Live and Local: Kell at the GO
Mike Kell is in the process of recording some music with our friends at Guernsey Beat Records. This may be a secret, but I don’t know why it would be. If it is, well, I guess I screwed up.
Since that cat’s out of the damn bag, I’ll go the next step and say that Mr. Kell was kind enough to invite me and my lovely companion to the storied Garyowen Irish pub last week to attend a session wherein a video recording of his performance was being made.
I don’t know when or where the studio recordings or the video will be released, but I will keep you posted, or perhaps Mike or Rob can respond to this and let us know, after Rob starts the process of suing me, or has Deano throw me a beatin’, for releasing classified info.
So, it was a night of mad geniuses, and pure Gettysburg music scene magic. I was flattered to have been invited.
First mad genius was Cody, the person doing the video work with several cameras and cool pro devices that he used to navigate the very small upstairs room of the GO with a pretty significant density of humanity to work around. He contorted and disappeared and showed up again, driving the whole thing while seeming like he wasn’t even there.
Rob and Llew were there as well, Rob being the poet in residence of Gettysburg mad geniuses and Llew being…well, Llew. Nuff said. And since Dean is probably already going to smack me anyway, I’ll also mention I heard a rumor that there could be some recordings coming from Llew as well. Here’s hoping.
Sticking with that theme, imagine my surprise as I’m sitting there trying not to bump any of Cody’s gear while I eat my Irish Country Salad with shrimp and sip my Smithwicks, when Mike Dempsey walks by. I’d just seen him the previous week playing piano with Sons of Pitches at a very cool garden outside a museum in Hagerstown…and there he is with a trumpet and the thing-like-a-keytar-but-you-blow-into-it-with-a-straw-thing-and-i-don’t-know-what-you-call-it.
Flippin’ amazing.
Continuing to speak of mad geniuses…if you see Kell, you probably See Troy and Sawyer…and there they were. Sawyer is a brilliant bass player, even in a town that has some bass players that…you know… are pretty goddamn good. And Troy makes a beat and percussion on so many different drums and boards and other things I don’t even know what they are. They are tight as shit and augment anything Kell does on that F hole guitar of his like they’ve seen it all a million times…which I guess they have. Every time I see them, I think they’re great, and am amazed that they put up with Kell’s bullshit as masterfully as they do.
Speaking of…
I have a habit of saying things that I later regret. Sometimes I regret them as soon as they come out of my stupid mouth, other times I think “yeah…that was ok” and later I find out what kind of bear trap I just stepped on with my face.
Loyal readers will recall I wrote something a while ago about the music of a certain period, about 30 years ago. I wasn’t positive about it. For example, the band Live and the word “suck” came up a few times. There are local musicians who disagree, and some (like Mike Kell, for instance), have made a habit now of seeing me in their gigs and dedicating a song or two to me that they know I’ll hate.
Now for Mat Morris, a situation like this is just Christmas coming early… but I don’t think Kell even likes these songs either!
So after this Kell video event, I was talking with my lovely companion and trying to compare Mike Kell to some other local musicians that we like, and I was struggling with it. During that conversation, I had also made the mistake of making fun of the “America’s Got Talent” type music judging shows. As I struggled, she pointed out that I sounded just like the Judges on those shows, so clearly I was just talking out of my ass.
Which I was, of course. She’s never wrong. It’s kind of what I do, after all.
So, with all that in mind, and without trying to be clever (I’ve already described to you how that usually goes), I’ll just say this. Mike Kell was brilliant last Thursday at the GO. I look forward to his upcoming Guernsey Beat recording, and I hope his video goes viral-as-all-hell. It should, because the set was great and Cody is a goddamn freak with those cameras. Plus, I root for him because Mike is my friend and a fellow asshole. The difference is he’s also among the mad geniuses.
Which reminds me. Anne was working the bar during this event, and while doing so, she literally stepped out from behind the bar to sing on one of Mike’s songs…which was fantastic because Anne is fantastic, but also because that is the most Gettysburg thing I can imagine happening.
I will let you know when I find out about the release of Kell’s album and videos (or you can check with Guernsey Beat if I’m not around because I’m hospitalized or something). Also, shout out to Stable Shakers and Sons of Pitches, who killed it last week with Dempsey down in Hagerstown. Lovely Companion and I were blown away. Also, was lucky enough to have a much-overdue Evan Crider sighting at that show. Always a pleasure, Brother.