[Harp-L] Fabulous Thunderbirds in PA - my report

[Robb Bingham <robbingham@xxxxxxxxx>]

Just saw Kim Wilson put on the best harmonica show
I've ever seen. And he did it for about 100 of the
drunkest, most boring riff-raff I've ever even seen
[well, since my French, camper-seaside gigs]. 

I fully expected him to phone it in when he saw how
empty the house was- but I'm telling you he blew the
roof off. I kept looking around to see if maybe the
place had filled up. Nope. But didn't matter.

He played [man I hope it was recorded] what I'm
calling ~Kim's Boogie~ for over half an hour. He
played chords and melody at the same time while
bending notes on both sides. He did three encores. He
played without any mic, while standing on the edge of
the stage. Generous. That's the word that came to
mind. The older crowd had a core of ~Blues Fest~
followers but most of them were finishing off a
datenight and would talk and hop up to get more beer.
But I'm telling you he kicked ass from start to finish
like it was a sold out stadium tribute to him. Never
stopped. Never once. The best blues I've heard; and
I've seen a bunch.

Afterwords the whole band hawked T-shirts and CD's to
very drunk, obnoxious people. They didn't even know
their names! [~Hey! Drummer Guy!? Gimme a stick man!?
C'mon!~]. I don't know, I was sober and the whole
thing made me wonder about this business- - - but
enough of that [I mean, these fans were happy with the
warm-up band!- which was a Jackson Browne Cover Band
who sang off key and made up even worse lyrics then
the originals]. 

So afterwords I asked him about his rig. At the same
time some guy asked him to sign a poster- which turned
out to be a Buddy Guy poster. Kim handed it back and
asked for the right one: He asked if Buddy Guy was
really coming here [yes] and commented that he had no
control over the sound and rented the amps's because
of that [so, ~Good luck to Buddy~], but he was using a
re-issue Bassman [I think] and a ~Fender Deville~
[Blues Deville?] with some kind of feedback eater and
interface between them. Doesn't matter because he
wasn't happy with the set up. He played through a
JT-30 which I'm sure was an original crystal favorite.
Lots of the time he played through the vocal mic, and,
like I said, a couple times he used no mic. The only
time I saw him ~worry~ the sound/set-up, was the first
tune, where he signaled for a long time that he wanted
more monitor. I tried asking specifics but my heart
wasn't into it. He'd worked so freaking hard, and I 
was really sick of the beer sloshing down my back from
the idiot behind me who kept saying that he noticed
that he had two amps too, ~Must be expensive, Dude!~.
The band was as good as it gets [except maybe a little
too much showcasing of the keys- but that was a big
crowd pleaser]. All I know is that i sat in the front
row for the harp solos and saw the guy work harder
than James Brown. It was an honor to observe it.

That's my report. I feel like I've just seen Little
Walter in his prime. Better, in MHO.
Robb


		
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