Sunday, November 21, 2004
Heartbreak in the Honky Tonk
I've been to Nashville twice and twice I've left Nashville. But once again, I feel like I've left my heart in some saloon on Broadway, reeling like the old 45s in that beat-up jukebox by the cigarette machine.
And the stories that those jukeboxes could tell -- they're all filled with the greats: Johnny Cash, Marty Robbins, Bill Monroe, Hank Williams, Ernest Tubbs, Patsy Cline. And while Broadway is maybe the only place in Nashville while you'll really hear live country being performed and appreciated (meaning, that's where the city sends its tourists), you know that the old timin' ghost riders in the sky are still hanging around. Because Broadway is really all about what country wants to be, a lot of neon, a lot of Pabst Blue Ribbon, a lot of pompadour, a lot of drawl and maybe a little bit of humble flair. For a full history of country, walk past the bars with names like Tootsie's Purple Lounge and Robert's Western Saloon till you get to Hatch Show Print, where antique, custom-made, hand-perfected posters of shows plaster the exposed-brick, from the Stanley Brothers to Loretta Lynn.
Many people call and think of the Ryman Auditorium -- home of the Grand Ole Opry before it moved to the kitsch of Opryland -- as the "Mother Church" of country music. It's true. You sit on pews made of solid wood and it makes you stay upright. You're afraid to let your attention stray because the person next to you is close enough to know you're yawning. But when Ryan Adams began to play, that's when we knew that the good word about music being a religious experience is true. You feel it as it surges through the wooden floor, shaking down your frame as it muscles up through your oaken perch, coursing across the auditorium like an electrified sermon. Ryan was on his Sunday best behaviour -- no tantrums, no childish tomfoolery, no gibberish, no false starts and nothing but perfect singing and playing. Plugged and unplugged, blowing the harmonica and Jerry Lee Lewis-tip toeing on the ivories, he delivered a set covering all but the "Rock and Roll" album. For both the believers and the non-believers, Ryan was a preacher you couldn't trust, but his shortcomings and his devilish band, the Cardinals, saved your soul. Some musicians make albums named "Grace," Ryan Adams makes albums named "Love is Hell." But the fact remains that he's up on stage, and we were down there.
Coasting the set lists, it seems like St. Louis got a show full of character and Omaha got a three hour 10-minute set on this tour. But these weren't shows with hometown emotion. There's nothing like playing in the town where you made it. Ryan Adams genuinely happy and proud to be playing live, everyone singing along to every song in a sort of just-loud-enough hymnful mantra? You'd think it'd never happen in your lifetime. JC must have been smiling down with pride.
Here I am, back up north of the Mason-Dixon and missing tea sweet as honey on the vine and chicken so fried it must've come from scrambled eggs. Listening to Marty Robbins singing about the story of his life, pink carnations and white gardenias and towns with names like El Paso. And I'm thinking that I might be crazy, crazy for feeling so lonely.
And the stories that those jukeboxes could tell -- they're all filled with the greats: Johnny Cash, Marty Robbins, Bill Monroe, Hank Williams, Ernest Tubbs, Patsy Cline. And while Broadway is maybe the only place in Nashville while you'll really hear live country being performed and appreciated (meaning, that's where the city sends its tourists), you know that the old timin' ghost riders in the sky are still hanging around. Because Broadway is really all about what country wants to be, a lot of neon, a lot of Pabst Blue Ribbon, a lot of pompadour, a lot of drawl and maybe a little bit of humble flair. For a full history of country, walk past the bars with names like Tootsie's Purple Lounge and Robert's Western Saloon till you get to Hatch Show Print, where antique, custom-made, hand-perfected posters of shows plaster the exposed-brick, from the Stanley Brothers to Loretta Lynn.
Many people call and think of the Ryman Auditorium -- home of the Grand Ole Opry before it moved to the kitsch of Opryland -- as the "Mother Church" of country music. It's true. You sit on pews made of solid wood and it makes you stay upright. You're afraid to let your attention stray because the person next to you is close enough to know you're yawning. But when Ryan Adams began to play, that's when we knew that the good word about music being a religious experience is true. You feel it as it surges through the wooden floor, shaking down your frame as it muscles up through your oaken perch, coursing across the auditorium like an electrified sermon. Ryan was on his Sunday best behaviour -- no tantrums, no childish tomfoolery, no gibberish, no false starts and nothing but perfect singing and playing. Plugged and unplugged, blowing the harmonica and Jerry Lee Lewis-tip toeing on the ivories, he delivered a set covering all but the "Rock and Roll" album. For both the believers and the non-believers, Ryan was a preacher you couldn't trust, but his shortcomings and his devilish band, the Cardinals, saved your soul. Some musicians make albums named "Grace," Ryan Adams makes albums named "Love is Hell." But the fact remains that he's up on stage, and we were down there.
Coasting the set lists, it seems like St. Louis got a show full of character and Omaha got a three hour 10-minute set on this tour. But these weren't shows with hometown emotion. There's nothing like playing in the town where you made it. Ryan Adams genuinely happy and proud to be playing live, everyone singing along to every song in a sort of just-loud-enough hymnful mantra? You'd think it'd never happen in your lifetime. JC must have been smiling down with pride.
Here I am, back up north of the Mason-Dixon and missing tea sweet as honey on the vine and chicken so fried it must've come from scrambled eggs. Listening to Marty Robbins singing about the story of his life, pink carnations and white gardenias and towns with names like El Paso. And I'm thinking that I might be crazy, crazy for feeling so lonely.
// posted by Desiree @ 10:36 PM 
