JERICHO ROAD SHOW 2010 OUTSTANDING LIVING Tour-Thanks Y'all!

[Rambling Steve Gardner]

JERICHO ROAD SHOW 2010 OUTSTANDING LIVING Tour Thanks Y'all! This year's tour members included-Steve Gardner, Bill Steber of the Jake Leg Stompers, Cody Ruth, Dudley Tardo of the Mississippi House Rockers, Big Steve Gardner and special guest John Dunnaway of the Midnight Shift and Erik Trauner of the Mojo Blues Band, Austria. Well it was some hard travelin' through the sunny south where some say, "the women provide warmth in winter and a good shade in summer." (The men too.) But all in all the 2010 JERICHO ROAD SHOW tour was a very LARGE and good time indeed...yet indeed I sometimes felt the part of the stranger in a strange land...or at least someone who was stranger than most. This year we crisscrossed the south, running the roads from top to bottom...the new roads that have paved over or just plain by-passed the old memory lanes. We traveled the new express roads. Fast roads, running snake like, without sign post marking the way back to the familiar past, the pre-911 past, those places that lie in the sunshine of a memory bright and an out look dim. Pull out the map. Shine the light somewhere between what used to be and what might have been. I guess that we just can't get there from here. I need a new map. I passed over a country covered in large expanses of concrete and asphalt, states colored red or blue filled with blacks, whites and browns. Places where the good humor man totes a fire arm because the kids and grown ups want crack flavored ice cream...with sprinkles. Or guarded gated communities with talk radio sound tracks blaring fear and division full bore at a pace the North Koreans would have been proud to claim as their own. Homeland Security? Off the road, in the darkness and the quiet, the time of sharp notes and flat shadows, I could sometimes hear the echo of that old time used to be. I could taste it ever so faintly in the dark water flowing south or glimpse it etched somewhere down deep in the headstones and mile markers that were not unlike the stones in my passway. The old people say that you can never twice put your hand into the same water of the flowing river. But you can enjoy where you are and when you are as you strive to be your best self on your worst day. I turned onto the back roads. I turned off my radio. I opened my eyes. Good people everywhere just waiting for a chance to prove it. We found that there was always something new, exciting and fun just waiting to happen! Drag out a guitar and the race is on! We met so many very good and very interesting folks out there. Most of our shows this round went really well. Life wise and Music wise, people seem to be starving for something "real"...I'm not sure how real we are, but I can guarantee that we don't come out of a box and weren't made from a mix. Hell our National Guitars weigh almost as much as the X-tra large, refillable BIG GULP cola sold at most filling stations....and that's saying something. Saying something? That's what I have missed most, I think, as I ramble around these days thinking to myself, " Where are all of those old guys, the talkers?" Where are the old guys that we used to over hear talking outside of church, telling jokes and lies? Making stories. I just didn't hear too many good stories this time around but we damn sure left them with something to talk about! WE kicked things off in Meridian and then Jackson at my sister, Renee's, home festival. Daddy a.k.a. BIG STEVE, who played on the new WOOLY BULLY EXPRESS record, sat in with us. Big Fun. About 80 people came out for the event. It was great to see friends and family gathered up out in the yard, drinking beer and finally dancing in a conga line to Walkin' The Dog. We then headed back over to Meridian where we hooked up with Erik Trauner and his wife, from Austria-The Mojo Blues Band, at the Jacky Jack show...which is Live Radio and broadcast on Public television around the south. We played for about 700 at the Temple Theater. MORE Big fun. We had the Stage Hands, two young black back up singers, a young Jimmy Rogers look alike on the same show along with an Elvis look alike who only sang "serious" gospel tunes and didn't wiggle too much in his tight, form fitting jump suit which showed off his 79 year old physique. Then Up into the Delta for the Sunflower River Blues festival, WABG Awesome AM Greenwood with POE and Tomomi, WABG TV Greenville with Sade Turnipseed, da House Indianola, Down to Vicksburg two shows for the Vicksburg Blues Society, Two shows in Florida-Blazzues Blues'N Jazz Club and the Naked Grape, Two shows in Hattiesburg-the farmer's Market and the Thirsty Hippo, then down to New Orleans where we did Peggy Lou's two hour LIVE radio show on WWOZ, Saturday 10-midnight. New Orleans in August- it was HOT as hell down there but WWOZ/Peggy Lou are two of OUR FAVORITES...well worth it! Peggy Lou's show was the usual show-flat out 100mph start and we played the whole two hours live, non stop. The studio was full of friends and fans. The crazy cook Troy and his wife Mockingbird, from the Country Club, ( a clothing optional swimming and dinning establishment in town) showed up in the WWOZ studio too. They have taken a liking to us over the past couple of years that we have been recording down there. As appreciation for us and our music they took all of our breakfast orders-everything from crab cakes and French Toast to steak and eggs- and put together a feast which they sent over to our motel the next morning. (Many more days like that and we will all be shopping for new pants! Or maybe an Elvis jump suit.) All kinds of places brought out all kinds of crowds from young to old and all racial mixes- for the most part good response...especially to Bill Steber's saw and Big Steve. But we haven't sold as many Cd's as I had hoped. A sign of the hard economic times I'm afraid. We had Dudley Tardo of the Mississippi House Rockers on drums most of the time. Dudley does an outstanding job on our new record, WOOLY BULLY EXPRESS. In Pensacola, our friends and local Roots players, Betsy Badwater and Lang Hollowman sat in. Those two played a lot of "hobo" percussion-rail road spikes, tin cans, washboard, kitchen sinks, hub caps and even a duck decoy. Lang also ripped the strings off of the guitar. In Clearwater at the Naked Grape We a guest drummer from the all girl band, the Sweater Puppets helped us pull the Wooly Bully right down to the beach. In Hattiesburg, Cody Ruth booked us at the Farmer's Market and took advantage of the USM back to school rush. We played the late show at the Thirsty Hippo for a mixed crowd of under and over graduate type students. They never knew what hit 'em.... We then headed northeast to Alabama where we did seven shows in a single day for Alabama high school students. I did a History of American Roots and Blues, like those shows that I do in Tokyo for the US State Dept. It was a lot of work but I think that the students got into it and had never seen so many strange and interesting instruments that were played without electricity. We played the next night over at the University of Alabama for the first in their series of Public Television performances on Southern Music. (Six of our tunes were included in a compilation CD entitled, "Music From The New South".) I played a couple of solo shows back in Jackson and then played Pucket's in Nashville with Bill Steber and the Jake Leg Stompers. Those guys are good! Finally a solo show in Memphis....then....Back to Tokyo Sept 12! I am still recovering and trying to decide how to make it all count and get better at what I amdoing....whatever that is. I really appreciate all of you who have hung on for the ride and help me find the meaning in the words and the song in the wind. Steve Gardner Tokyo 9/2010

[Allan Murphy]

Hi Steve - thanks for telling it the way it is. I sure like your old saying about not being able to put your hand twice in the water of a flowing river. I found that when I went "home" to Vancouver in August for 2 weeks. Things change and we change living over here - but the basic things are still fine. Looking forward to catching up with you "soon". Allan