The Thin Straight Line

Wednesday June 9th, 1999 @ 8:31 PM

Filed under: Everything, Tales Told Well

“Let’s form a committee and look into it…” A long time ago I decided to start a huge basketball tournament for church kids who couldn’t make their high school team. I made a proposal to the church board and they formed a committee, mostly to give me reasons why it shouldn’t be done and couldn’t be done.

“The kids would fornicate in the Hotel…” they asseverated. “They’d vandalize the gym…” they decided.

“There would be nothing but confusion and chaos with that many kids,” one man pointed out.

The negative assault continued on my poor little idea baby. After much “harrumphing” and throat clearing, and with pious frowns belying their sophistry, they voted me down.

I later went about my tournament independently and it became so large and successful that it made the book of world records for most tournament teams under one roof. Some kids fornicated I’m sure, and there was some confusion, and a little of every problem that was forecast came up, but, I became a hero to the kids and their parents and started something that couldn’t be stopped. So the church board formalized my tournament and gave it an official organization name and put a “qualified” executive in charge of it, and they proceeded to fire me and steal my tournament.

I’ve always thought that if you put a committee to work on a painting of scenery, that the result would be a thin straight line.

“The mountains are too high”, someone would cry out in fully justified effrontery.

“The valley’s are too low,” would sound in righteous indignation.
“The river’s are too fast,” a fearful voice would quaver.
“The sun is too bright,” someone would pontificate.

And so eventually when the committee finally agreed on everything that didn’t offend somebody else, the painting would consist of a thin straight line with no color or ingenuity or spirit. However, the committee would declare it a work of genius, abstract and original, not too liberal, not too conservative, not too offensive, not too anything.

When Blinddog Smokin’ first hit the blues scene, and by that I mean the established clubs, festivals, magazines, and blues societies, we had rabbit ears. We listened to every comment and criticism and worried about who didn’t like us and why.
“They are too young,” they said of Jason, Andy, and Chuck.
“He’s too old, ” some said about me.
“Too much rock influence.”
“Carl talks too much to the audience.”
“They’re too white.”
“Chuck’s too black.”
“Not enough Delta influence.”
“They spend too much time down in the Delta.”
“Real blues can’t come out of Wyoming.”
“Andy’s hair is too long for a blues man.”
And nowadays: “Andy’s hair is too short for a blues man.”
I could write a small book on all the stuff we were too much of or not enough of.

The first time we were invited to a major festival, The King Biscuit in Helena Arkansas, 1996, we had been a band for three years and were still adjusting our style to meet this bar owner’s tastes and that blues society’s preference etc. At the King Biscuit, Jerry Pillow, the music director, had seen in us the potential that many now understand clearly. He gave us our first big break.

We responded by looking out at the audience and seeing writers, booking agents, radio announcers, label executives, festival organizers, blues society presidents, and worst of all: heavyweight established blues stars–we just compromised our style that was already chameleon, and gave the audience a thin straight line of music.

It was Bruce Iglauer of Alligator records who unwittingly turned us around. Bruce hates our music. That is his word, not mine. He once said, upon reviewing our CDs, that he wanted to help us gain distribution so that “other people could hate us too”. He called us a “schizophrenic” band. He said that until we learned to get a recognizable style we could never be on his label. He likes old guys, old conservative blues, old tried and true formulas. This is fine, but it is not our style.

We took his advice to heart in a way he didn’t intend. We decided to start writing our music the way we liked it. We decided to start performing in the style we felt comfortable with. We decided to give Bruce Iglauer the finger and anybody else who didn’t happen to approve of our band personality. In short, we finally became artists.

Since then we have learned to believe in our songs, our personas, our moves on stage, our solos, our stage rapport, our taste in music, and have presented that image with confidence and panache. No more thin straight line. The result is a burgeoning and a blossoming that has gotten us invitations to tour overseas (this late Fall), invitations to many more festivals and top echelon clubs, and overwhelming positive response at our shows. We have several thousand people on our mailing list and have sold over ten thousand CDs off the stage and we keep the money, not some conniving label executive. We have a big tour bus and our own recording studio where we are currently putting out our fourth and fifth CDs due for release this November.

Some of you saw us recently at the Newton, Kansas Blues Festival. I consider that a breakthrough performance. Over the last few years we have learned how to perform with confidence, but in Newton, we just dominated the stage and overwhelmed the audience. We had arrived at the place where we know exactly how our stuff is going to go over and we played it to the hilt. We had standing ovations and an outrageous demand at the end for encores. We signed autographs for the next two hours and sold a thousand dollars worth of CDs and T-shirts.

The lesson herein for all of us is that we humans are unique individuals. No two fingerprints alike, no two personalities. However, the world pushes conformity. We are told who is supposed to be popular, what tv shows to watch, what movies to see, what clothes to wear and what cars to drive. The government and the workplace are replete with policies. We are told what is politically correct to say.

The inbred blues world has a barb wire fence around its stars and a list of “you can’t do’s” that would make a Marine Corps Drill instructor happy. Well, Blinddog Smokin’ has cut the barb wire and we go where we want to, and whistle while we work. Our blues rooted music is being “digged and dunged” and allowed to grow, and our personalities are free and strong. I truly believe I could look any other performer of any stature right in the eye while I was on stage and just do my thing without caring at all whether he liked it or not.

Farewell to the thin straight line.

Posted by Carl