Wrapping it all up

Well, I wrapped up my fifth live recording in a year and a half yesterday. Grey November Day has now joined The Wine and the Song, Mighty Grace, and Carpenter's Gothic in post-production, and together they will be released as a four album set, Sky Above and Earth Below- the follow-up to last year's Evergreen. In the process I will have met my goal: to put as many of my songs as possible onto CDs in live settings so that both my catalogue and my credibility are established. Hooray..

As for last night: to be honest, I really thought that my first set was a little sketchy, and I felt like I was down 3-0 after the first period of a critical game. But that being said, I always feel poor about my performances on a recording night. I get nervous in ways I never do for an ordinary gig. In reflection, I may have to drop a couple of songs, but that always happens. On the other hand, an extremely warm audience responded with great enthusiasm to some of the tunes, so what the hell do I know, anyway?

I came out of the first set feeling peeved at myself, but determined not to lose the whole game. Thankfully, I had a great bunch of musicians to help me put it over the top: Sarah Ternoway on bass, Gregg Lawless on lead guitar, Scott Vernon on drums and Aengus Finnan even joined us on backup vocals for one tune. With their talent and energy and my dogged insistence on pulling the damned thing off in the end, we managed to really fire it up for the second set.

We closed with a barn-burner version of one of my goofiest tunes, "The Old Man's Workshop," complete with mixed-up lyrics, audience interaction, train-wreck ending and all the great emotion that makes live performances so much fun.

I was reminded a couple of times that I should do more goofy stuff. I was reminded about 30 times that people really listen to lyrics. And I was reminded continually, all night long, that music matters immensely to people, and that it's best heard in small rooms with a crowd that cares and musicians who can make it feel real. I reminded myself that it had all been worth it, and that this manic year and a half of effort and ego and fire and frustration had payed off in the end, on the last night, in a good place, with great people.

Just remind me not to do any more of these. Studio, here I come...