Messenger Blog

Hey, Jacob, how's it going on this Tuesday after a Monday that was Columbus Day, and thus, more like a Sunday?

I trust that the tracks we laid down Saturday, at the "museum of crap," were adequate compensation for taking that night off from busking, I look forward to hearing that session (end of message).

The Sum
We made something like 44 bucks playing for maybe 2 hours on "Boardwalk," last night.
Boardwalk, in the realm of busking in New Orleans, is the spot right where Rouse's Market on Royal Street sits.

It was most likely available because it was a Monday evening.

Park Place would be a couple blocks down, where the Rib Room, and whatever hotel it is part of, sits, and is where Tanya Huang has first dibs at. She will often pay one of the homeless people the ripe sum of 20 dollars to plant their cardboard right there to sleep, so that, when the sun comes up and people start to stir, they can hold the spot for her, maybe even by sitting there with some kind of musical instrument from early morning, until she arrived around 11:30 to play from noon until maybe midnight, something that happens from Thursday through Sunday.

Doing the math yields a 48 hours work week for her. though it might hover just above 40, due to her knocking off before midnight on Sundays; because they're Sundays.

I'm pretty sure we knocked off before midnight, it being a Monday like a Sunday...

I been seeing that guy for years walking around with that guitar on his back, but ain't never heard him play the thing...

And, across the street from us was the "I've been listening for 57 years," guy (above).

I could intuit from his body language, after we had arrived to find no other buskers playing, that he was eager to finally hear me play, after 13 years of seeing me going to and fro with a guitar on my back, stopping to listen to Tanya and Dorise, Doreen's Jazz Band, or one of the "old timey" bands like "Yes, Ma'am," that have like a dozen members, on any given occasion, and maybe even a tap dancer. (I always wondered what it must be like to be in such an outfit and, seeing a dollar go in the tip bucket, think: I just made 8 cents!). But, the guy who's been sitting there for 57 years kind of perked up a bit, in anticipation of having a 13 year long curiosity satisfied. He had:..I been seeing that guy for years walking around with that guitar on his back, but ain't never heard him play the thing!.... written all over his face.

Suddenly, I was more nervous over what that guy's impressions were going to be, more so than the fact that we had lucked upon the Boardwalk of the French Quarter being available. He was going to be the measuring stick of whether or not we were "ready for prime time." 

The Sun

The sun was in our faces, but the shadow of the buildings across the street was only about 10 feet from us, and was creeping towards us. 

After starting to play "Ain't No Sunshine," for the guy, and getting the sound kind of balanced and mixed in the process, it was aborted about half way through, partly because I remembered the inherent folly in trying to play something for someone based upon sizing them up. 

One of the highlights of the evening ensued when we did one of my songs called: "The Sun Told Me (everything's gonna be alright)" and 4 one dollar bills went into the case, and then a fresh 10 dollar bill during another McKenna song, perhaps: "Crazy About A Crazy Girl."
I think the tip tally was one twenty, one ten, two fives and 4 ones...
Then arrived Elijah, who had landed on the "go to jail" square when we were playing at the Lilly Pad (St. Charles Place, for trivia's sake) and whose arrest caused enough of a stir that Lilly told me not to play there for "a month, to let things cool down."

He is out on bail, thanks in no small part, to Jacob, who had been the guy's contact on the outside (maybe the only person who had accepted a collect call from "Orleans Parish Prison" from him).

He looked a whole lot better than he had on that night when the police thumped him up against Lilly's shutters, causing her to check her camera to see what the ruckus was, and then causing her oldest daughter to rush out in a full blown panic, thinking that the plain clothed officer involved was a tourist who was beating on me "because he didn't like your music, or something..."

That had been too much drama, and had revealed to "the whole neighborhood," which had stuck its collective head out the collective window, the extent to which Lilly cares about me and wants to protect me. And, due to neighborhood politics that are beyond the scope of this post, and beyond my comprehension, the one month cooling off moratorium on me playing there, was enacted. 

Lilly is in a court battle with a neighbor over the right to the alleyway between their houses. Lilly considered it her property and, at one time, told me that that was where I should play, right in front of the gate to that alley; to mark her territory, in a sense. But after the initial ruling was not in her favor and a judge said that the neighbors could use the alley for things like painting that side of their house, and were thus entitled to their own copy of the key to the gate, Lilly told me to move over a few feet onto her step but no longer right in front of the gate. She felt like she was ceding land to the enemy, I believe.

But, up walked Elijah, looking much better than on that night when he was being accused of being a thief and a crackhead, by a group of people sitting a couple stoops down from us, and then later being arrested for "robbery' and handcuffed up against the house. He had gained about 5 pounds of weight and was no longer shiny with sweat, very nervous and a fiend for everything in sight, asking for one of my cigarettes, was that weed in the rolled up one? Could he have a sip off of whatever we were drinking (kratom tea) etc... 

He apologized to me for the situation with Lilly that had arose when he "went down." It was a chance for me to be vindicated a bit over having come across as kind of a jerk for running him off a few times. Jacob and I are a duo; we've been working on our sound for a couple years. We've never rehearsed anything with you and would thus be just winging it and having a ragged jam session; which is fine when just hanging out somewhere; but we're out here trying to make some money during these 3 short hours...or words to that effect that I would tell him. I'm sure Jacob was wondering what harm could come of letting him join us, and maybe looking at him while rolling his eyes, as if to say: I don't know why he can't be more accepting of people, excuse him for being a boomer, set in his ways and close-minded....I apologize for him... 

Now, at least, Elijah realizes that I wasn't just using Lilly as an excuse to not have to play with other people besides Jacob...

I kept looking over at the guy whose been listening for 57 years, for some kind of indication on Elijah. As he and Jacob talked, I checked to see if the old guy would shake his head or make the finger across the throat gesture. For, if anyone would know that the guy is bad news and to be avoided, it would be that guy. But he gave me no warning glances.

After I came out of Rouses Market with my first beer of the day -a "hazy" IPA of some sort- Elijah was sitting next to Jacob with his guitar out, and asking for "a low 'e'" to tune to. And we were suddenly a trio, without myself having been consulted.

All the conditions were right for me to just let the matter go; there was no Lilly enforcing a 2 musician limit at the spot, the guy had just gotten out of jail and seemed to have cleaned up from whatever mess he was in that had landed him there, the sun had finally sunken behind the buildings across the street putting us in some blessed shade....
I couldn't hear Elijah hardly at all on the other side of Jacob and the amp, which had been placed as far from the mic as possible to eliminate feedback. So I just tried to play my best along with Jacobs bass notes, which I could hear.
Then, of course, a 20 dollar bill went into the case. Was it $10 for Jacob and I, or was it $6.66 for all three of us?

Thankfully, Jacob had broached the subject of tips while I had been in Rouses, with Elijah having said that he didn't want "his share" of the tip jar.

I wound up getting another beer, a Foster's Ale in the "oilcan," and then, as if the penalty for each beer is one more party-crasher, up walked a another musician, who probably lacked the skill to make a living busking on his own corner, but who could certainly blend in with a group (for a share of the tip jar).

He had a story. Doesn't every skeezer have one? He had just had a near death experience, complete with the tunnel of light, and the voice of his his mother telling him to turn around an go back -there are people who need to be skeezed, God has plans for you; your work on earth isn't finished, type of thing....

He was a likeable guy; but I couldn't help wondering what he was even playing, since he was even further away from me than Elijah; and I couldn't help wondering what a Grateful Dead concert would be like if, by the second set there were a half dozen random hippies on various instruments jamming away on Morning Dew, whom Jerry had said: "I see you brought your mandolin (flute, zither, trumpet) come on up and join in; the more the merrier!" to.

I didn't have to be able to hear how the 4 of us sounded. The old man got up and started walking off to somewhere else. I caught up to him around the corner and said: "We ain't no Doreen's Jazz Band, huh?"

He said we were alright but: "Just don't mess with my spot..." That was kind of funny because after we first got there, we had considered setting up there because it was in the shade....