing Like Me Tour:

June 22: Old Town School of Folk, Chicago, IL (According to Bragg’s site, he’ll also be playing the same venue on the next night.)
June 24: The Ark, Ann Arbor, MI
June 26: Birchmere, Alexandria, VA
June 28: Somerville Theatre, Somerville, MA
June 29: Stone Moutain Arts Center, Brownfield, ME
June 30: The Music Hall, Portsmouth, NH
July 1: Higher Ground, South Burlington, VT
July 10: Barrymore Theatre, Madison, WI
July 12: Okemah Festival, Okemah, OK
July 13: City Winery, New York, NY
July 15: Avalon Theatre, Easton, MD

“Walt Whitman’s Niece” and “Joe DiMaggio Done It Again”

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Mermaid Avenue

Lest you fall into the trap of thinking Woody Guthrie is all political seriousness and no fun, spend a little time with “Walt Whitman’s Niece” and Joe DiMaggio.

Guthrie wrote the lyrics, but never recorded the song. Organized by Woody’s daughter Nora, Billy Bragg and Wilco collaborated on “Mermaid Avenue” in 1998, the first of two albums of previously-unrecorded Guthrie compositions. It opened with the tale of a bawdy tale that may or may not have included the great poet’s niece.

Two years later, with a second volume, Guthrie wrote the second best baseball poem in American history – after “Casey at the Bat,” of course, with “Joe DiMaggio Done it Again”.