It's great to be back here in the Valley after being at large in the South.
Here's a rough mix preview of a song from the disc Jim Cavender and I just cut in his basement, A Cellar Full of Noise.
It was great to play again at Pearl, a club in Dallas that should be held up as an example of how its done. Rick and Tracy Yost care about music.
A couple more Texas shows, then I jumped the big grey dog to Huntsville. Rita Burkholder picked me up there, and before I knew it, I was in Jim Cavender's basement, and we were having at it musically, making the album we'd been talking about since 2006, when Jim produced the trio record I did at Sun Studios in Memphis, Along The Anchorline.
It took us years to figure out what we thought a good Jim and Skip record would likely be, and then we did it in his basement in four days, playing almost all the instruments ourselves, with some help from Terri Smith Cavender (some percussion), Rita (a vocal part), and Lou Watters is dopwn for a flugelhorn part. Jim played all the drums. We split vocals and stringed instruments pretty much equal.
There's originals and covers, a few duets, and lots of guitars -- accoustic,. electric, nylor strong, baritone, and anything else we could find. Low-tuned, high stringed, capoed, open tuned, and whatever. About a dozen guitars went into the making of this disc.
Leaving Huntsville was hard. It's a town of people I just love. But Mobile called, and since the label that puts out The Long Way Home is located in nearby Fairhope, I listened to Mobile. Again, I went Greyhound as there's no light rail anywhere near Huntsville.
(I don't recognize anyone take long greyhound trips through the deep south. It's hard on your spirit. The 15 hour ride to Huntsville from Lafayette, LA was not a happy experience.)
Ten hours from Huntsville to Mobile. May and Camilla picked me up and took me to Waffle House. I got to David White's apartment not long after, and we had out BFF reunion.
Those of you who know my records know David played drums on several of my jazz records, and he's been my closest ally on the road, too. But we'd never played a gig where I was singing. I was kind of nervous. My reputation in Lower Alabama was strictly for jazz guitar. Camilla was taking a huge risk putting out a record of me down there with no jazz guitar on it whatsoever. I was nervous.
I always play down there at a joint called Satori. So, there I was back at Satori, with David, and a great bassist named Ben Harper with whom he played in the band Fez.
Opening shows for Candye Kane, I played with her rhythm section, and they're certainly great. But Ben and David were my rhythm section, and there's something about guys who play the music like they own it that makes it jump higher. Ben and David and I got to the meat of the music, and the audience at Satori was one of the best ever. This was my favorite show so far this year. Well, it's tied for first with the show Al Perry and I (finally) played together in Tucson a few months back.
(Regrettably, I didn't record the Mobile show, but Rob and Lacey in Tucson sent me a recording of the show with Al. Al rules.)
Hanging out in Mobile was great. David and I watched movies, ate at the Waffle House, and did Skip and David stuff. On the night before I left, Billy Francis had a vinyl party for us, and me, David, Billy, Camilla, May, and a couple others played records and had a big time. Great pizza, too. That was a sweet gathering.
The next day, I nearly missed two of my three planes back to Los Angeles. I miss you guys.
