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This started when John Atwater, who owns Mo Daddy’s, walked into the Asheville Wine Market (where I am gainfully employed) to buy some wine. I happened to have a MoTwang business card, and I laid it down in front of him and said, “When you have a place called Mo Daddy’s, you really need a band called MoTwang.” To my complete astonishment, he said “We’re booking the first quarter, is January 31 okay?” Now Mo Daddy’s is mostly known as a blues joint, but the Drive By Truckers are at the Orange Peel that night, and Mo Daddy’s is right up the street, and I think he was hoping we’d pull some after-concert traffic.

Also, it turns out John is a fan of pedal steel guitar, and of course Larry plays that instrument, in fact he’s what you might call a phenomenal player, doesn’t sound like anybody else. So that was a plus, too.

And now it turns out that there’s this sorta famous documentary-maker who is including me in a little video project about people who’ve changed careers, and they want to come out and shoot some video at the gig.

So I’m just letting people know that it would be really great if they came out to see us, and if it were just one time, this would be the time, and anyway it might be enjoyable to hear Roanne sing “Save me from the people tryin’ to save my soul” while enjoying a chicken waffle. Also to hear Larry do his ferocious thing on pedal steel; also to hear Ray get into his crazy Hendrix mode on “Crash Landing,” and hear him sing “Columbus” in his Chris Isaak/Tom Waits voice and even hear me pretend I’m Delbert McClinton on “Two More Bottles of Wine.”

I play bass okay, and once upon a long time ago I could do a credible imitation of Mike Bloomfield imitating B.B. King on the electric guitar. I love playing acoustic guitar, so it’s a real shame I’m so bad at it. My friends who can really play have a saying: “Your left hand is what you know; your right hand is who you are.” Well, I’m nobody, who are you?

These thoughts came to mind as we started discussing adding a short set of acoustic music to our live show. Ray found a couple versions of “Hard Times Come Again No More,” a beautiful Stephen Foster song. We’ll probably model our version on one by the McGarrigles (along with Emmylou Harris, Rufus Wainwright (lookin’ a little spaced-out, there…) and other luminaries too numerous to mention), although the one I like best is by Mavis Staples. I also find it amusing that in my upside-down postmodern brain, Stephen Foster reminds me a lot of Randy Newman (If Stephen Foster were alive today, maybe he’d have written “Sail Away.”)

Anyway, it’ll be interesting. Harmonizing with Roanne and Ray is always an adventure for me; she’s got the Big Voice, and he can sing the Really Hard Intervals. It’s probably the hardest job I have in the band, and of course the most rewarding when it works.

Oh, and speaking of “acoustic” performance, check out Jerry Jeff Walker interviewing Steve Earle, followed by Steve doing “Copperhead Road” all by his lonesome with a mandolin–proof, in my opinion, that when you’re a real rock’n'roller, you can get over without plugging anything in at all.

So I was cruising around YouTube looking for nothing in particular when I remembered the first pro rock’n'roller I ever met. I’d been playing bass behind a folk duo; they’d caught the attention of producer Jeff Katz. We were having some kind of getting-to-know-you meeting, when this kid walked into Katz’s office for a moment. His name was Jamie Lyons, and he was the lead singer of a one-hit-wonder band called “The Music Explosion.” The one hit, of course, was “Little Bit ‘O Soul.” It has just now occurred to me that this entry was planned to impress us kids from Long Island. It worked, although nothing ever came out of it.

I looked him up, and one of the things I found was Tom Petty turning this old bar-band chestnut into a big production. I sent it to everybody in the band, thinking they’d be as impressed as I was with what ol’ Tom had done with the song. What did I get back? Complete snarkiness. Roanne’s was best: “I’m votin for the jacket, vests, suspenders, and we all need some snake skin boots!!” Eric volunteered that he still had a pair of leather pants somewhere. Ray–always practical in these matters–pointed out the extra-musical aspects of Petty’s show, with a link to cheap stage lighting.

Anyways, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for any kinda showbiz at a MoTwang show. We’re hopelessly old fashioned: We like to get up there, sing and play as hard as we can, and hope against hope that somebody might actually get drunk enough to get up and dance.

P.S.: Here’s a link to Jamie Lyons, the pride of Mansfield, Ohio, lip-synching his way into pop history.

It’s been a long time since August 23rd, the last time we were in front of an audience (College Street Pub). Since then, we’ve lost Rick Frieling to a Big Job in Macon, GA, auditioned some drummers, and found Eric Schweitzer. Eric’s a Black Mountain native–first member of MoTwang who is actually from around here. He’s nice and solid, and has a sparkly drumkit (we like sparkle) and used to make a living as a magician. Maybe he’ll saw one of us in half?

Anyway, we’ll be at Mo Daddy’s on Saturday, January 31st. Mo Daddy’s is on Biltmore Avenue, right next to Mamacita’s. To everyone who’s supported us, and asked after us over the past few months: Please come on out and bring your friends! We have new songs, a great new drummer, and of course Larry will be on the umpteenth revision of his rig, and he’ll be happy to explain what all those little blue and red lights are all about.

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