Hoots & Hellmouth: February 4th, 2012

Hoots & Hellmouth

February 4^th, 2012

Elk Creek Cafe +Aleworks

Millheim, Pennsylvania

I only wished I had written of this experience while it was fresher in my memory.  This was the first concert of this year that I went to, taking place on February 4.  It was one of the best and most intimate concert experiences I have ever had.  I know that H&HM aren’t exactly a huge act that would draw an insanely large crowd, but I do believe that is why it was one of the best concert experiences of my life and I have come to really appreciate the small, intimate venue for concerts.    

For starters, the Elk Creek Café +Aleworks is a restaurant and ale house.  It is maybe 75 feet by 200 feet, and that is going by my horridly poor guestimated calculations.  It is essentially a restaurant, with a chimney in its center and a stage on the wall opposite the bar.  It is a very nicely lit and maintained establishment.  There was a logo for the cafe on the wall behind the stage.  The Alehouse is what it sounds like; it is a small microbrewery and restaurant.  We had the privilege of ordering and enjoying a wonderful meal prior to watching the show!

We ordered our meals and pitchers of ale and started the evening off.  I believe I had the bacon cheeseburger, if I remember correctly.  I think that a burger is a good menu item to try out at a new place to see how the food will be.  Though somewhat pricey for what we got, the food was definitely enjoyable.  The people I was with ordered a dozen wings, which they let me sample a few of as well as pitchers of ale for the evening.  The wings were some of the biggest I have ever eaten.  What I do remember the best is the delicious sauce that came with my burger.  I don’t know what it was for exactly, so I smeared some on my burger and proceeded to dip folded fries into it.  After a good full belly I started on some ale, which was a brown ale something or other that was on special in pitchers for the night.  The bar is also a microbrewery and they make all of their own beer.  The beer was quite delicious and I enjoyed a few foaming glasses throughout the evening.  On with the show!

The acoustics in this place were amazing.  The sound booth and man were right in front of our table so I watched intently as he and the guys messed with it earlier in the evening to get it just so.  I should mention that the place was so small, the band was hanging out the entire night at a table in the far corner to the right of the stage, which was probably about 20 to 30 feet away.  Pretty amazing.  Just wolfing down my burger checking out some musicians I find quite amazing.  A definite moment for the books (or blog)!  I wasn’t sure what to expect when the show started.  I had two of H&HM’s albums at the time and rather enjoyed both of them, though I had never seen them live.  I did not have their new album, Salt, which was only released a month or two prior to the concert.  Let the show begin.

So the room quiets down a bit and the lighting changes and they finally start into their very first song, which is Roll, Brandywine, Roll, followed by The Good I Know You Know.  These were the two songs that my best good pal I had accompanied to the show had wished to hear above all!  Score!   I think I had my phone up and was recording throughout this.  Before they got into the next song after their opening, Rob (mandolin/etc) made a joke about making history here tonight and being sure to upload to your Facebook, commenting on the video taking that was going on around them in a positive way.  How delightful!  These are the only songs I remember a specific order for.  I do remember hearing Forks and Knives, and some others off of their first albums, but then the latter part of the performance seemed devoted mostly to their new album Salt.  I swear it almost seems as if they played the album in its entirety, and who knows, they may have.  I had heard their concerts described as “revivals” and as the night progressed I was soon to learn just what this meant. 

Dancers swarmed the stage, stomping in a line right in front of the boys.  During the intro of The Ache, I remember the sound of the bass completely filling the room, thick like smoke, and when he dragged the bow across those strings I swear that I felt it in the gray matter of my brain!  As the band moved through their sets, it was more and more evident what was meant by revival.  Slowly more and more people would migrate to the front of the room to stand before them and stomp, clap, dance, sway, or any combination of the aforementioned movements.  People were getting right up in front of them and taking pictures and video with their phones and cameras.  Meanwhile, they performed perfectly, like they were a framed piece of art or a living tourist attraction. 

During the break, I perused the items they had for sale on the back table they were sitting at earlier.  Among the items was the book Seeds of Discent by Nic Esposito, concerning self sustainable agriculture, as they were there having played the PASA convention that they frequent every year.  I was told the owner of the Aleworks was the man who started PASA.  I chitchatted with the guy they had selling the stuff for awhile, discussing the book and other things.  He gave me a business card with the books name, etc, on it so I could check into it later on.  Eventually the band came around and my friends and I were able to speak one on one with them.  I ended up purchasing two vinyl records while there, The Holy Open Secret and a copy of their new album Salt.  I was able to take the copy of THOS around to each of the band members and have them sign it.  They doodled on it, as the drummer, who I started with, told me they did if people didn’t mind.  Mind?  Yeah, I will “mind” big time if you doodle on a copy of your vinyl sleeve in front of me with a Sharpie while we chit chat like we’re pals.  This was epic. 

I remember high-fiving Mike Reilly, the drummer, who was very chill and layed back.  Rob Berliner (mandonlin/piano/banjo/organ/vocals) was actually the one who checked me out with his super technical phone swiping “device”,which we had problems with.  He said I would have to wait and apologized.  “Ohh no!!” Whatever will I do.  I guess just stand here and talk to you some more.  I believe he told me I had a nice name and we discussed where I hailed from.  He was a nice guy.  Todd “Bud” Erk, the bassist, was one of the shyest guys I have met and it was incredibly awkward getting his signature on the album.  He sort of stayed on the stage and wasn’t talking to folks as much, but I got him! 

This left only Mr. Sean Hoots. His glasses, beard, hair combo were drawing me in.  He had a presence that I had been marveling over the entire evening, that I couldn’t even explain if I tried.  He was great in person.  Up close and personal, his style of playing was a glorious thing to witness!  The way he passionately attacked the strings of the guitar and channeled Jesus on stage!  I had to tell him!  “…you have one of the most powerful stage presences that I have ever seen…”, there I was, kissing ass to underrated musicians.  “Aw, shucks.  Thank you.” he said to me.  I got Sean Hoots to say shucks?  What an honestly awesome guy!  Seriously. 

Their second set was even more stomptastic than the first.  Feet were flying and people were bouncing; you couldn’t NOT move to this music!  The sheer power that I felt in the room during each rise and fall during Why Would You Not Want To Go There? changed my life!  The song has a maddening pace combined with swaying lyrics, and an excellent use of absences.  Being such a closeup observer of the strumming pattern of Sean Hoots and his channeling performance was moving to say the absolute least and I ended up being obsessed with this song for a few months afterward. The wall of energy in front of them at that moment was phenomenal.  Everybody in the entire room was feeling and contributing to that song.  "That just comes right back to you!" Sean had told me, when I was commenting on the "wall of energy" to him.  It was a revival, alright.

Every time that I listen to Being Borned Again, the last song on the Salt album, I am transported back to that night and I can remember the entire crowd/room being instructed toward stomping and clapping in perfect time and unison to the beat of the tune in that dimly and perfectly lit room.  Blue tinted lights illuminated the band, and I heard one of the best songs for the first time in my life and immediately fell in love with it.  Muscle memory will always connect that song for me to that stomp clap pattern and that room where the whole crowd was revealed to be one energetic organism moving together. 

I had one of the most intimate musical experiences of my life seeing Hoots and Hellmouth at the Elk Creek Cafe and Aleworks and I look very forward to seeing them perform again! 

Love is a Lesson Learned

Tuesday, January 17, 2011
Tell us about your first teacher who was important to you.

Although there were a few teachers in my schooling that really affected me, I think my first real teacher was my grandmother.  She was a hell of a woman.  So much so that it is almost blaspheme even speaking of her using fowl language.  I think that she would be honored that I am categorizing her as a teacher in my life.  She was many things, mostly a wife, mother, grandmother and a house wife but she was also so much more – so inspirational.  She taught me so much and is still in death.  She really had a true teacher spirit.  She probably would have been immensely happy to have been a teacher, but she wasn’t able to even finish high school because she ended up being the one to stay home to take care of her dying mother.  Her husband and her children, she said, was her vocation.  That was an understatement. 

My grandmother’s teaching spirit came through in mostly everything that she did.  She really put her heart into what she did.  She was a loving and devoted wife, an amazing mother to 9 kids, and a grandmother to all of us (there are tons).  I can’t even fathom how she made us all feel so loved?  I can’t understand it, actually.  It still astounds me today.  But that was one of her greatest lessons.  She really was one of the biggest sources of light in my life. She is one of the few people that made me feel good about myself, made me feel special and absolutely made me feel loved.  She taught me how to love.  

When she died I knew that I was losing an incredible source of energy and love.  I knew that I would never be able to tap into that like I did when she was alive, and it was horrible.  It wasn’t like I visited my grandmother everyday or anything (which is ridiculous considering the distance) but I did visit her periodically and see her a lot during my life.  Her influence to the time actually spent with me ratio is astounding.  I used to call her "Mommy-Grandma" when I was a little girl.  This started because I actually would call her Mommy and then catch and correct myself.  It's just one of those things, but I think it is one of those "you're Freudian slip is showing" things.  It speaks volumes about me.  To this day I will also sometimes slip up and refer to her as "Mom."  I learned after her death from one of my aunts how honored she was that I possibly would have thought of her that way.  I was honored to be able to feel that way; to have her influence as a child.  

She continues to be a huge influence in my life and I think about her almost daily.  I still look to her to guide me.  You would swear that the woman was in my head.  Other than the lesson in love, my grandmother's other gift to me was the lesson of faith.  Faith and love - they sort of go hand in hand, don't they?  Although I was sat by my gram a lot while I was little, I didn't live with her.  I've got other structures in my head making up my perspective.  A lot of other things control my brain, but I think her loving lessons really formed most of the positive framework of my mind and I don’t think I would have been able to survive without that love.

"I'm Taking it Back!" - The Resurrection of ICQ

I just installed ICQ 7.7.  ICQ, if you are not aware, is a nifty little program that I think created the internet back in the 90’s.  Not really, but it was a lovely and simple program that was pretty much the precursor to text messaging if you think about.  It was glorious.  You had a number.  You had a contact list.  You messaged people privately. (Privacy? Remember that?)  Or you could chat with groups of people.  A good time was had by all.  It can really go hand in hand with a young teenager learning their way around the web.  It is also good I kept a good head about me.  I was a young girl with access to many anonymous people from all over the world.  I received at least two phone calls from people I talked to on the net while in high school.  (They were actually people I talked to for a long time on ICQ, I didn’t just let anyone call me!  It’s still scary in retrospect if you think about it, though.  This is one of the many instances that I am immensely proud of my past self because it had that could have gone bad air about it.  But yes – I let guys call me from South Carolina and from Canada before because of ICQ.)

I think that ICQ perhaps got lost in the madness of AOL Instant Messenger.  While this was a neat little proggie as well, I never found it as satisfying or appealing as ICQ.  I always missed ICQ, but after my friends weren’t using it anymore and everyone “moved on” what was the point?

I am becoming continually more frustrated with Facebook.  I started a Twitter account to follow Johnette Napolitano from Concrete Blonde, among other things, but that was a main one, and I am intrigued by its possibilities and I love love love how ICQ now hooks up to Twitter.  It is supposedly able to hook up to your Facebook also but it is having a problem with that currently.  Hm. Isn’t that interesting?  Screw Facebook.  It’s a love hate relationship anymore.  It’s like Walmart.  Nothing can be good forever.  It’s like a band once they make it; you almost have to remember them for what they were before they sold out and changed in order to fit in with the money.  Bah.

So I’m picking and choosing what I want from the mainstream media machine that is ‘creating’ us.  I’m choosing to blog.  I’m choosing to Twitter.  Yes, I’ll still Facebook reluctantly, but I’m taking ICQ back!  I want to explore it in its updated form and see what it has to offer the web user today.  This should be interesting.  So there you have it.  I’m taking it back!  Join me if you want.  The echo is pretty damn loud in here.  So far only one guy from Spain that follows me on Twitter has found me.  It’s just me and Javier for now, but let’s wait and see who’s coming with me!  I feel like it is the apocalypse and you have to travel around seeking survivors. ICQ-Q-Q-Q-Q???!!  

[My name is Missie Sue.  My number is 635303735.  I am predominantly right brain bored.  Idiosyncrasies keep me going.  ICQ for conversation. My left brain will give my right brain the message.  ;P]

November Blog #13: "I may be Twitter-pated!"

Twitter-pated!

I haven’t written anything all day because I have been all Twitter-pated.  I honestly have not crossed over into the Twitter world this entire time until now.  I actually ended up giving in and creating an account to follow Johnette from Concrete Blonde (therealjohnette).  (I also have been aching to follow Daniel Tosh.) 

Twitter is much different than I expected, but I am not entirely sure what I expected.  I’m very intrigued.  It’s interesting to see the conversations people have on here.  I was just blogging about privacy and it’s interesting that I ended up creating a Twitter account then.  This place is nuts!  I’m loving it so far! Haah.

I have mostly been enjoying adding people that I have been wanting to follow that I know have Twitter.  I added Deepak Chopra and the Dalai Lama.  Mostly entity people and not people I actually know in (real) life…in person.  Wow.  In person.  What has this world become, is there such a thing anymore.  We have such a world on here.  You know I can remember when I was a teenager and the internet was basically just coming out into the main stream.  I can remember having a computer and not even having the interinet but being so excited that I could just use Word and write stories and use Paint and draw stuff.  Things have come so very far. 

In high school I used to use ICQ a lot.  It made tons of sense.  You had a list of people, you talked to them.  It was more private though.  It seems that most things now have things open so conversations can be seen by anyone.  It’s funny how Twitter works and you can see one side of the conversations people are having.  I’m sure I can view the other side somewhere, but I’m still learning this stuff.  It’s kinda complicated, but that’s only because I haven’t played with it.  I’m a newbie.  This is a whole new world.

I set it up to my phone, like Facebook.  I think this will be fun.  I think maybe Twitter would work better for a stream of thought type of thing?  Connected to my blog.  Ideas and thoughts.  And YouTube Posts.  Missie Sue shtuff.

Twitter seems like a Facebook type of feel but not.  It’s way different.  I’m basically looking for people to follow now and setting things up and I will be adding a widget on here I think probably.  I guess if you want to know what trivial shit is running through my head on a live stream, then follow me.  How stalker does that sound? Everything is so voyeuristic now it’s funny.  I guess we just play our role and put our best cyber foot forward. 

I think that Twitter will serve my blog well, and probably my YouTube (TheDriftingSunMaid) channel.  I can update and stay updated with things easier.  I still have a lot of lingo to learn and play with this hashtag thing.  We’ll see if it will be something I get into and then just get bored with.  It’s hard to say with me.  I’m trying my best not to do that with the blogging.  I’m trying my best to stay in this century and update myself.  So here I go; another step into this interweb way of living and sharing to communicate my thoughts.  Hello, Twitter!  I’m Missie Sue.  Pleased to meet you!  Welcome to my life.  

[ Follow me on Twitter @MusingThrough ]

Me To You,

Missie Sue