i miss nashville

i played this little place right outside nashville a couple times. i don't wanna mention the name. it doesn't matter. i played it a couple times. it was a roadhouse. not only was "roadhouse" in their name but it was also a legitimate roadhouse. if you went there during the day, i hear they serve a mean shredded chicken sandwich. i never experienced that. i always got there around 7pm. i played around 9pm each time in the basement beneath the diner. the scene there was something to behold. nothing to tell my mom or grandma v. about because it wasn't the grand ole opry... but then again, nothing is. it was just a basement with a basement sound and a small p.a. it had some cables and chords along the concrete walls and a small bar in the corner. it was big enough to fit about 30 people. intimate? yeah. intimate. you would say it was an intimate setting, but then again, for the amount of venues set up per capita in nashville, every venue is "intimate." it was something other than intimate, honestly.... cos it was in the woods and away from the streets and high rises and even music row, for that matter. it was a road house. the owner served up some very nice orange moonshine. ohio, don't even try to find anything comparable within your borders. please. it's not something you're supposed to be able to offer.

i played my songs there. original songs. that's what people came there for. the people came there for the people who had stories to sing about. not the people you'd know on radio though, because the dj's don't talk about them and they never play their cuts. oh, but they matter. will klmbrough, tommy womack, rodney crowell. they matter. they matter cos the stars you know sing their songs. cos the stars you know have nothing much to say about their own lives... they want to, but they can't express it with their pens the way some of the writers can. and those writers came to that roadhouse with their guitars. rarely did they bring a band. they may have brought some of their other writer friends, but they mostly just brought a guitar and set up a stool beside them to hold their drink of choice. they also brought their handful of fans.

i managed a retail music store in berry hill too. the stresses and pressure of retail is overwhelming enough to know to appreciate little dive bars playing old western music that never gets played on jukeboxes north of the ohio river and west of the mississippi. i won't mention the name of that bar either, but perhaps i should cos they would probably appreciate your business if you're ever in the nashville area. nonetheless, it was a place to unwind. it was a place to reflect with some of my friends. some of the only friends i had left. i bumped into colleagues and musicians and associates there... but i also ran into some of my secret idols. remember garth brooks' "low places"? of course you do. met the writer there. in the corner. playing the digital game thing. drunk. i didn't know it was him, because after all, in my world growing up, garth brooks did that song. :) no no no, he did not. he didn't do that song. the exploited the genius of that song, at best. love garth brooks, but come on, that song is epic and he didn't pen it. anyhow... met the dude. and he was drunk. and behold, he was in that dive bar living out the lyrics of his song. i immediately beheld him as something or someone i should probably never forget about, alone, in the corner, no one around, drunk. i don't think i envied someone so pitiful in my life. in that moment, i understood where he was. not mercy or sympathy, no... just understanding. i don't think it's a bad way to fade away at all. i don't even know what game he was playing... but i imagine he probably wasn't winning. and that's ok.

that old roadhouse has had so many more stars than i can name. a stage i'd rather be on than any other besides the tonight show's. it held the pain and struggle of those who fought the fates in order to get what they wanted and ultimately failed. i know that pain and i understand it even if i never went thru exactly what they went thru... i know how hard it is go thru a thing that is so incredibly big to express thru some kind of standard conversation... a pain so insurmountable... so indescribable, the only way you can attempt tp express it is thru something so much bigger than you... with chords and melody... ideas and emotions that are strictly singable, not conversational... at this point... if i die... that little basement at the roadhouse playing in front of people who care is my heaven... or perhaps in front of a digital poker game i keep feeding with my wallet... with someone across the bar playing pool who sees my back thru the fog of smoke and understands that there's no place i'd rather be... because after all, i expressed it all when i released that song... or that other song... and that's all that matters.