The Stars at Night and Other Tall Tales — A Travelogue — Part 2
Showtime at The Kessler — A Memorable Night + Tequila.
Missed Part 1? Catch up here!
The Kessler is a beautiful old Art Deco theater in the Winnetka Heights neighborhood of Dallas, constructed in 1941 and has passed through various ownerships — at one time it was the property of Gene Autry — the most famous of the Singing Cowboys, but hardly the only one, if you consider Tex Ritter, Roy Rogers, Marty Robbins and my personal favorite Slim Whitman. The staff was good as gold and treated us with great care and professionalism. The green room was spacious and packed with snacks and drinks. I had a Miller Lite within seconds of its discovery.
I’d gone on a long run down the Katy Trail in the early afternoon — 10.2 miles — not to brag. Believe me, there was nothing to brag about on the eighth, ninth and tenth miles, where my audible wheezing would have been heavily scrutinized by any worthwhile cardiologist. The looks of concern would have broken the hardest of hearts. Nevertheless, the work went on, as Ted Kennedy famously promised it would. Another Kennedy brother on the brain. Dealey Plaza, the Ambassador Hotel, Chappaquiddick. Best not to entertain thoughts of these places in your mind, if you can avoid it, but in Dallas it was proving challenging.
I repaired to the Bishop Arts Hotel after my run and as I was going through my various and sundry rituals to try and get normal or at least hydrated before having to put on my sequins and perform my song and dance routine. My phone buzzed with a text message from Mike V., announcing that he and the rest of the band were already at the venue. I checked the time; it was 5:49 according to my watch. So this meant it was… 4:49? I responded: “I thought load-in AND soundcheck were at 5:30?” Was it possible that my devices had set themselves to Central Time while I wasn’t paying attention? Of course it was possible. I had mostly been thinking about landmen and Tom DeLonge and trying to keep one eye on the Masters, so needless to say losing an hour — or frankly, days — was absolutely on the table. I panicked and asked Timothy what time he had and he confirmed that it was only 10 ‘til 5, so I texted Mike back and let him know I’d be there soon.
Upon arrival, there was some manner of hand-wringing over how to deal with the hyper-aggressive tour manager from Él Mató a un Policía Motorizado, a popular indie rock outfit from Argentina who were headlining that night. He had evidently taken some not insignificant measures to cordon off quite a bit of the shared backline for his band and we were going to have to address this because we would not be able to appropriately bring our own special formula of good time rock ‘n’ roll music without, say, half of the drum kit or any amps. I pondered our options, offered up several contingencies as to what a landman might do in this circumstance and then Jon said he’d just go talk to the guy, which seemed probably like the right course of action. I did of course offer to intervene and start crying if Jon’s attempts at negotiating did not succeed. We fortunately didn’t have to escalate to that level of psyops and soundcheck was a pleasure, which is not always the case with festivals. The whole crew at the Kessler were patient and funny. Seven of us onstage and they got the mix just right.
Karly Hartzman from the great band Wednesday was playing after us, playing solo, and so she soundchecked before us. Playing alone in a large room is an inherently tricky business, but it was obvious that with her wondrous vocals and hugely compelling songs that she would tear the house down. Our job was to prime the pump, as it were, and that’s exactly what we intended to do. Backstage Timothy asked if he had time between the soundcheck and the show to attend to some brief illicit errand, probably involving Whole Foods, with its not-exactly-priced-to-market sandwiches and compelling selection of cleverly-named IPAs. He was the same sucker for it in Texas as he had been in Durham and DC. A true acolyte, though the charm was lost on me: “One entree — two sides!”, tended to go his excited patter about their alleged dinner deals. As if that were so different from anywhere even half-way worth the price. During this exhausting contretemps, I noticed another perk from our rider. A fifth of Patrón Silver tequila, another thing that would inevitably need to be dealt with, one way or the other — a delicious monkey’s paw.
Anyway, to Timothy, I said, “absolutely not,” owing as showtime was in fifteen minutes. Under further scrutiny, it turned out the show was in two-hours-and-fifteen minutes, and everybody got what they wanted. Out in the courtyard, I thought I heard Peter and Stephen discussing parenthood, with Mike V. maybe joining in. People think the deep intimacy of bands occurs after shows — after the blood and feathers have flown — but it’s actually beforehand. All of us in a shaky partnership relying on one another to not be totally made a fool of — humiliated before a large crowd — professionally and emotionally damaged.
This is a level of vulnerability that is difficult to describe. When one person looks shaky, another might take them aside and ask if they are hanging in. Travel enough together, and you start to get these cues. I walked away from the table, allowing the conversation to continue organically. All of my bandmates have always been a massive resource to me at all times. All the joyful and scary stuff: the finances, the future planning, the strange hope we must hold on to, all comes to the fore with the band, before we play a note.
I’m sure Mick Jagger has said this in a much more salacious way, but a band is a million moving pieces which you just pray will fit together once the crowd lights dim and the stage lights go up. Ten seconds after the first keening riffs of our set opener “Numb It Up and Go,” it was obvious the show was going to be a riot, and perhaps cause one as well. We’d been allotted 30 minutes into which we mainlined eleven songs from various releases, including several from 2024’s acclaimed LP The Interrogator. Some of the 400-plus crowd was definitely there to see us, but others were just waiting for Karly Hartzman and Él Mató and getting a good spot by the stage. Everything went off like gangbusters. A lot of people are probably wondering: Did we play the song about former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan from our 2019 Bar/None Records LP A Goddamn Impossible Way of Life? Of course we did, with brutal impunity. “Print The Legend,” from The Interrogator was the one which won them over most of all. Fourth in the set and a singalong, just the kind of situation to straighten out a wobbly audience. Mike V. dressed for business and wore his red suit, which is always a crowd pleaser too.
Karly got up next and absolutely killed it — taming a deeply partisan but occasionally noisy audience into shutting the fuck up and letting her finish her songs. The only two artists I’ve ever seen command a room solo with such magnetic force are Richard Thompson and Patterson Hood, which is a pretty representative cross-section of her amazingly humane and uncompromising work. The crowd went nuts — the job was done.
I got to talk a little with Karly — first after the show and later on the street when I was going for tacos. She was staying at the Bishop Arts Hotel too, walking the other way. We talked DBT and golf, John Daly. It was the second or the third day of the Masters at this point, and I’d need to be paying attention. In golf circles, you follow Rory McIlroy, the Replacements of golfers. The best, but also the worst. If somehow he won the Masters it would complete the career grand slam and be the biggest story in golf at least since Tiger’s Masters triumph in 2019. Rory had been erratic on Thursday, and then sublime on Friday. I collected myself.
At the Texas Theatre the next morning I met two of my all-time favorite living authors: Megan Abbott and William Boyle. Both were evidently alive and well at the Texas Theatre where they were going to host a screening and group discussion of the Coen Brothers first feature Blood Simple. I don’t know what I expected, but they were so kind and solicitous. The place was astonishing. I parked out front in the Malibu, in a clearly illegal parking spot at 9 or 11 AM. The perfectly coiffed theater curator came out the door to greet us: such a nice guy and might have passed for a young Jerry Lee Lewis. Full appearance commitment. I asked him about the car and he basically said illegal parking was essentially impossible in this part of Dallas. That sense of being on the outer edges of legality extended to the movie theater too — with its huge seating, surreptitious bars, strange vestibules and video games. This was the place Lee Harvey Oswald got popped, his last movie ever an Audie Murphy film. The movie showing the last night we were in town is Wim Wenders — Wings of Desire. Everybody I met from Dallas talked about the assassination. Dallas is all Dirk Nowitzki, Tony Dorsett and Dealey Plaza. Deep blues.
Rory McIllroy was making Saturday moves at the Masters. A white-hot front nine 32 had featured a birdie-eagle-birdie start. Holy fuck, he was suddenly leading in a tournament that he’d seemed determined to kick away on Thursday. My editors at The Ringer and I excitedly exchanged emails, attempting to ascertain where that whole thing was going — could this happen? What would be the frame? Before all that, first thing in the morning, Timothy and I went to the Tom Thumb grocery store. I wasn’t familiar with the chain, but it seemed in terms of layout, pricing and organization to resemble the Giant or the Stop & Shop — a cabal I well know. Sometimes these places have different names, but the same corporate ownership. As a part of this kind of handover, your rewards card might even work at a strange location like the Tom Thumb. Mine ultimately didn’t, but I wasn’t overwhelmed or even bothered. We got a couple cups of Starbucks coffee and knocked around. I don’t know what I was looking for. I purchased a 12-pack of Miller Lite in aluminum bottles. I know. Totally. It’s a bottle and a can simultaneously. What can’t American ingenuity innovate? But the Paranoid Style is a thirsty crew and I figured that at a minimum Jon and William would be interested (they were).
Off to Josey Records, the Largest Record Store in the world, self-advertised, where our intrepid lead guitarist Peter was playing a show to celebrate the release of his new solo album The Face of 68. And who was I to doubt Josey Records’ acreage although my mind raced to all of the Tower Records which most have existed in Tokyo and Berlin or whatever, and whether this could be possibly true? Everything is bigger in Texas, I am told and Joseys was big alright — refreshingly so — full of posters and ephemera and the troubled, exalted business of the collector. They had The Interrogator in stock, and The Face of 68.
I was offered a Miller Lite at the door — a strange thing that doesn’t happen at most of the record stores I have ever attended. It made no sense, but it was 3 pm, or 1pm or 4, and I could not but surrender to the siren call. Jon, William, Tim and I pored over posters — there had to be thousands; Josey Records is really huge — before settling on this Little Feat beauty. We could not be denied. We’re currently trying to decorate our home and obviously we couldn’t walk away without this. The guys and I discussed what might have happened during the photo shoot such that this was the best and final image that they could put on a poster. We wondered about who was the teenage boy who hung this poster in this room and thought, “These hale fellows are the correct role models for me!” And on and on. Lowell George and Little Feat are endlessly fascinating to us all.
On stage at Josey Records, Peter Holsapple put on a masterclass for an enthusiastic audience. He played dB’s standards and new songs. The crowd went wild. Here’s a clip of “That Time Is Gone,” one of my all-time faves.
After that, aimlessly, I went for a run and passed several neighborhoods and golf courses. It was an edifying experience. The day after shows is a strange mental space. Obviously you think: “What have we done?” In this case the answer was good, but even having to linger with the question is its own kind of self-harm tribunal. Tequila was poured. I installed the Little Feat poster on one of our windows in the Bishop Arts Hotel so people would know this was a safe space. William dropped by and grabbed a few end-of-the-night Miller Lites for Jon and himself. Rory took a two-shot lead over Bryson DeChambeau heading into Sunday. All eyes turned to Tulsa.
END CHAPTER TWO.
COMING UP: TIM, JON AND I GO TO TULSA AND GET AN EDUCATION, PLAY FOOSBALL AND GO TO THE GROCERY. I ATTEMPT TO FILE MULTIPLE GOLF AND GOLF-ADJACENT STORIES. A UPS STORE IS VISITED — WITH NEARLY APOCALYPTIC CONSEQUENCES.
I would truly love to get some notice if you ever play anywhere near the geographic center of this country. In time to buy tickets and arrange my life so that I can go. "Near" in my dialect is around 500 miles.
Like! More engrossing than Almost Famous.