Brad Spurgeon | Brad Spurgeon's Blog

Deadly, Deadly Night at the Harcourt Arms in Oxford – Art Sketchers, Students et al….

July 11, 2011
bradspurgeon

This is Oxford, right? So the fact of going up to perform in an open mic and finding yourself facing a battery of art sketchers and writers, and why not professors, is not really that surprising, right? Well, last night at the Harcourt Arms pub in Oxford, I was a little taken aback by it all. And I had the greatest time in the world. Not just singing, speaking to the artists – who were sketching the musicians – and taking in the local beer, but also listening to a nightlong lineup of wonderful musicians.

This IS Oxford. It means it is full of interesting people, loads of musicians, open mics, and great pubs. The Harcourt Arms is a mainstay, located in the highly sought after Jericho – I’ll have to check that spelling – district of Oxford. A friend of mine told me they used to have a weekly or monthly Gothic night there, but lately the pub was bought by a new owner and it happened at just the same moment that the Bookbinder’s Pub around the corner went through some change of hands or renovation and got rid of its four-year-old open mic. That highly successful open mic was run by Nigel Brown, and somehow he and the new owners of the Harcourt Arms connected and came to an agreement about having an open mic on Sundays. Thank goodness they did. This was very cozy, warm, well run, and there is even a backyard area where you can escape to think of other things, if you want.

But you won’t want. If you like open mics. The sound system is great, the room is convivial, and the night was full of musicians and spectators. And as it turned out, I felt like I was an art school model, but when I asked the artists if they were a group belonging to a school, they said “No.” They were just there for the fun of it. I also noticed a novelist or memoirist writing during the music; so it was that I felt more at home than ever doing my videos of the performers and then my interviews with spectators and Nigel Brown, for my documentary.

Loved some of the performers, the last two – Sam Quill doing a John Martyn song and Kasra – being particularly interesting, but also Jon Soul of the JJ Soul Band, with his Tom Waits voice….

Oh, and someone very kindly offered to do a video of me singing Borderline – second time in a week – and I accepted, and I’m glad I did. We get the artists here too, and it’s not a bad video….

Family Day at the Galway and Elsewhere; or Jamming With a Last Waltz Band Member – my Son

May 31, 2011
bradspurgeon

Going to the Brasserie Lipp to celebrate my daughter Emily’s 18th birthday, I decided nevertheless to take along my guitar, since that legendary brasserie is located in the same Latin Quarter neighborhood as the Tennessee Bar and the Galway Pub and it was Monday night and that meant the two open mics;

So we had a great meal at Lipp – with my son Paul and daughter eating the same dish of pig’s foot, not for me, and I had the famous choucroute – and of course we all had a nice Beaujolais to go along with it, since the legal drinking age in France is 18 and we had to celebrate that. We finished eating and got out of their at around 10:30 and headed over to the Tennessee Bar where the action was hot, the room was full, and some hard hitting and hard singing guy was on the stage. I took one look around the room and knew that I’d probably not get on – too many performers – and anyway, I had known that from the beginning but just wanted to show my son and daughter the Tennessee joint where I hang out so often.

So we stayed for a bit of this guy and then went to the Galway. My timing was perfect, as Stephen Prescott put me up as soon as we arrived and I did four or five songs. Then Stephen spent much of the rest of the night trying to get my son up on the stage, as I had told him before that Paul has a group, called The Last Waltz, and that he plays guitar and sings. In his band, in fact, he only does the occasional backup vocal, so he is not really used to singing in public – having only done it once or twice before. (To my knowledge.) Eventually, at the end of the evening, with Stephen, me and my daughter pushing Paul, we decided that he and I would go up together and jam a bit. Or rather, I’d sing some songs and he would do lead, some rhythm guitar, whatever.

He and I never play together at home. His music is his music, mine is mine. We did jam a little in the early days, but never seriously. And we never learned the same song. So this was not just our debut performance in public at an open mic, it was our first time playing what ended up being four songs together without break or practice, from beginning to end. We started with Marc Bolan’s “Cat Black, the Wizard’s Hat.” Then we did “Unchained Melody,” then we did, “I Shall Be Released.” By that last song we were starting to get the feel for things, and afterwards we would be complimented on that one. But none of it really showed off Paul’s best talents – he writes his own songs and learns the classics note by note -, and just before we left the stage he started playing “Little Wing,” and I said, “Crap, you should have played that and I’d do and improvise the singing.”

But there it was, a birthday and a birth – of a father and son duo. Well, probably not. But he might go again with The Last Waltz.

Too bad we didn’t get any of it on video, but there were some other high moments in the night – like Stephen’s “Common People,” and Sven Cosnuau singing with Pierre Doucet playing backup guitar.

Brad, Mark Renesh, Alex and the Gang at the Backyard Pub & Grill, Kuala Lumpur

April 12, 2011
bradspurgeon

I could not have dreamed before coming to Kuala Lumpur last week that I would have had such a musically and personally rich experience in just six days in Malaysia. Retrospectively, the signs were perhaps there: I had lined up in advance a gig and a half-hour slot at an open mic, starting on the first day of arrival. The rest was a matter of serendipity, synchronicity, and pushing the limits.

It turned out that the day I chose to play Laila’s Cafe open mic was also the first day in a year that a friend of one of its organizers decided to drop by to check it out. This was Edmund Anthony, the man who runs the music program at the famous Backyard Pub & Grill in KL. So we met, he liked my singing, and he invited me to check out the Backyard on Friday. That in turn led to an invitation to me to play a solo act there last night, as he has solo performers early in the week, building up to full-fledged bands later on.

So it was that I ended up playing not only Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday (the latter thanks to the Melbourne open mic organizer, Emily Brown’s research on where else I could play in KL, but I also got to play this nice little gig at the KL landmark Backyard Pub & Grill. This was also thanks to the kindness of Mark Renesh, who is the regular Monday night musician at the Backyard. He not only let me play from 9:30 onwards for about 45 minutes, but he later invited me up to play a couple of songs with him – “Stand By Me” and “Unchained Melody.”

Mark Renesh is a very cool dude with a voice that you think you are hallucinating with when you hear it and see him singing and you wonder where the hell it’s coming from. It’s his, all right. But Mark, who has always worked solo, has developed the one-man solo gig into an art of technological proportions I have yet to see beaten. That is, I’ve recently started using a vocal harmonizing device occasionally at my brunch, and Stephen “Danger” Prescott uses one at the Galway open mic in Paris. Other musicians, like Thomas Brun at the Highlander’s open mic, have a lot of looping and fuzz type of gadgets too. But Mark has a lot of stuff he pre-records, including rhythm devices, vocal harmonies, and I think other guitars. The whole is like a one man band, and very impressive.

Moreover, Mark has a fabulous voice that very frequently does an exact rendition of the cover songs he sings. Very unusual.

Another thing that made the even fabulous was that I actually had three of my best friends among Formula One journalists come along to dine with me and listen to my concert. Well, I say “dine,” but it took a couple of them quite a while to find the Backyard, as they ended up driving around KL about three times before finding it. And I was extremely honored to have come around to listen to me as well, one of my favorite former Formula One racing drivers, the local Malaysian boy, Alex Yoong, who is currently head of driver development at Team Lotus. Having the Malaysian come and hear me play on his home turf was sensational. Alex is also doing television racing commentary here, and still doing a little bit of racing – like GT3 last year. Just realized I first wrote about Alex Yoong way, way back in 1999.

In any case, the evening was fabulous, it was a privilege to play at this KL landmark music joint, and I enjoyed my set thoroughly – playing my usual mix of my own songs and cover songs.

BSP: GIG at Disquaires

February 26, 2011
bradspurgeon

Flyer for the Brad Spurgeon concert at the Disquaires in Paris

I’ve got nothin’ to write on this blog as all I’ve been doing is preparing for my gig tomorrow at the Disquaires in Paris near the place de la Bastille. I will be performing with two of the five musicians I worked with on my recordings at the Point Ephemere last summer. Virgile will join me on bass and Félix will play lead guitar. We had a great practice session and I am just fabulously excited about the concert. Hope some readers of the blog can make it.

Three segments to the night: Calvin McEnron playing from 8:30 on his set, my set around 9:30 and The Romantic Black Shirts will do their set after mine.

Ciao and à demain. Oh, the Disquaires: 6 rue des Taillandiers * 75011 Paris * M° Ledru Rollin ou Bastille

Oh, yes, and this means no Sunday brunch tomorrow.

Oh Crap! A Backlog of Videos of Great Music – and Les Covering my Song

February 22, 2011
bradspurgeon

That probably sounds weird as a title to this post. But I have dropped behind in my posts, with only a brief interlude of the post of Johnny Borrell at my brunch. And in fact, I have been very busy listening to music all over Paris. So I will simply lay down a little log of videos below of the various places I have been since last Friday… ie, music on Friday, music on Saturday, two venues on Sunday, two venues on Monday…. And here, with no more than one video per act – except the Burnin’ Jacks at the Gibus – is a little record of the past few days:

And here is what is for me a HUGE P.S.: My friend Les DeShane recorded in Thailand a cover of my very own song “Since You Left Me.” I was stunned and flattered completely. First time anyone has covered a song of mine:

Video Show of Little New Things from Brunch and Tennessee and Galway

February 15, 2011
bradspurgeon

Just getting ready to go off to the Ptit Bonheur la Chance and Ollie’s open mic, I realize I have posted nothing for the last couple of days. But as I await the news to see if my scheduled visit to Bahrain will happen in three weeks for the first of my world travels this year, I thought I should just put up the bits of new stuff I noticed at my brunch on Sunday at the Mecano, the evening at the Tennessee Bar open mic last night and at the Galway Pub open mic.

Trying not to go over too much familiar ground here, I want to simply say that the brunch was another resounding success, with more musicians than ever, and a wonderful atmosphere and a great brunch. I will not put up all the musicians, but just the little twists of difference. Pierre Doucet showed up for the first time, with his violin, and I was delighted to be able to play with him, for several songs. Pierre often plays with Stephen Prescott at the Galway, and yesterday was our first time playing together. I started with “Crazy Love,” and it is the only one we got down on a single video. I would have preferred to get the “Mad World,” which went much better, and which we again played to resounding success last night at the Galway. But I’m putting up the “Crazy Love” for the hell of it, even though it is not my best rendition of the song – but the violin gives a bit of a different dimension.

The other videos below all have some new aspect to them – like the different kind of singer at the Tennessee, Tory Roucaud singing her own French song, or Stephen Prescott singing about where the wild roses grow, which I had not heard him sing before, and which I was too far gone over to do a proper recording of…. (no prepositions at the end of sentences, please….) Ayse Ayhan singing in her native Turkish, Martin Rahin finally visiting the brunch and singing his own French songs and a great cover about being 20 years old….

Serenading in the streets? Singing amongst the Anarchists? Podcast of Milan Chapter of Open Mic Book-in-Progress

February 11, 2011
bradspurgeon

I am still working like mad on the book of my worldwide open mic adventure of 2009, in which I played my music in 17 countries, nearly 30 cities and all continents except Africa and Antarctica in less than a year. Towards the end of the year my trips became so closely spaced that I did not have the time between trip to write down all the experiences for the book. So I ended up dictating several chapters while driving my car to and from the Formula One races that provided the backbone to most of the trip.

Podcast of Open Mic Book Milan Dictation by Brad Spurgeon:

Lately I have been transcribing the chapter of my visit to Milan, Italy – where the Italian Grand Prix took place in the suburb of Monza – and it occurred to me that there was an amusing little story that sounded kind of fun as a potential podcast. So I decided to put that up here on the blog, a little podcast, a little radio show of me talking about my visit to Milan and my disappointments, and the sudden discovery of hope for the next night – which would indeed fulfill itself. Up to then I had been really let down and depressed with the music scene in Milan, in fact, it remained a huge let down a city where opera was big but live pop music, jams and open mics in bars was almost non-existent.

My goal, remember, was to play in an open mic or jam session around the world at each venue I went to. The book is a look not only at the venues, the musicians, the kind of people who host and play in the open mics, but it was also a personal journal and travelogue. That is mostly what this particular segment of the chapter is about. I actually dictated this segment while driving from Milan to Monza in my rental car the day after it happened. So this was dictated in September 2009.

Please keep in mind that this dictated version will be edited and re-written to a degree in the final book version. But I wanted to share the moment with you, despite all the hesitations and rewording that I do as I talk to myself in the car! If you did not already click the audio player above, then below the same link leads to the 10-minute dictation in MP3 format of part of the Milan chapter of my work-in-progress OPEN MIC : A MUSICAL JOURNEY AROUND THE WORLD:

Podcast of Open Mic Book Milan Dictation by Brad Spurgeon

Mini Post: Lean On Me

January 14, 2011
bradspurgeon

Nothing much to report after being destroyed by David Broad’s guitar playing on Tuesday. Went to the Highlander and the Cavern on Wednesday, and liked the cover of the Bill Withers song by the replacement MC at the Highlander.

Remember Bill Withers? This guy wrote some extraordinary songs, and if you did not know they were all written by him, the sound of the songs would not give it away – what a range. I mean, “Lean On Me,” and “Ain’t No Sunshine” and “Just the Two of Us.” Three unconnected masterpieces.

Only other thing to report is the new blog for Paris expats about musical goings on. It’s called “Gigs in Paris.” Check it out.

Tonight, I’m off to the Industry of Cool festival at the Maroquinerie. There I will listen intently to the many bands that grew up at Earle’s Open Mic….

And I also want to announce my first gig with a band coming up at the Disquaires on 27 February. Also on the program will be Calvin McEnron and also The Romantic Black Shirts.

“Blind Boy” Brad Plays His Usual Paris Haunts

January 4, 2011
bradspurgeon

I left out a detail in my previous post in which I tried to sum up the previous week’s activities. I wanted to keep the detail personal, private and just not make anything out of it. But as I decided to sit down and do my blog entry today about last night’s musical activities, I thought that it was not possible to write about the spirit of my evening – and what the people there saw – without unfortunately unveiling the news.

blind boy brad with glasses coolly covering the black eye

It’s pretty banal, actually, but a little embarrassing: I was attacked on New Year’s Eve and had my face re-arranged. Well, okay, it’s not as bad as all that. But the black eye is a doozer. I had to cancel my Sunday brunch two days ago because my face was still something of a mask of red and black spots. But I decided last night that I would not let the assailant get away with destroying my glasses, my Lacoste coat, my face AND my fun!

So it was that I went to the Tennessee Bar and the Galway Pub to play in the open mics as I usually do. But I wore dark glasses to cover the dalmatian look. Unfortunately, my forehead still has some bloody scrapes on it, and it was clear that I had been beaten (although the scrapes are much less visible even today). So this raises the question as to whether a performer really should go up and play music – which is supposed to be entertaining for the audience – when clearly in a state of disgusting ugliness through visible wounds. If I were a Sex Pistol, or maybe Nazi Dog of the Viletones, I would actually do all I could no doubt to inflict such wounds upon myself while actually on the stage performing. But as these open mics are generally considered nice family entertainment, and worse, as they are carried out by amateurs, it can look like a strange assault and self-indulgent act to perform in such circumstances.

These, at least, were the thoughts going through my mind when I got up on stage soon after arrival at the Tennessee Bar. It was odd to get up behind the mic and suddenly realize that I could not see a single person in the audience through my dark glasses. This really made me feel cut off. I tried to joke about my face and seek a thread of banter that would link the music to the face – after all, think of how odd it would be to sing of happy days with a face like a pulp! (I exaggerate.)

I sang Tom Petty’s song, “I Won’t Back Down,” which seemed appropriate. Then I sang my own song, “Borderline.” Then I ran out of ideas and thoughts on how to blend the face with the music, and for reasons beyond me I immediately segued into “Unchained Melody.” Judging by all the talk I heard in the audience building up as my three songs progressed, I did not grab the audience.

I left almost immediately afterwards, feeling as if I had been self-indulgent. But I also thought I would nevertheless test out the waters at the Galway. Stephen Prescott, the MC, immediately greeted me with a laugh and a talk about black eyes of his own in the past. I inquired as to whether he thought I could expect the permanent pink spot I am seeing to disappear, and he said in his experience he had seen nothing for days and it all came back.

I was immediately put at ease. Then when it finally came my turn to play my songs, good-natured Stephen presented me as “Blind” Brad, or “Blind” Brad Spurgeon, or something like that. This made me feel really comfortable, and even cool, with the glasses, and I realized there were precendents and even a tradition of performing like this – from Blind Boy Fuller, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, and even the Frenchman Gilbert Montagne. So I instantly ceased to think about my physical appearance, and I asked the lead guitarist from a group that had played just before me if he could play with me – he said they were from England and that the band’s name was “Mana King,” but I cannot find a link for them – and we played the first two songs together. I played “Crazy Love” and “Father and Son,” and he played some great lead. Then, alone, I did “Andalucia” and “Since You Left Me.” Had a great time, felt exorcised and as if I’d had my revenge on my attacker and I was back to normal.

Special Video Edition Of Brad and Les at the Galway – Thanks To DeShane

September 7, 2010
bradspurgeon

I think that since I started this blog last March or whenever it was, I have put up nearly 200 videos of other people at open mics around the world, but when I play, I can never get one of me. Thanks to my friend Les DeShane, a fabulous musician who is also a pro with a video camera, I finally have videos of me performing at an open mic. Unfortunately, Les also counted on me doing videos of him, and while his music is superb, there is no doubt I did flat and uninteresting videos of Les. But I’m putting up the best of each of us from the Galway Pub open mic in Paris last night. No more words on this page, I will leave the rest of the space for videos. Oh, no, must mention that I here screw up the lyrics on “Father and Son” for the first time in about a year!!!

I will write more about Les another time, as he is also on an interesting musical voyage like mine, that has taken him to most corners of the world as well….

Oh, almost forgot. At the end of the videos, I want to add a final video, that of Arturo from Colombia, who does a great version of an REM song….

In honor of Les, I start with the videos of him: