The Melon Patch

Well, where do I start? These past couple of months have been action-packed...
I'm currently in the middle of what I'm calling a West Coast Tour, a significant part of which
is spent doing television work here in LA, where I live... (they are shooting Dexter on the lot where I work, that's a picture of me with his boat 'Slice Of Life' above...) . In any case I still managed to log some 8000 miles! My jaunt took me to Central and Northern California where I played some great venues, met lots of new friends and bonded with some old(er) ones. I even got to play for some kids at a Native American Reservation school where they start their day out with a drum circle and the burning of sage! Of note was Evangeline's Café run by Evangeline Elston. The place is up in Colfax, California, a great little town up near Grass Valey/Nevada City. Evangeline was incredibly hospitable and the venue is all about the artist. She runs it a bit more like a house concert. I joked with her that I didn't know whether to tell everyone that I knew, or to keep it a secret; it's really that kind of place. I should also mention Kenny Schick, Sabine Huessler, and David (DB) Walker. Sabine and Kenny set up an incredible show for us and really brought out an amazing crowd. They are incredibly dedicated artists and they work their asses off. They also happen to be REALLY GOOD; you should check them out. DB is also incredible. He started our 2 hour round with a dead-on-cover of a Chris Whitley tune and ended it with a tune about masturbation... beat that... no, not THAT!
I then camped in Ashland, OR and stayed at a Motel 6 outside Portland, mainly because it was new and smelled ALMOST like a NICE hotel! While up in Portland, I coaxed the incredibly adept fingerstyle blues-woman, Mary Flower, into coming out to my gig at The Mississippi Pizza Pub. The next day I went to a centennial bridge ceremony for the Hawthorn Street Bridge that she played a few songs at, the mayor was there and a woman they call the Bridge Lady. Very interesting. Definitely not the average experience of a person just traveling through. Afterwards Mary let me do laundry at her house, made us a salad and we jammed a bit. I think we're friends now. After Portland I headed over to Sisters for the Dave Carter Memorial Song Contest... that is perhaps a post in-and-of-itself; more on that later. Oh, I didn't win, but it's OK... many other great things happened.