How can you not love a club that has this on their regular menu? "Painted Pony"- This selection is captive on the carousel of time, using only seasonal, local produce.
We (Ashara, Smurf, Chris Treacy, Maggie, Anne, ChuckE, Jenny and her husband Eric) started off the evening with a great vegetarian dinner. The show started about 35 minutes late, but we didn't care too much- we were enjoying the company! The manager of Club Passim started with "The good news is there are 25 people playing tonight. The bad news is they are all playing Big Yellow Taxi!" Hmmm.....sounds a bit like the covers project! Actually, the whole evening was very much like a compilation of Bob's cover project- some performances were GREAT, some were good, some underwhelming, and some we were rolling our eyes at. Without further a do........... 1) Carl Cacho- Help Me: He was just OK. Kind of Bob Dylanish sounding to me. 2) Rob Seigel- Both Sides Now: "There are so many reasons to love Joni, the melody, chord texture, but the thing that struck me most at 12 years old were the lyrics." This versioon was very fast, almost "rock-like". Not for my taste. 3) Flora Reed- River: "I was reading an interview of Joni recently and read that she liked Nora Jones because she sang in an unambitious way. So, I will try to sing in an unambitious way for Joni." Flora has sort of a husky voice and had a bit of trouble reaching the high notes. Otherwise, not too bad. 4) Chris and Meredith Thompson- Big Yellow Taxi: "25 people are not going to do Big Yellow Taxi, but we are going to do it 25 times!" I've got to say that I am a little prejudiced on this one. I have seen this sister-duo several times and the band I am in has played at the same festival as them for several years. These two rock!! Their harmonies are split on, and they really have the rhythm. One sister plays guitar, and the other plays the djembe (hand drum). The picked this song because they felt it was topical, and sang "put away those pesticides please" instead of DDT. They passed out homemade shakers and let those that received them keep them after helping them out with the rhythm section. The crowd went wild, and they justly deserved it. 5) Joel Ninesling- Little Green: "When I think of Joni, the only word that comes to mind is 'rabid'." Joel drew out the notes to this song as well as the guitar, sometimes holding each note for 2 measures instead of one. A bit gravelly voice, but a pleasant cover nonetheless. 6) Stephanie Corby: Steph is a great singer/songwriter from Newburyport, and I've gotten to know her through singing at a Memorial for a woman killed in the 9-11 attacks. Unfortunately, she wasn't feeling well and wasn't able to make it. 7) Oen Kennedy- Black Crow: Oen started with explaining to us the scientific name for the crow, not to be confused with the raven. He was wondering if Joni knew about the 10,000 crow roost in neighboring Framingham, or if she was just using the crow as a metaphor. He did a very nice rendition of this song, complete with crow calls at the very end, which was a pretty cool touch. 8) Marc Herman- Boderline: "I'm a little nervous, but I think my guitar is more nervous with this alternate tuning stuff. This is a song that unfortunately will always be topical." This guy was a Les Ross look-alike, and had a very similar quiet sounding voice. *Very* nice!!! 9) Hanneke Cassel- Morning Morgantown: She is a wonderful fiddle player, and was joined by a guitarist and a mandolin player. Really nice redition of this song. It was instrumental except for the mandolin player singing one middle verse, and then doing some scat singing as well. A+ for this one! 10) Rose Polanski- Willy: "I actually have a friend on the JMDL. When I was trying to figure out what to play, Yael came to my house and played a bunch of stuff for me. She played Willy, a song I had never heard before, and she helped me find the tabs on the website." She played this one the piano, after saying that she doesn't have a piano at home, and had been playing it on the guitar all week. It was a nice interpretation of the song, and her piano playing wasn't bad, but I found her voice to be underwhelming and breathy. It really bothered me also that she took a breath in the middle of the word ancient. (An *breath* cient.) 11)Chris O'Brien- Come in From the Cold: "To recap, I'm just going to do a verse from each song that was played tonight. Actually, I started listening to my Joni albums, trying to decide which song to play. Two verses into this song, I called Matt to tell him I wanted to do this song. Then I went out to get a drink of water, and about 6 minutes later came back into the room and it was *still* playing!" Chris did a *great* job with this song, really one of my favorites of the evening. I thought his guitar work was great- got the "Joni guitar slap" down, and had a nice voice. Lots of great energy. Even though he forgot a verse at the end, he kept playing, said, "there's more" but than couldn't remember, so said he was going to end it, and did. Another A+ in my book. 12) Diane Zeigler: One of my favorite performers, but unfortunately with all the snow we had, wasn't able to make it down from VT. 13) Merrie Armstrong- Woodstock: "I must confess this is not my favorite song, but I thought it was appropriate considering the times." Merrie is a Kate Bennett look-alike, and even has a similar voice. She played an electric guitar, and used a lot of bass notes, which made it a very "dark" version. Interesting take on it, and felt like she captured the feeling of what is going on now. Part 2 tomorrow as it is past midnight, and I am going to turn into a pumpkin. Hugs, Ashara
