Miscellaneous

HLSR

By Chris Stevenson

Went to see John Fogerty at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo on Wednesday night.  The way it's set up is the doors to the stadium open up at 6:45 and the rodeo goes on for a couple of hours.  They have all of the events you expect:  saddle bronc riding, team calf roping, steer wrestling, barrel racing, bull riding, etc.  We got there in time to see the very last bull rider.  Nothing exciting happened, which means the guy on the bull didn't get his guts stomped out or paralyzed.  We also saw the wagon races where a miniature conestoga wagon pulled by a team of four horses and sponsored by Kroger or WaMu or IWMarks jewelers runs around a circular track of safety cones.  Last was the calf scramble, where a bunch of country high school kids from FFA groups around the state try to catch a calf and bring it into a marked area on the ground.  It sounds easier than it is, mainly because the arena is so big.  Some of those kids gave it up to catch those calves.  Full on tackling and rolling around in the dirt and shit.  But anyway, John Fogerty.  I love me some Creedence, so it was cool to hear all of the old hits:  Born on the Bayou, Bad Moon Rising, Fortunate Son, etc.  He played almost all of the hits.  He is a very polished performer and he has a very distinctive voice, even when he speaks.  Of course, I'm paying attention to weird details.  There was one song where he was supposed to play the harmonica and the first time he went to play it I think he actually had it backward on his mouth.  It was supposed to be a harmonica part of the song, but he cut it off after he fucked it up.  The band didn't miss a beat.  He picked up the harmonica again later in the song, but he just couldn't get it right and he threw it down on the stage.  I think he was pissed off, but I doubt many people saw that.  Dude also changed guitars a lot.  He had a guitar shaped like a baseball bat to play "Centerfield."  The roadie in charge of tuning and bringing the guitars out to him after nearly every song was Johnny-on-the-Spot.  The stage at the rodeo is this mobile rotating stage that they set up in the middle of the arena, so it's set apart from the stands by a good distance.  So you feel separated from the musicians.  But all in all, it was a good show.  The real treat, though, was the free concert after Fogerty at "The Hideout," which is a stage set up inside the Astrodome.  It was pretty cool being on the floor of the Astrodome, but even cooler than that was the free show was Billy Joe Shaver.  For those who don't know, BJS is in the pantheon of Outlaw Country singers and songwriters.  He's got a few songs out there that you'd recognize and he's written songs for some of the biggest stars out there.  But more than that, he's sincere.  He's got a genuine smile on his face most of the time.  He's been through the wringer - lost a couple of fingers on one hand, lost his son to a heroin overdose in 2000, lost his wife and mother to cancer within a couple of months of each other - but now he's got Jesus and he's okay.  He must've quit drinking a while back because he made the comment, "If yer not drinkin' water, yer oughter."  He also described a song as "belt buckle shining music," which I thought was funny as hell.  He's a bit of a goofy guy too.  During one song that had to do with birds or wings or something, he kept flapping his arms like wings forever.  It was almost embarrassing.  He dances around without the best moves (he almost stumbled once) and he makes some awkward gestures while performing.  But one thing you know for sure is that the man is sincere and he's one of the best songwriters I've ever heard.  And I'll take that over stage presence any day of the week.

Full post as published by Cursed With Ambition on March 14, 2008 (boomark / email).