There are certain moments in your life you sort of never forget, know what I mean? Well Sunday at Atty Maes was right up there in terms of being unforgettable. Atty Maes is this bar at the bend in the road on Plum Island that Michael and Kakki had found a few years back and it has grown as a sort of finishing party place for the Toppsfield fest. The past years CDs of the music there is all this quiet intimate atmosphere. I can still hear Marian from Vienna doing The Wolf that Lives in Lindsey or something and it sounds like the only people there are listers and its sort of a repeat of the church scene but with the bar there of course a little different. For this location I had planned three more Joni Songs plus a song I wrote for the listers themselves that was themed by one of the threads that had gone through the JMDL about Trees and the actual subject was Jimmy Stewarts (FMYFL on the list) playing doctor with this little girl next door in this tree as he had posted. So it was to be you know a fun little set. My wife and I had spent the day strolling throughout the New England seaside at the local street fare in Newburyport (really a pleasure) then we buzzed out towards Gloucester, Ipswitch and Salem through verdant polo fields, country lanes, off the beaten path antique stores one of which Im sure is a front for Space alien-like couple who are the proprietors who looked at us when we walked in as if to say "No one in 30 years has ever been in our store so what are you doing here". The entire store was filled with unredeemable junk but there it was with its door open and these people sitting there. I was carefully looking for the trap door in the floor as I "browsed" and the vibe was reeeely strange so after a bit we "escaped' leaving this strange strange staring couple to their lair and "treasures" like jagged cut magazine covers of National Geographic framed in rotting termite eaten frames selling at the bargain price of $45. Like I said this was witch country. I always wondered where the Addams family lived. Salem was a beautiful but funny feeling town. We went to see the witch museum which is famous but after reading the placards in the lobby waiting for the tour let me tell you just what they wrote on those things in the lobby was enough to convince me that I didnt need to hear about 10 year old girls burned alive over "rumors' and strange behavior. Count'em TEN women were done in in Toppsfield. Yikes. I was in a strange mood anyway from just having been subjected to the "glare tour" ride at the antique treasure trove. All the stores in Salem have this witch theme as if this religious cleansing mass murder and total freak out in the name of superstition was something to "celebrate". As if you go to LA and stand in line for the Manson Family House Tour. "Ding Dong....Get your severed charred limb souveniers right here". The town is actually quite pretty and they have several places there that look very much like the prototype of the haunted house so it must be a great place to celebrate Holloween. Leaving this area in the late afternoon we (of course) got lost and it took us quite a while to find our way back to our hotel having fallen prey to the Leprechan designed road system and the missing sign syndrome a number of times. But get back we did and we found a wonderful restaraunt where we had dinner and then on to Atty Maes. By the time we got there around 7:30 I could hear this really raucus band playing hot hot hot music and i knew this wasnt what I expected. As the door to the place opened out came this giant cloud of smoke like the scene in Predator 2 when Danny Glover meets the Rastafarian Mafia King in an alley and they open the car door and this cloud billows out except this cloud was made in North Carolina. I said "Oh my God they allow smoking indoors here". California of course is mostly smoke free and i dont think about it anymore but all of a sudden here it was in Ted Kennedys state...smoke filled bars. Amazing. And it was reeeely reeeely reeeely loud. As I walked through the place this is a super hot band blaring super hot music to a large herd of humans in mating mode. It didnt look to me like they were there to hear yours truly sing River. Uh oh. My wife is nearly allergic to smoke and as we snaked our way through this mob scene both of us getting looks and free feels I felt like Russle Crowe in Gladiator. All that was missing were the chained tigers. Emerging out the back door i found all these listers mingling in the front area and it seemed like they were all getting ready to actuallty leave which would have been fine with me except I knew that Mike Paz had gone through a ton of work to organize this event and something had obviously gone very strangely awry. Encountering him he told me to "sign up" so i did amidst the dijn and I saw the names of some who i knew were fleeing for their lives outside. Even Ashara was going. In fact everyone was fleeing this incredible scene. Poor Mike. I began to realize that what was happeneing was the totally unexpected. Can happen in the live music biz and I gave my wife the keys to our car and I said go wait for me in the car. Ill do my songs and meet you back there as soon as I can. Im standing there with my fellow victims Steve Mixon and Jeff Bisch. We knew we were really up against it. Here we had never played anything like the material we needed for this raucus place in fact I had no idea WHAT we were going to play right up until Mike reveals my name to the crowd who was already a little curious about what these acoustic instruments were doing in their place. The last thing that happened to me was that 20 seconds before im supposed to play I close my guitar case to get it off the stage area and catching my thumbnail on the lock proceed to rip about a third of it off the finger. Its bleeding like crazy and Im sucking my thumb which by that time Im sure everyone thought it was my security blanket-like reversion to the musician fetal position. Somehow it stopped bleeding and the finger was sort of numb but i was so distracted by the entire environment that we just began. I have no idea what it sounded like. Im thinking as we play what on earth are we going to do for a second song. Jeff did a Dylan song and his harp broke. So Steve Mixon and I did something i cant remember what. I leaned over to Steve and said what on earth are we going to do and him being the utter professional that he is he just said screw this lets just play what we know and forget about the crowd and the scene so we did Buckets of Rain again. Ill tell you this in all the years I played Ill never forget Steves solos which even through the haze of my numb thumb finger and the smoke and the horny crowd and all just sounded totally amazingly great. I dont think I would have made it and kept my sanity without him being there. Steve a big big standing O and eternal thanks from Marcel. My thumb had actually stopped throbbing as I packed up and i remember hearing Yael begin her song. I went up to Mike and as i start to talk to him this guy comes up and says that the band is going to start again. I made it back to the car. I really felt sorry for him as I pictrued all his work having gone down the drain. later I came to understand that many of the other listers had played earlier in the late afternoon it was only the late players that had been hit by the "Perfect Storm" of music. My wife was still in the car sick from the smoke so i dropped her off at the hotel and went on to Asharas. The Leprechans struck again. Fortunately we have cell phones these days. After i ended up in Ipswitch again I radioed her and she literally talked me back to her house like a movie in which the passenger lands the 747 after the pilot has a heart attack. I was so happy to finally get back to her house. The thumb was stable but it wasnt going to be easy to play that was for sure. The last afterparty was great to be at. In the back room Ashara was finally able to kick back there being little work left to do. The room was filled with dozens of candles and Jeff and kate were doing songs. Jeff did this incredible song about a little girl being playfully swung by her grandpa in the park (the man has a way with powerful imagery in his lyrics) and Les Ross did some more of his inimitable renditions like Amelia. Just a sweet guy. In the outer room Steve Polifka was leading this theatre of the bizarre with Reggae versions of Joni songs and martin Giles playing bass and it was something you had to be there to truly appreciate since they were converting all the lyrics to Jamaican. Hey mon like rastamon vibrations spice-in oop de Morgantown mon. The pain had begun to get interesting but I made one more trip through the house. Got to finally do the song for Jimmy although it was in Asharas formal dining room. I think he liked it although he had had a few drinks and was trying to tell me something about this person he had met through the internet named Sandra. [Inside joke]. Anyway with mother thumb beginning to get cranky I did one more song back in the candle room with Jeff and Kate and had to leave. Parting is such sweet sorrow but then again as you trade hugs and goodbyes you never get the feeling you wont see everyone again and again and again. Our last afternoon was spent in Boston. Went to the old North Church and visited Paul Reveres house and had a superlative Italian lunch with my thumb swolen and my arm in a sling. What a great way to end a pefect weekend. My wife is French and Im Italian so I need to use both tongues. Au revoir mon ami. Chi vediammo ancora alla MECCA. If you have never been to a fest sell the house or car. Ask Hell. Its just one of those priceless experiences. Its also something that as you spend time on the list you get one impression of the people behind the posts but meeting them is a whole different thing. This is really one big happy family with some amazing characters. Please forgive me for not mentioning everyone but a few gubbeys are in order. Mags and Brei- thanks for your friendship over the last couple of years You deserve each other. Leslie & Steve, You guys have been so kind and so tallented. maybe we should start a minifest just to do songs out here. Willy the Shake... the man of the incredible posts. It was a wonderful thing hearing you sing. Bob Muller- Bob you are my hero. Your endless energy and humor are an inspiration. Jimmy, - My wicked step brother. Sandra wanted me to tell you you broke her heart. Thanks for your posts which keep me in stitches. Ashara... Thank you for everything...Your generosity is off the charts. thanks for allowing us a mothership of joy in which to meet and greet and share the love. Maggie, chef supreme, Thanks for all your work which is so easily taken fro granted Pazman, Michael, you are the soul of the fests. I cant imagine one without you. OK so your into this VG-8 thing but Im from San francisco so Im open minded. Thanks for your friendship and consideration big guy. Chuck E... It was incredible finally meeting you. I wish we had been able to talk more. Kate Bennett and Jeff, I love your musics. Thanks so much for your friendship. WallyK: Why dont you leave that sinking Argentine economy and come to San Francisco. You'll make lots of new friends and they have places here where people sing like you and no one even notices. Seriously Wally, meeting you was one of the things I looked forward to most and I just wish we could have had more time to chat. Come to SF and dinner is on us. Russ... Thanks for coming Russ and giving me the gift of your awesome tallent. hey Russ I hear they have this great stand-up piano at Atty Maes.....why not? Smurph- y- When you said goodby to me I realized that there were still so many people I hadnt had a chance to meet that i wish I did. Chris Marshall- stellar addition to the fest. Thanks for coming all the way across the pond to thrill and amaze us all. Victor! : Victor again sorry I missed your set thank God for the CD to come. Les Irvin: It is amazing what that little internet project you started turned into now isnt it. Lama, -thanks for your hard work which will leave all our memories for us to see. Great to see you again Jimmy. Amy: Loved your set Amy. John Van Tiel- Why is it that you never come to San Francisco. We even have two windmills and brisk winds off a real seacoast. Maybe you can bring a guitar player with you. Thanks for the incredible cheeze and helping me to rinse the plates. Anne Sandstrom: Thanks for sending me your incredible CD. It was great meeting you and also thanks for the work you did on the organizing of the churchfest. Next time I want to sing a duet, seriously. Claude, See above. Rose, mama mia they sure have neet people in jersey. Lorie Frye- Thanks for spending some time with me and us Lori. After all the email exchanges it was great to share some time. Gregg- Great stuff Greg. Let me know the next time you come to the left coast to perform. Kakki : Miss Los Angeles and I say that with affection. Can we share a martini together next time. That one sip you gave me was the only alchohol i had the entire fest. Now that cant happen again. See you in LA my soul sistah. Pearl and Steve, it was great to see you again Nikki, hey you are getting better every time i see you Nikki. Keep in mind, colds and atty maes happen. Its the nature of the music biz. I looooved the weight excpet it was hard for me to do my levon helm on lighterfluid imitation. Les Ross... I think we met in a past life at the crusades oh Lionheart. Thanks so much for your warmth and songs. You MUST come back. Yael...wish we could have had more time to talk about things. You got chutzpa girl. never lose it and see you att he next fest. Steve Polifka- Thanks for the thrill of Two Grey Rooms steevo. It was a treat. And thanks for those magical moves on the Ganja line. Love to all hugs to all. Marcel Deste
