Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Subterranean OM 1

Ther exists a rathr "hip" litl bar on North av, not far from my new place in Chicago, and evry wensday, they host an od litl opn mic. Two days ago, I chekd it out.

Most of th performrs did th acustic gitar thing, but with th aded plesur of playng with a decent and frendly house drumr. I noticed ryt away that th crowd seemd prety receptiv and nice, compared to th othr opn mics I'v ben to around town, so I got exited about playng. Howevr, I made th mistake of waitng too long to syn up, and I wound up 8th on th list, imediatly foloing a very drol and iritating soul singr. Th good crowd shufld out (presumably to avoid being iritated), and wen I went up to play, only th drunks remaind. Th house drumr took a break to play chess (aftr I'd finaly decided to play with him and had pikd stranj-drumr-frendly songs). So it apeard to be just me and bar peple.

I playd:

.. th slipry toad
.. brown dwarf
.. hulo, wil u be my Sheep?

Then th host, Ciso, insistd on an encor:

.. e blu apratus

Th crowd proved not so bad aftr al. Ciso realy liked it and said somthing like, "That's probly th only song I'l evr hear about a brown dwarf star!" So I was feelng ok, but stil disapointd that a hole bunch of neat-lookng peple had left. I told George I was ready to go, so George hit th bathroom. Ciso came ovr and askd to se and play my mandolin. He seemd like a decent felo, so I felt hapy to oblije.

Aftr Ciso figurd out a few mando cords, he askd, "Say, wud u mind if I playd a song on yr mandolin?" Being a conjenial chap myself, I said, "Sure!" Soon George came by, said, "Ready to go?" and I had to say, "Uh, not quite."

Ciso playd "Don't Go Chasing Waterfalls," and did a real decent job of it. He wound up playng two mor songs on my mando, and it was lots of fun to wach. So George and I got som amusement out of it, but now we wer ready to go again, wen Ciso returnd th instrument and said, "How'd u like to play with this guy I no?"

Havng a few drinks in me and tryng to be frendly, I said yes.

So somhow, I found myself onstaje with th house drumr, a bass playr, and two reggae-rappers, who wer frestylng (for quite a long time) to th strains of my blu-green mandolin. I havn't playd with anyone lately, and I'v nevr playd anything hip-hop-esq, so I was sort of in panic-mode th hole time. Nonthless, it startd and endd, and I don't think I made a complete fool of myself. George was delytd by th hole thing. I was confused.

'Twas a good nyt.

No comments: