It was a night to remember. D'lilah Monroe danced across the top of the bar, wearing a black lace sheath dress and crooning "Fever". But I'd better begin with the beginning.
The Chazz Cats kindly sent me e-mail to say that they'd be at the Albion Club in SF on Sunday night, recording for their new album. The show starts at 5pm, so I take out the Thomas Guide and notice that the Albion is at 16th and Valencia, about two blocks from the 16th and Mission Bart station. My immediate thought? "No need to stay sober!"
Dissolve to the Colma Bart station, where I park and slip a PG Wodehouse book ("Laughing Gas" - it's a good one) into my pocket. I take the train. It's not the A-Train, it's the Baypoint... but it lead to jazz, and I read Wodehouse along the way.
Straight out of the 16th and Mission station is a lanky gentlemen with a guitar, who'd like to play a song that was given to him _directly_ by JESUS. It's not a very good song. I accidentally walk a couple blocks down Mission, then turn around and walk uphill on 16th.
This is not the classiest area of San Francisco. Besides the man who has accepted Jesus as his personal songwriter, the sidewalks offer a wide variety of drunk or stoned young men. They look completely unemployable, and I'm reminded of how Bukowski's father used to tell him that he'd end up like that one day. He did, too.
The Albion is near the old Roxy Theater - nice architecture. The Albion is on the next corner. But it's only 4pm, and I notice that there's a Jack's Bar one block down and opposite. I'm pretty sure that this is the same Jack's Bar that Julie took us to at least a year ago. It was about a twenty block walk from her house, and we kept asking if we were there yet. I think Ed and I tried to find it again a couple months later, but Julie couldn't tell us the street, and she wouldn't come with us. So we wandered around for a while and then went back to her place.
But I digress. The point is that I go into Jack's and ask the barkeep for a good pale ale. Jack's has over 50 beers on draft; he names four, and then serves me a typically north-western overhopped brew. Then I have a Celt's Ale, which is somewhat better. It's a Sunday afternoon, so the crowd consists of 4 other guys, all locals.
It's time to go across the street to the Albion. D'lilah is already in front, arguing with the club manager. Apparently she needs more than four electrical outlets for the show - surprising, since I saw them play a midnight jam at High Sierra with _no_ electricity. But she's an engineer, dammit - she _must_ know what she's doing.
I settle into the bar and order a draft Guinness from the bartender (apparently Billy Idol is out of work and falling back on mixology). He also has Snowshoe Weizen on tap - direct from Arnold, California. The house music is horrible reggae, with TVs in either corner, so I tip the bartender to kill the video and sound both. "I'd rather hear the band tune." Now it's quiet enough to go talk to the bass player (Tom Drohan) about his recording rig - an 8-track Alesis digital deck. I'd like one of those...
They play three sets, about 45 minutes each. The show is free, but they pass a champagne cooler (one of the old-fashioned chrome ones) during the breaks. There's a good jam with a guest musician on washboard ("Not one of those Japanese washboards! This is a pre-CBS, 1962 vintage Fender washboard!"). The bartender and I reach a silent meeting of minds, and the Guinness keeps coming.
D'lilah slinks up to the bar after the first set, and orders a Manhattan (or maybe a Gibson - anyway, not a vodka martini). She's wearing a black lace sheath dress - with a body-tone slip underneath, and a black feather boa. I ask if she could sing Route 66, and she asked if I'd seen the webcast on Saturday. I hadn't - "It was at 4pm - I was barely awake then."
"Us too. And I've been in this dress since 8am. We had a photo shoot this morning. I can't wait to get home, get into some sweats, and watch the X Files."
Shudder. "Were you shooting liner notes for the new album?" I asked.
"No, just publicity. So you saw us at High Sierra?"
"Yep, both times. It's a shame your main stage show was so short. Coming again?"
"We're booked for it. We're signed up for a set in the tent this time, too."
"Bring some sunblock this time - you and Greg were bright red!"
D'lilah just touches the tip on her nose and nods.
"Well, keep up those Fats Waller tunes. That's great stuff."
So she goes back on stage and starts with "Come and Get It" - after announcing that they are the Chazz Cats, "All Fats Waller, all the time!" The band keeps blowing, and people keep peeking in the door with those "What the HELL is going on in there?" expressions. Some of them stay. The second set finishes on "Route 66", with D'lilah pointing down the bar and announcing it "by request from YOU - I don't know your name, you're just YOU."
During the next set break the "fabulous Monroe sisters" (I'd only seen one of them before) sit down next to me, and we talk about this and that. I ask about club dates around Thanksgiving, but they don't know. Then they do a song or two in the third set. For the encore, D'lilah dances down the bar and back, while crooning "Fever".
I don't think I've ever seen an engineer move like that.
After the show I drink a cup of coffee. It may be the Mission, but there are more coffee shops that bars.... Then I slide back onto the train, and go home.
Damn - I missed the Simpsons.
So I make my own entertainment - a bottle of sweet Reisling, and a wok full of Thai chicken with basil, garlic, and a plump habanero chile. Mmmmmm - napalm.
©1997 Michael Blakeley