GREG BROWN solo, 2/15/2008
Stuart's Opera House, Nelsonville OH

SET 1:
Trouble In Mind (Richard M. Jones...see below)
What Happened? (Merle Haggard...see below)
Ever Since The World Ended (Mose Allison...ended with a Cheshire cat grin)
Kokomo
Oily Boys
My Home In The Sky
A Little You
The Train Carrying Jimmie Rodgers Home
One Wrong Turn

SET 2:
Pound It On Down
Verona Road
Hey Baby Hey
China
The Evening Call
Louisiana 1927 (Randy Newman)
Blues Go Walkin'
Slow Food

ENCORE: Jesus And Elvis

Of these 18 songs, I'd only seen 5 live before (A Little You, One Wrong
Turn, China, Blues Go Walkin' & Slow Food) in 4 previous Greg Brown shows.
So the other 13 songs were all new experiences for me. The three great
opening covers were cool, and just as I was thinkin', "you know seeing
Greg do a show of all covers wouldn't be half-bad at all, 'cause these
three tunes sound great," he starts in with Kokomo and Oily Boys and we're
off. People yelled a lot of approval at him during Oily Boys.

Two songs from Iowa Waltz! Never imagined I'd see My Home In The Sky
performed. Does anyone know: has he been doing that one at other shows
lately, or not hardly ever, or what?

Popped a G-string 3 minutes into One Wrong Turn, so after finishing the
song he said it had suddenly become a 2-set show, and he'd go change it
and be back for another set. Which he proceeded to do. Highlights for
me: During Hey Baby Hey, thinking of the person on the GB-list who'd
called that his/her Valentine song...Louisiana 1927, the great Randy
Newman song which lots of folks have covered lately, done up right Iowa
hillbilly-style...and Slow Food, which turned into a splendid rant about
(paraphrasing here) "yeah, it's great, it's great, everybody's able to do
a lot of things all at the same time all the time, and all those gizmos and
screens and buttons and such, it's great, and multi, multi, multi, multi,
multi, multi, multi-fucking-tasking and all this and all these people
havin' a good time sittin' by some box somewhere doin' some shit. And it's
great, and you can see television Everywhere...in the airport, in the
hotel, in the department store, it's everywhere, and it's always the same
faces and the same story inside the boxes and it's great and you know what,
I don't give a shit."

At least I think that's basically what he was saying. A rather vehement,
um, colorfully-stated expression about that state of mind rathar polarly
opposed to Slow Food, before singing some more about the good juices and
the greases with all the love cooked in. Mmm-mmm good.

And then encoring with a bouncy, jumpy rendition of Jesus And Elvis. Singing
that verse about Jesus saying wine would be better yet and what happened
when Elvis picked up a guitar three times, and practically wailing "made all
the women wet" on one of them, with his head moving all around the microphone
as he sang it like a newly-touched bobblehead (Hey there's an idea, GB
bobbleheads! I forgot how much his head moves around when he plays.)

I tried to approach him after the show, but learned Greg was real tired
after a long day in delayed airplanes, so he was on the road about 20
minutes after the show, presumably up to Kent OH, site of Saturday's show.
No visiting with anyone in Nelsonville tonight. I later learned (1) that
Greg had only arrived in Nelsonville at 7:40, had a quick sound check and
then started the show at 8:23, and that (2) Bo's cancellation (he was on
the poster and originally supposed to appear with Greg) was due to the birth
of a newborn that has become Greg's new grandchild...Greg didn't mention
this at all by the way but, of course, this is hopefully a wonderful thing
for everyone concerned.

At one point Greg had fun commentary, persumably prompted by his long
travel day from wherever he woke up this morning, about how "you gotta give
it to the airline people," mimicing how, as he said, they lie so well,
saying things like, "well, we're presently delayed because the weight of
our stowed baggage doesn't conform to regulations from Austin." Then he
said he sometimes wishes everyone would just constantly tell the truth from
now on, and even though that might not be easy, at least you'd know it was the
truth. Like, "well, we're gonna sit here till we get some more asses in
the seats of this plane so the flight will be more cost-effective for us."
"I could handle that," he said. Then he asked us to imagine if politicians
would just tell the truth, say, 30% of the time...and if husbands and wives
would tell the truth, okay, maybe 70% of the time..."the world would be
different," he said.

Since I know some of you care: Boots, blue jeans, tight black pullover shirt
(kinda sheer, Speedo? something like that), black leather vest, black
bandanna around his neck, dark shades, one circular ring in each earlobe,
graying mustache and goatee, and a certain kind of big fluffy gray winter
cap on his head the entire show (not sure what it's called, maybe a
toboggan? a head muffler? Russian headgear? I've no idea what you call that
kind of hat).

All in all, a pretty darn good night seeing Greg channel the spirit in a
great intimate small theatre. Wish I could see him in Kent. Anyone
going? Anyone else here go to Nelsonville tonight? If so, what'd you
think? I was particularly happy that he *was* solo, much as I love Bo's
licks, because Greg's personality kind of shines when he's carrying the ball
all by hisownself.

I also thought during the show about how, by whatever stroke of
happenstance that drew me into my first Greg Brown show almost 20 years ago,
I've since been turned on to *so much* in the way of his music and the other
music it spirals around, the tunes he covers, people he's played with, etc.
And then also finding out about this list and how people like Shirley and
Ramcey and Stute and Fern and Jan and Ian and Bill Pringle (has he mentioned
Cheryl Wheeler here?) and Australian Greg fans and Italian Greg fans and
all you other folks even *exist* (and though I've never mentioned her
before, there's also a wonderful Hoosier Hottie somewhere in this world
and I'm very thankful that she exists, and offer another prayer for her health
and wellbeing)...and having this talented dude singing from behind the
shades to thank yet again for all that and more.

I hope I don't sound like I'm just gushing with stars in my eyes and just
hyping him to you through my rose colored specs. It's just that I was
kinda disappointed by his previous Stuart's appearance's lack of strong
rapport (as I saw it) with the audience, a show where I felt like it was
the kind of mostly-dark-blues show recently discussed on this list. Not
*bad*...just not wow-can-you-believe-that!?! Tonight was closer to the
latter. The dude is exceptionally strong guitar-wise..."oh yeah, the boy
can play"...and I noticed that while the blues factored in a bunch of these
songs, it was like an interesting and exhilarating blues sound, not as much
of a depressing desperate blues like some of his also-great-but-darker
tunes like Ballingall Hotel and such. No, this was Hey Baby Hey and Pound
It On Down and A Little You and a trip to China and back, with the sound of
Jimmie Rodgers' Train rolling by as One Wrong Turn loomed, with it's G-string
ready to snap from Greg Brown's exquisite pressure.

It's late, and I'm waxing far too eloquent. Better shut 'er down. Hope
you enjoyed this review, such as it is, happy to share what I can. Merry
melodies, all. Steve Zarate, Athens OH
*******
Not sure Greg sang these exact lyrics, but he did start with the first
verse as it appears below. I found the following info at
www3.clearlight.com/~acsa/introjs.htm?/~acsa/songfile/TROUBLEI.HTM


Trouble In Mind
Lyrics: Richard M Jones
Music: Richard M Jones

Played by Jerry with the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Not to be confused
with I'm Troubled, also played by Jerry Garcia.

Chorus
Trouble in mind, I'm blue
But I won't be blue always
You know the sun's gonna shine
On my back door some day

I'm going down to the river
Take my old rockin' chair
If the blues don't take me
Gonna rock away from here

[chorus]

I'm gonna lay my head
On some lonesome railroad line
And let the two nineteen
Satisfy my troubled mind

[chorus]

You know the sun gonna shine
In my backdoor some day

Jerry Garcia Recordings
Date Album Recorded By
31 Oct 1987 Pure Jerry: Lunt-Fontanne Jerry Garcia Band

Origins
This is often listed as "traditional" but is a jazz standard originally
written by Richard M Jones in the early years of the twentieth century. It has
been covered by a huge range of jazz, blues, rock and country performers.

The recording on "Pure Jerry: Lunt-Fontaine" lists the title as "Troubled
In Mind" and the composer as "James Roots." This is a mistake: that is a
completely different song, recorded by the Pilgrim Travelers.

Some Dead Base setlists (eg 29 August 1987) list "I'm Troubled" when the
song played was in fact "Trouble In Mind."
*******
These are some incomplete lyrics to "What Happened?" It's apparently from a
4-month-old Merle Haggard release called "The Bluegrass Sessions." I
culled these together from some articles found with a quick yahoo search.
Until Greg said it was a Merle H. tune after he played it, I thought I was
listening to a brilliant followup to "I Want My Country Back" and "Oily
Boys." Has anybody else heard Greg sing this before?

It used to be Andy and Barney Fife,
Now it's Howard Stern and a brothel life
Too much crap can drive the world insane
What happened? Does anyone know?
What happened? Where did America go?

I remember the morning the towers fell
I fell back asleep and dreamed of hell
Truth that stood for years is down the drain
What happened? Does anybody know?
What happened? Where did America go?

What happened, does anybody know?
What happened, where did America go?
Everything Wal-Mart all the time,
No more mom and pop five and dimes
What happened, where did America go?
Where did America go?