Cloaca Melodia

The Haunt, Ithaca, NY.....   add your own comments if you were also there!    

The Haunt, Ithaca, NY..... Such a great concert. Richman was performing as a trio with the Modern Lovers, and that really made this performance head and shoulders over all all of the other times I've seen Jonathan . (I've seen him in a guitar + drums configuration, and you might not think simply adding a bass would really flesh out the sound, but it did.)   Jonathan was touring in support of his latest album It's Time For , which featured one of songs that illustrates some of Jonathan's core principles that are foundational in his music: "Corner Store" (he re-recorded the song four years later for Jonathan Goes Country , but it was originally from  It's Time For ). "I know it costs more money to shop there but this was love, this was love," Jonathan croons on the song's bridge. "I know you had to pay more money, I'll pay money, I'll pay more. I don't care what the mall has got, I want back that corner store." Modernity ...

Colemans, Rome, NY...... My hometown friend Dave was attending Hamilton College in Clinton, NY, while I was at Ithaca College. He told me that The Beat Farmers were going to be playing near in in Rome (where my mother's side of the family is from). I didn't have a car, so I took a Greyhound to Utica and Dave picked me up. I've never been to the bar before or since, but it was a pretty standard type of wood-panelled bar with a lot of 4'x4' tables in front of the stage and standing area around the perimeter of the room. The band was just like the title of their later live album: Loud 'n' Plowed . Jerry Rainey and Buddy Blue were somewhat memorable, but it's hard to compete for brain-space when you've got a guy in the band like the late, legendary Country Dick Montana. Montana, the big guy dressed in a duster and cowboy hat behind the drum kit, punctuated his percussion with frequent shouts of "Hah!" He came out from behind the drums to ta...

The Haunt, Ithaca, NY..... The band's latest release was the "All Shook Up" single as their follow-up to their 1985 debut full-length Who Betrays Me...And Other Happier Songs . We were playing their Elvis cover heavily at my college radio station, WICB. In fact, we gave a lot of their songs heavy airplay! I don't really remember much about the show, except that they did indeed play "All Shook Up." But I recall having a good time, as well as having a conversation with singer Deena Shoshkes after the show.  

Ithaca College, Ithaca, NY I haven't written about this show, but here's a review of it from The Ithacan by my WICB colleague Scott Murphy.