– Got to Highlander earlier than ever in last year at least – 8:45.
– Still did not play until after midnight.
– Got to have several nice conversations.
– Got to see lots of different performances from usual. (The most important aspect.)
– Got to blow out my emotions with the same songs I do far too often, but that I still like: “Mad World,” “What’s Up!” and “Wicked Game.” Same mad thoughts throughout.
– Could have done Cavern, but decided for the first time in three days to limit things to one open mic only.
I’ve ended up having a couple of crowd-pleasing cover songs that tend to get the audience participating, clapping, drumming on tables and joining in the chorus. Those are “Mad World” and “What’s Up!” I think these are pretty much sure-fire for almost anyone who sings them, but they work more often than not very well for me now. Last night at the Highlander open mic was no exception. But what a contrast to going to the Cavern afterwards….
The point is, I wish I had a lot more of those sure-fire crowd pleasing songs. But it takes time, and there are only so many that exist, no doubt. (Another would be Wonderwall, but I don’t do it since I have a hard time with the rhythm on the guitar!!!!) Anyway, I will continue to try to build up a repertoire in that direction, as well as write my own. Last night I started with “Crazy Lady,” my latest completed song. I enjoy singing it, but it did not light the fires the way “What’s Up!” subsequently did. And then someone requested “Mad World.”
The reason I am blowing my own horn here is not to boast, but simply to set the stage for the contrast. From the Highlander I went over to the Cavern, which holds its vocal jam open mic night on Wednesdays as well, but a little later than the Scottish pub. I have written extensively about my failures at the Cavern in the last few months, as I have tried singing “What’s Up!” there with the band and done dismally, horrendously, depressingly badly each time.
There is a HUGE difference between playing your own guitar at your own rhythm in your own way and actually having to stand up with a band that plays the song the way it was recorded. (More or less.) But that is also a wonderful, and usually humbling, challenge. So despite wanting to commit suicide on at least the last two occasions at the Cavern, I decided to return last night, but this time not for “What’s Up!”
It occurred to me that if I tried “Wicked Game,” I might have a little more luck. There are not many different ways to play those three chords – Bm, A, E – and the rhythm doesn’t change much either. So I went, asked Guillaume, the bass player, if I could try it, and he, as usual encouraged the effort.
Thank goodness I tried! It did not go amazingly well, but it went okay, there was progress, and I began to feel more at ease with the band. Guillaume commented afterwards that he thought it went a lot better too, than the last couple of times. And I heard a few nice things from the audience too.
The point of all this is to say, “Don’t give up!” But it is hard as hell to practice with a live band in front of a live audience. The other point of this post, however, is to say just how different each musical exercise is. You can play an audience with familiar songs and conditions, and you can appear like a complete crappy amateur on the other side of the street in different conditions. So leap in head first and try em all and work at em all. Coming out the other side with a bit of progress feels GREAT! Of course, you need patient and kind musicians like at the Cavern to do it, too.
There may or may not have been a full moon last night over the Highlander open mic – I cannot remember having noted the fact on the way there – but the atmosphere was clearly insane. And fun. Despite there not being an absolutely packed house, those who were there were full of wildness….
I will not go into all the details, suffice it to say that some spectators were really enthusiastic and then quite nasty; while others were so enthusiastic that they took to the stage themselves to join in various choruses and whatnot. I was one of the lucky ones to benefit by that aspect, as I had a couple of gorgeous women join me for my songs. Well, one for three songs, and another for two songs – oh, to say nothing of another standing in front of the “stage” and singing along.
Of course, sensing the madness in the air, I decided to focus only on cover songs, and ones that either make no sense – “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere” by Dylan – or ones about our crazy world, like “Mad World” and “What’s Up!”
One of those who joined me was the fabulous Adele, who did her own set a few slots before mine, and she played ukelele and sang in her superb and emotional voice. Adele is studying opera singing, but I think she could do pop if that fails! (And probably any other style….)
I wish I had my set on film this time!! But I got some of the other good stuff, including Thomas Allen and Ninouche Johansson playinig for their first time at the Highlander. I had met them at the Baroc a few weeks ago.
The cold weather in Paris finally had its effect on the open mics, as the Highlander open mic was very thin when I arrived. That, on the other hand, was just fabulous! There were enough musicians and spectators to make it nice and warm and comfortable. There were some good, interesting, fun and new musicians, and I was able to arrive late and still go on. And then I STILL had the time to drop in at the Cavern, just up the street, in order to give myself another punishment.
The Cavern, on the other hand, did not suffer quite as much by the cold, but there were fewer than last time I went a couple of weeks ago. It was wonderful to see Maddie Speed there trying out the live karaoke thing after visiting so many open mics lately with her guitar. And SHE did a great job. I, unfortunately, seem to be a glutton for punishment. Last time, as I noted on this blog, I made a horrible mess of “What’s Up!”, getting the key entirely wrong and delivering a lifeless rendition of one of my best songs I do with my guitar all by myself.
So last night, Guillaume, the genial bass player and leader of the band at the Cavern’s vocal jam open mic, saw me and asked if I wanted to sing. I had not enough courage to make that fact known myself, but when invited, I leapt at the opportunity. This time, I worked very carefully and closely with the guitarist in advance and we got the key right. And so… I found myself entirely and totally confounded by the tempo…. and made a massive, horrendous mess of it for the second time in a row.
I am going to have to find some little Chinese restaurant somewhere and practice at a karaoke until I feel comfortable singing songs in their orginal tempo and rhythm.
What’s new to write about another night at the Highlander open mic in Paris after attending so many of them? You can wonder how I can keep it up, a blog on visiting so many of the same open mics in Paris. Actually, I will soon return to my round-the-world adventure, so this Paris sojourn will thin out for a part of the year. But there was something new last night at the Highlander, as there almost invariably always is.
At least, it was new for me. I had heard and seen on the Internet about a guy named John McNulty, an expat living in Paris, who had run the open mic at the Tennessee Bar before James Iansiti took over. And John had also run one at the Beaver bar, a Canadian bar that no longer exists – although it was replaced by another bar….
Well, I had never in the last three years seen this John McNulty perform, and I did not even know he was still in Paris. Last night the mystery was solved as John did a slot at the Highlander. And this guy is really good. He has a large range in his voice, and does one of the best Johnny Cash covers I’ve heard, coming out with this Johnny Cash voice, but then throwing in some wonderful high-pitched voice parts for good measure, taking the song elsewhere.
There was a new young woman who was very vibrant, and one or two other interesting acts. Unfortunately, I got there too late to be anything more than about No. 27 on the list, and while I probably would have made it up, I quit at around midnight. I went over to the Cavern, but just got there while the band finished its last song of the first set. I thought about going to the Caveau des Oubliettes, but my cold had advanced so much that fatigue made me think better of continuing the night. So I returned home and slept like a rock (‘n roll star).
A few months ago the Highlander shifted its 5-year-old open mic from the ground floor to the basement. I thought it was a bad move as I thought there was something warmer about the ground floor, but after the open mic had to return to the ground floor just for one night last night to make way for the Robert Burns celebration in the basement, I have revised my opinion.
The ground floor is too packed, too suffocating, not as good acoustically and more difficult to order from the bar! There’s also a way for most of the chattering classes to move into the back of the basement room, where as on the ground floor they are mostly much closer to the performance area.
Having said that, when an exceptional performer gets up and sings the right thing, the chattering cuts out a lot, or at least gets replaced with a sense of community, warmth, great vibe and fun. That happened last night occasionally, especially early in the evening when, sorry to repeat this name once again, Conn Bux took to the mic.
Conn is the Irish musician I keep talking about. But last night was a particularly poignant moment because he announced with his second song that he wanted to dedicate it to an old friend of his, a woman named Emma, who died of breast cancer last weekend at the age of 35. It was wrenchingly emotional, in fact. And it did not stop with the dedicated song, it continued when Conn went on to continue with his next song called “Last Time,” about seeing someone for the last time. Afterwards he told me the first song was a favorite of Emma, and that he had sung Last Time with her in his mind too. Of course.
I enjoyed my own moment as a lot of the audience members sang along with me on three of the cover songs I chose do, “What’s Up!,” “Father and Son,” and “Just Like a Woman.” Of course, I chose them with that hope in mind, thinking the audience needing some drawing together and personal interactivity at that point – which was well past midnight. Still, I was so delighted with the singing along on the Dylan song that they actually threw me off a couple of times as I kind of waited to hear THEM sing the lines instead of me…. A huge, greatly needed, pleasure.
This could be considered Part III in the series of Paris open mics coming back into the usual high level of attendance and action, as the Highlander open mic was bustling full of performers and spectators last night. Thomas Brun, the founding MC of the open mic, had also returned from his winter holidays, and was in great singing form.
I managed to get there at a reasonable hour for once, signed up and got on in about the middle of the evening, so that was great. Even greater was having an upright bass accompany me on all three of my songs. I started with “Crazy Love,” since I wanted to do a kind of “Irish” soul song, to try to match Conn Bux’s Irish soul…. I had met Conn last week at the Galway, and then on Monday at the Galway, and then there he was at the Highlander.
I did my song, “Except Her Heart,” and then “Mad World.” It was great fun playing with the acoustic upright bass!
Conn was great, and I particularly enjoyed his song he wrote when he was 16 years old, about some rotten boss he had in a sandwich joint.
There were several new performers and a few more established ones, including All the Roads, who did his wonderful Irish song by Damon Rice, with some French in the middle of it – but my recording device was not turned on or died out or something, during that one….
After the Highlander I popped in to the Cavern to find its open mic – or live karaoke – just bursting at the seams with musicians and spectators, including Dr. Chouette, whom I videoed at the Ptit Bonheur la Chance a few weeks ago. And he invited me to his concert this Friday at the Abracadabra bar….
But I had by then drunk a little too much to go up on stage and try to repair my damaged reputation on the ill-fated rendition of “What’s Up!” a few weeks earlier, so I decided to return home after listening to a few fine songs…. I especially liked the Peter Gabriel one they did with one of the regular guitarists doing the singing, and the bass player doing the Kate Bush part of the song… Don’t give up….
I went a little late to the Highlander open mic last night and worried I’d never have a place on the usually packed list. But it turned out that because it fell between Christmas and New Year’s, the usually full, even outrageous, evening and list at the Highlander was just a nice comfortable situation. I got to play almost as soon as I arrived, the audience was warm and receptive and spoke less than usual during the performances, and there were some new musicians and old ones sounding great.
I even had a request from an audience member to sing my “Borderline” song, which is always nice to have requests of one’s own music.
I then went over to the Cavern to see if I could face down the failure of the previous week, and see if I could get the band to play the song with the capo on the sixth fret of the guitarist. But once I got there and listened to a few songs I backed down; it was a different guitarist this time, and I just decided that I could try it another time. So I watched a few of the acts and then went home. A very quiet night in Paris during the winter festive week…. It was very much the same kind of atmosphere as the night before at the Ptit Bonheur la Chance, and I await the re-awakening of Paris with excitement nevertheless….
I have said this before, and I will probably say it again: The beauty of live performance is that sometimes it just goes bad. And that makes the great stuff that much greater. If it was not that alive, it would not be live. Last night I returned to the Highlander and used my new Gibson J200 for the first time, and I had planned to do three songs I rarely do there, as I do not like to only do what “works,” as I do so often the same songs. Well, guess what? It did not “work.” At least, that’s how I felt personally. The J200 gave feedback throughout, sounded like crap – only because I have not mastered the complicated controls of the Fishman pick-up – and I was continually trying to feel comfortable, between the guitar and the monitor and the songs I do not usually sing. In the end, though, at least one other performer told me it was “good anyway.” So I slept okay.
Of course, it did not help that there were some fabulous performers there after me! The one that stood out the most while I was there was Joe, who I have recorded before from his stint at the Cavern Club vocal jam open mic a month or so ago. This time Joe played his guitar and sang, and boy did he ever. It was great – especially his first and last songs, the last being Bob Marley….
So I decided to go off to the Cavern and maybe do something there in the vocal jam to save my sense of the evening. But there were a lot of performers and a lot of them were superb, and the tone was sort of soul-like, sort of nightclub ballroom Las Vegas like, as it often is, sort of professional and polished. So I sort of left after a single set – but loved most of what I heard.
Better luck tonight at the Mazet. And in the next few days I know there is something absolutely super cool and great coming up, which I will speak about when the right moment comes – probably after the show!!!
Oh, and to conclude: After a night when you feel like things went crap during a live performance, you HAVE to say, “Thanks so much! That gives more value to when it works! And that is precisely what makes ‘live music’ so special.”
Here goes: Sometimes life runs away with us and we cannot seem to catch up. That is how it has been for me since Monday. So this will be a catch-up post, or rather a “ketchup post” for its fast-food writing style. It starts at Tony’s Aussie bar in the Itaewon neighborhood in Seoul, and finishes at the Highlander in Paris. But one of the most interesting parts was one of the flights – or, rather, the guy sitting next to me.
So anyway… I went to Tony’s Aussie bar last year while at the Korean Grand Prix, and so I returned this year to find the same place, but better. Tony’s is a cool expat bar/restaurant, run by cool Tony, who is a drummer and entertainment tycoon in the making. The bar was an afterthought, something that grew out of him sitting in this place and practicing his drums and finding people dropping by and wanting to jam, and drink and eat and, hey, presto, there it was and is: One of the greatest places for jamming in Seoul. He also has a standup comedy night and another kind of open mic night on Sundays.
What made it better even than last year was that there were more people present, more Koreans, and other nationalities – British, Australian, American, Canadian – and some absolutely wonderful musicians and singers. During my three-song set – Mad World, I Won’t Back Down, and Borderline – I was joined on the first two by Vadim Scott, a Ukraine/Canadian who lives in Seoul and works as a musician and actor. He just climbed up behind the mic and joined in with me. That’s the spirit of Tony’s, and I loved it. Especially playing with Tony on the drums, with the bass player and violinist. Check out the Hendrix bit and the guitar solo bit too. Great stuff.
I left Tony’s at 1 AM, went to bed at 1:30 AM and then got up at 4:30 AM to go to the airport, catch a flight to Tokyo and from there a flight to Paris.
The second I sat down in the Air France A380, the guy sitting next to me said, “You are a guitarist?” He had seen me put my guitar in the overhead compartment, and he was smarter than most of the Japanese customs people who thought it was a set of golf clubs. In fact, he was much smarter, and when we were not both trying to catch up on sleep during the 12-hour flight, we were talking music. Because it turned out that this was Paolo Alderighi, one of Italy’s most promising and finest jazz piano players on the international scene. He plays a wicked stride piano, mostly American jazz from the ’30s and ’40s, but he is classically trained, and mixes the traditional jazz with a classic feel too, and his own feel from growing up with a dad who loved and played jazz music around the house.
But part of our conversation also centered around how to mix and live a life using different talents, multiple approaches and points of view and careers. Paolo, for instance, is a pianist, but he also took a degree in management and economics, and he is now teaching a course in musical culture at a university in Italy. I spoke, of course, about how I write as a journalist about Formula One racing, I do other more literary writing pursuits, the music, the open mic adventure, the film. We listened to each other’s music on our iPhones, and I was humbled by the quality of his, which I will put below from YouTube.
What really fascinated me too discussing his life and career, was how it came about in an interesting step-by-step manner with one thing leading to another without a master plan. He did a gig here and a gig there since he was 16 or so and the pieces all began falling together, the connections were made, other musicians met, and now he travels the world and plays his piano from Japan to the United States, Australia and almost everywhere in between.
So I returned to Paris late Tuesday, missed open mics and crashed out in bed for the night. Woke up, tried getting things done, was swamped, but then did that ridiculous small space-holder post here before doing the Highlander open mic, where it was life as usual, lots of fun, some good musicians, some less so. And I enjoyed trying to get the audience to sing along with “What’s Up!” which they did. But I was thinking I have to find something new since I’m doing the same songs week after week now at the Highlander….
It is still taking so long to upload all the videos over this period of time that I will just now put up a few, and add more later….
