Hey Loud-heads!

I think it's been about FOUR YEARS since I've been able to catch one of Loudo's
shows. It seems I've been showing up in towns where he's just been, days after
the fact, for a long time (Someone on this list got pissed when I pumped my own
career with the thinly-excused celebration of having performed on the same stage
that Loudon had been on a couple years back). Driving from San Francisco to
Chicago in four days, I found myself back in town in time to catch Loudon at
"Space" in Evanston, Illinois.

The band, "Sons of the Never Wrong" opened the evening, with two women and a
man, playful, clever and all with strong voices. They were boomer-generation
types, and at least twice noted that they'd been performing together for over 17
years. ("Had we known we'd be together this long, we would've come up with a
better name.")

I hadn't started writing notes during their first song, but enjoyed: "What about
me" (A mix of three unique tunes, including a variation of "Bridge Over Troubled
Water"), "My Last Boyfriend" (The male performer left the stage while the two
women sang, sounding very much like "Four Bitchin Babes"), "Seven Chinese Baby
Girls": (A song about China sending female babies to the United States), "We are
Wanderers" and "Set God's Children Free" (titles guessed at from the lyrics).

In the break between sets, I checked in with three twenty-something girls,
dancing at the back of the room. Are you guys really Loudon Wainwright fans? ...
You're not just Rufus Wainwright fans?"

"No," they insist: We're LOUDON fans!

"You give me hope for the next generation." (Given that there were several
request for songs from "Knocked Up"/"Strange Weirdos" last night, I'm guessing
that may have been the girls' source of fandom.) (Why, oh, why, didn't Loudon
let the album have the same name as the movie???)

Entering the stage from through the audience (there was no onstage entrace),
Loudon knocked his two bottles of water off of the stool, and fussed with them
for a bit. Standing in front of the mike, he noted, "I seem to have grown a few
inches since the sound check." But even then, Loudon, and the rest of us heard
applause, AFTER the audience applause dropped out. The sound guy had left the
preshow music, of a live performance, running. Had it been louder, it might have
made one suspicous that the venue was padding the applause.

Loudon launched into "Times is Hard", the tune that repeats the refrain of "All
I can do is play this song," which got some nice audience response when rhymed
against "Circuit City just said 'So long'" and "Money's short and the odds are
long". The funniest line, at least to this capacity crowd, which clearly knew
the tone of Loudon's catalogue, was "Looks like you guys need some cheering up"
followed by "It aint me babe, you got that wrong; all I can do is play this
song."

Loudon noted that he wrote that one back in January as part of the "Songs for
the New Depression," to "cash in on the hard times!" "I got a bunch of these,"
he added, and as he continued to play several of this same ilk, I began to
suspect that "Songs for the New Depression" might well be the name of his next
studio album (following the Charlie Poole project).

The next number was an ascerbic look at a couple that is staying together for
the sake of the house. The house has lost about 25% of its value in the
depression, and they can't afford to sell it without taking a loss, and so they
check the newspaper and watch the markets, noting "You can't up and run out on
me." At one point in the song, Loudon messed up a chord change, and reworked it
three or four times before shouting out: "New song! Don't know it yet!" to more
applause. The song ended on a bittersweet note, as he sang "I'm afraid I would
find / It was the best part of ourselves / That we had left behind."

Acknowledging that these were the new songs, Loudon reassured us that "I have
some old ones" (applause), and noted his latest album was "Recovery". (A single
shout went up from the audience, and Loudon cited the "unsolicited
testimonial.") He assured us that "Recovery" has "Nothing to do with drugs and
alcohol ... but it makes a great gift for those who ARE in recovery ... and it
will be on sale here tonight, he noted, brandishing the sharpie that occupied
his shirt pocket (not for the last time).

He played a jazzy/funky version of "Be Careful There's a Baby in the House", and
then noted that there was ONE song about alcohol on "Recovery", and played
"Drunk men stumble, drunk men fall ..." After the song: "I wrote that one in
1972. I was drunk that whole year."

When he again mentioned that "Recovery" would be on sale, someone shouted out
"How much?" That seemed to stump him and eventually he said, "Twenty dollars."
When that seemed to deflate the demand, he added "But, uh ..." (drawing the
Sharpie out of his pocket) "You can sell it on E-bay and clean up!"

As he struggled with the tuning of his guitar, Loudon asked "We are near the
lake, aren't we?"

"Yes," they shouted back. (Lake Michigan was about a half mile away.)

"Well, let's go! Come on!", he responded, as if the whole crowd of us was going
to go for a late night skinny dip.

Loudon shifted into family mode, singing his songs about "Granny" and "Loudon
the First". The latter, "Half Fist," seemed improved in performance since the
last time I'd seen it, as Loudon seemed to be stressing the ominous chords on
the guitar, making it feel a bit more like a sea chanty than I'd recalled.

He introduced "a brand new song; I haven't played this for anybody yet ... You
strike me as a likely group!" He explained that his dad had died over a decade
ago, but his Dad's girlfriend was finally selling the old apartment, and called
to invite the family to come by to see if there was anything among his Dad's
stuff that they wanted. We didn't catch a title, but the song essentially
enumerated the stuff that Loudon proceeded to weed through. I wrote what I could
as fast as I can, but my notes, scrawled quickly in the dark, are fairly
illegible now:

"We got a dead man's rod and a dead man's reel
A dead man's tuxedo with a lived-in feel"

It continued through the "dead man's belt," "clippers," "tweed jacket with
patched elbows," "I walked a mile in a dead man's shoes," "slept with a dead
man's widow" ... "wore a dead man's pants, tried on a dead man's shirt, dead
man's suits... crashed a dead man's car ... sank a dead man's boat ... I'd sleep
like a dead man in a dead man's bed ... I said a dead man's prayer," and
ultimately asking "what's a dead man worth?" Somewhere in the middle of the
enumeration, Loudon sang "I guess you're all wondering how long this can go on."

Back into "Songs for the New Depression," another new song started out
"Everybody's scared and nervous ... Everybody's talkin like it's 1929 ..."
singing as a character who'd talked about "the job I said I hated; yesterday
they gave me the sack" and now "wish I had that job back." He sang about a guy
who was "glad you got yourself a college eduction", but "robbed a filling
station ... on account of college loans he had to pay ... back." Somewhere in
the song he references "I'm gonna take along a book by Maynard Keynes ... John
Maynard Keynes ..." diligently citing "1893-1946," and ended up determining that
he was going to "stay in bed; that's what I'm gonna do." He later identified the
song as "Fear Itself."

"Speaking of economists ..." he segued ... he asked how many of us knew who Paul
Krugman was, and several of the audience chirped up with bits of Krugman's bio,
and when one noted that "He won the Nobel prize!" Loudon interrupted to play
"The Krugman Blues," in a much better performance that what had been posted on
YouTube recently. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK3-HAdUJx0) Some of the best
lines: "All the other experts seem way off base -- I guess I identify with that
pissed off look on Paul's face." "He's one unhappy pup ... Krugman looks so
downtrodden I wish he'd lighten up." (I only wish this song had a better ending
than "You bring me down but way to go Paul.")

Loudon then suggested that if we went to lw3.com, we could buy some of these
songs for 99 cents ... "Cashing in on the hard times."

Another song was borrowed from the "Old Depression," singing "All hail Mister
Roosevelt," as it cheered Roosevelt on to victory at the start of his
administration as he took on the depression. Much of it sounded extremely
familiar, and Loudon added another verse suggesting "Let's look into the future"
and repeating the first verse with "Mister O-bam-a" where "Roosevelt" had been.
It ended to hearty cheers.

"Back to my swinging life," Loudon launched into "Doing the Math," with lyrics
filled with impending doom. He juxtaposed this heavy material with a broad,
stiff, plastered smile and a square-shouldered bravado, making the guitar seem
like a tiny children's toy in his arms.

We were mostly laughing hilariously at this, but in the break between songs, as
one or two of us started to call out for songs, one woman piped up "Give us
something real!"

"Huh?"

"Do something real."

As Loudon doesn't seem to have a song called "Something Real," none of us quite
knew how to take that comment, and then someone else called out for "That's my
Daughter!" This didn't quite save the day, as the requested song had actually
been written by somebody else, and while Loudon re-tuned the guitar, he said,
"First I'm going to do this one though ..." (as we all laughed), and he did
"Gray in L.A.," also from the "Strange Weirdos/Knocked Up" soundtrack.

Briefly checking his watch for the first time, Loudon proceeded to "the
afore-mentioned 'That's my Daughter'. (I noticed the three 20-something Loudon
fans were dancing to this one, confirming my previous suspicion.)

"While I'm doing covers ..." Loudon introduced his record coming out next month:
"High, Wide and Handsome," a tribute to Charlie Poole. He seemed pleased that
several people in the audience actually seemed to know of Poole, who was often
characterized as "Obscure ... except in this ... town."

He performed a touching Poole number about a fellow checking in at the post
office, singing "Is there any mail for me ... but at last it never came ..."
eventually leaving a note as he died: "Should a letter come, please place it by
my side."

Afterwards he said: "That's 'The Letter That Never Came', that's pretty real!"
(a shot back at the, presumedly, drunk, 'Do something real' lady).

He talked a bit about the southern expression "High, Wide and Handsome," which
was how Poole wanted to die (at the age of 38) after drinking himself to death.
He then did his song by that same title, with the wistful lyric "Just remember I
laughed twice as hard as I cried."

Loudon mentioned that some have been mis-hearing the title as "High, WHITE and
Handsome."

"Back to my swinging life," he promised, and launched into the story about his
Martin 328 which was damaged by "Suzy" in the Durango airport.

"I wonder how Suzie is doing ...
In the airport in Durango;
Does Suzie still work for the airlines?
I pray to God they let that bitch go."

The song goes on to describe how, as he watches out the window "My old ax hit
the tarmac; I swear I heard it crack," but when he complained to "Suzie" who
denied it completely, "That bitch kicked my ass big time" ... "Kick it" (as he
proceeded into the instrumental).

The song notes that Loudon's style is not to litigate such expensive matters,
but that he would, in fact get back at her with a song... eventually admitting
that, for legal reasons, "The bitch's real name isn't Suzie ... but I wonder how
Angela's doing?" (This song may have brought the house down more than anything
all night... and he was definitely "on" last night.)

As a request for "Unhappy Anniversary" rang out, Loudon, in the midst of
adjusting his capo, was into the song within a couple of seconds.

After that one, the requests came flooding in, and one couple shouted out that
the first dance at their wedding had been to "Strange Weirdos".

"Then you owe me some more money!" Loudon replied. Though he quickly reassured
them: "Keep it. You're going to need it."

"White Winos" was next, by request, as was "The Swimming Song" complete with a
"clap your hands" section or two. Loudon thanked the crowd and made to exit, but
the only exit was THROUGH the audience. After making it about five feet off of
the stage, he turned around and returned, explaining: "If this stage were set up
differently I would've definitely milked that a little more ... got offstage and
done some coke before coming back on."

He sang "Happy Birthday Martha" getting us to join in singing "Five Years Old",
and then went into "Your Mother and I".

"Here's a song I wrote for the New Depression. I repeatedly get described as
being cynical. One paper, in San Francisco actually described me as 'moribund'
... I had to look that one up. But that was when not a lot of people were doing
it. Now everybody's doing the cynical thing. So this is the new, HOPEFUL me."

He played "Middle of the Night,"

"Into this darkness we're hurled
With not a glimmer of a light
It's not the end of the world,
It's just the middle of the night."

Also featuring the lines (I didn't capture all of these, but was able to check
them on YouTube):
"The middle of the night,
That's what this is
If death is the real test
This is just a quiz."

In the malestrom of your mind you are swirled
You're almost down the drain, but not quite,
It's not the end of the world,
Rather the middle of the night.

Around fate's fickle finger we're twirled
Small wonder we're so uptight
It's not the end of the world
Barely the middle of the night ..."

He made his final exit, proceeding once again THROUGH the audience, which must
have been an annoyance to him. And as the audience processed out, I finally
spotted Jay, who I've met up with for at least a half dozen LW3 concerts. This
time, however, Jay had his young lad, "Loudon" with him, and he introduced him
to the elder Loudon for the first time. We captured a couple of photos, I shook
Loudon's hand, and we headed off into the night, with all (but the youthful
Loudon, who thought it was "boring") agreeing that this may have been the best
performance we'd seen him do over the years. There was a great mix of the old
and the new songs, and there wasn't a bad song in the bunch. Some of the songs
that we'd come to dread ("Tonya's Twirls," "The Acid Song") hadn't surfaced, and
the venue's lighting and sound was really good. (Made him much better than the
recent NYC concert clips that've been popping up on YouTube.")

For those who may have suggested on this list that the man may have "lost it," I
respectfully disagree.

Tim


Phone: 847-757-3648 Fax: 847-901-9263
Websites: http://www.moliere-in-english.com/ / http://www.timmooneyrep.com/
Video: http://www.youtube.com/molierelover
Blog: http://timmooneyrep.blogspot.com/

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