well, this past weekend found me lucky enough to, again, get to see Jeff Tweedy play in a basement in front of about 30 people. See, I have some friends (Sam, Sooz, and Laura) who, along with some other big Wilco fans, donate money to the charity Letters To Santa (a cause for which I made a mash-up CD for their mix CD auction last year) and Jeff comes to their house to play songs for them.

Last year I was lucky enough to play the night before at a house party there and they asked if I wanted to come the next day to see Jeff play. I, needless to say, obliged. This year they asked if I wanted to record it (the person who did last year, i guess couldn't make it this time).. anyhow, so I got to see Jeff play yet again (in amazingly intimate environs) for not a thing. Pretty sweet yes? I surely think so.

Anyway..
On to the show... he played for something like two and a half hours (he must have been seriously exhausted afterward), telling stories and talking with everyone. Everybody in the room got to call out a song they wanted him to play, passing the task off each time to the next person. I was not expecting to be (or better to say deserving to be) included in this as I was the "recording engineer" but I got the last pick. I requested "Late Greats" and he played a beautiful version of it.

SO.. after that he started a sing-a-long type segment where people came up and played guitars with him. After a while, I was coerced (or better to say physically dragged by Sooz) up there to play along on a spare acoustic guitar. After a few songs with Jeff, myself, and a few other folks (i think 5 all together), they requested the song "Out On The Weekend" by Neil Young. Now.. i thought it smelled a bit fishy, since Sooz had asked me to play that a few of my shows before (since I had played it previously when she wasn't there).. but whether or not it was intentional.. I ended up playing it just me and Jeff. I was a quite nervous and could not remember the structure of the song (as it had been nearly a year since I had played it last).. but I fumbled through it with him as everybody in the room sang (they did most of the singing actually.. my voice didn't seem to want to do much). It was fun, and certainly a very big surprise.

The whole evening was definitely a treat (thank you to Sam, Sooz, and Laura).
A good time and for a great cause.

(I would however like to curse the name of Pro-Tools though.. as it reliably froze every 5:08 into a record time.. making recording the show somewhat of a nightmare.. but alas.. )

That's all for now-Devin