1/24/04

I spent the last week staring at a blinking cursor on my laptop, wondering if the IT guys could tell that I’ve downloaded the Paris Hilton video off Grokster. I mean, I renamed it “CompiledStatistics2003.xls,” but shit, are they that easily fooled? You can imagine my delight, then, when my editor broke my worried trance by assigning me the following sweet, sweet plum of an assignment. “You’re interviewing those queens from 82 Unlucky,” said the boss, “and then you’re going to our ‘Appropriate Internet Use Policy’ seminar.” Done and done!

I first made use of my expense account to purchase a round-trip first-class ticket to New York City, where I would be spending the weekend with alt-country’s darlings du jour, gamboling about Manhattan Town and recording their reactions to the big city. Immediately upon taking my seat, I ordered a double bourbon and washed down two Ambien and a pair of Vicodin. I was farsighted enough in graduate school to live with medical students, and boy, has it paid off ! Forty-five seconds later I was unconscious and dreaming of Angelica, the lovely consort of keyboardist Joey Aucoin. Only, in this dream, Aucoin was a pious Franciscan novice, wearing a cassock and emptying bedpans at some county-run hospital, and your intrepid reviewer was all done up in French cuffs, top hat, and tails, and was escorting Angelica to the Grammys. “And the winner for ‘Greatest Music Critic of All Time’,” giggled co-presenters Paris Hilton and the IT Guy from Work, “is Daddy Jums!” I whirled to receive a congratulatory kiss from Angelica, but she had morphed into Aucoin himself, sniffing his finger and giving me the stinkeye!

I awoke suddenly, soaked in sweat, and dug around for some Oxycontin I knew I had stashed in a pocket somewhere. Four hours later, I woke up in New York.

I first met up with the Unlucky boys at the ice skating rink at the south end of Central Park. One was establishing his Oughts cred by ostentatiously reading The Onion. Another was reestablishing his Nineties cred by getting ostentatiously stoned in the gazebo. The other three were weaving about the ice on poorly-fitted skates, with only Kyle Ellefson successfully navigating his way across that pale, cold imitation of the Wisconsin lakes of his childhood. “See that guy crouched over there?” Ellefson asked. “He’s ice-fishing. Used to do it all the time back home.” Perhaps Ellefson had been in the gazebo earlier, I thought, since the man was clearly taking a shit in the bushes.

After a few minutes of small-talk with the boys, I was blazed to the bejeezusbelt and escorting my new best friends to a favorite watering hole of mine, The Playwright’s Tavern off Times Square. Once there, we got down to brass tacks, except for drummer Eric Wensman, who was getting down to the music of 1985. Is it really that cool to do “The Robot” when you’re in a New York bar? That shit might fly in Playa del Rey, but don’t Manhattanites require a higher level of sophistication? I turned to apologize to the woman next to me, but she had been inspired by Wensman and was doing the “Funky Chicken.” I stood corrected.

Now the Playwright’s Tavern suffers for not serving Guiness, but they’ve got Stout, and I had the aforementioned expense account. They were also able to make me an excellent “pick-n-shovel,” that being a shot of cheap bourbon followed by a beer chaser. I’ve been a fan of them ever since one night at the Liquid Kitty in Los Angeles when a lovely little biscuit mistook me for Dan Ackroyd and stuck her tongue in my mouth. After a couple of those liquid gems, I was ready to ask some questions:

Daddy Jums: What the fuck are you looking at?

In retrospect, I probably should have forsaken the last couple pick-n-shovels. My focus blurred a bit during the next hour, and it seems I also lost my notes. But the next thing I knew, we weren’t even in the Playwright’s Lounge anymore, but instead I was sitting at a poker table in the midtown loft of a notorious celebrity; since it wasn’t Paris Hilton’s, I didn’t give a shit, but the scene was intense.

We had been joined by two young women whom I immediately assumed were groupies of some sort. 82 Unlucky, after all, has achieved some modicum of fame these past few months, and I could hardly consider its members beholden to my bourgeois moral conventions, could I? One of these groupies, though, was doing what she called her “yoga moves,” but it looked a lot like that scene in the Paris Hilton video right before her phone rings. Being a great enthusiast of the Eastern arts of meditation, I was held in thrall. But when she started flirting with the bassist and left me to swill cheap red wine, I figured I needed to occupy myself elsewhere, and boy, was I right. I’ve never seen so clean a bathroom floor, I thought, while spasmodically vomiting into the celebrity toilet, and when the fuck did I eat tartaglione?

I’ll tell you, celebrities, they’ve got it made. This guy had a phone right next to his toilet, so he could call anybody and pretend like he was at his desk. We in the lumpenproletariat have no such privileges. Anyway, I realized after a minute that I was leaning against his speed dial. “Hello?” I heard a voice inquire, and I searched desperately for something meaningful to say: “What the fuck are you looking at?” Luckily, the second of the aforementioned groupies was there to save me, and to give me a tall glass of cool, refreshing water. I woke up hours later in my hotel, the remains of an undoubtedly delicious roast beef hoagie in the bed with me. Rock stars. They really know how to party.

The next day, I met 82 Unlucky in the chic Chelsea flat they keep for east coast visits. I couldn’t quite shake the feeling that maybe I wasn’t getting the whole story, because it looked to me like maybe they were just crashing on the couch at their friend’s place. When I got there, she was cooking bacon and eggs for Dave Scales, the bassist, and keyboardist Joey Aucoin. The other three band members, lead guitarist Jason Sheppard, singer/guitarist Kyle Ellefson, and drummer Eric Wensman, were gone already; I knew that the Jayhawks were in town, so maybe they were hanging out with them. But I was due to fly home to Los Angeles in a matter of hours, had no interview completed, and was pretty sure that someone had stolen my pills the night before. It was time to start asking some questions!

First, of course, to the bacon and eggs. They were delicious, and their maker, a lovely young lady who had never even heard that the original singer of “The First Cut Is The Deepest” was actually Cat Stevens, not Rod Fucking Stewart or Sheryl Fucking Crow. I set about correcting her, and when I turned around to start my interview a few minutes later, Aucoin and Scales were gone. To the airport.

I got back to Los Angeles later that night, and submitted the following interview. Greatest Music Critic of All Time, indeed.

Daddy Jums: ...We’ve we've got five people here. Let me see if we've got everyone's name right. Over here on vocals and keyboards is Jen Gunderman, is that how you say it?

Jen: That's right, yeah.

Daddy Jums: Hey, how about that and Marc Perlman, playing bass and Gary Louris is right in front of me, right center and both speakers we're expecting, lead singer, guitar player...

Gary: Pisces

Daddy Jums: You're a Pisces, Kraig Johnson playing guitar over here and on drums we have Tim O'Reagan, you put them all together and you've got the Jayhawks. Welcome back to town you guys.

Gary: Thank you very much, the Windy City, ...

Gary: The last time we were here we were stranded at the airport, the big snowstorm, remember that Kraig?

Kraig: Yes I do remember that...

Daddy Jums: So has that been awhile ago?

Kraig: ...we did spend a lot of time on 94.

Gary: Yes we did.

Daddy Jums: The last time you had an album out, that's been a few years now right?

Gary: Yup!

Daddy Jums: What have you been doing for three years? What took you so long?

Gary: (laughing) Sittin' on our you know what. Uh, well for many different reasons we just haven't done much for three years and really we haven't toured heavily for about four or five so we're ready to go.

Daddy Jums: We were seeing you in Chicago at all the big, I remember this, you seemed like you were at the biggest and best of the summer music festivals along with all the other places, but you'd be at these big downtown street parties, isn't that right? Yeah, you played some of that stuff.

Gary: Yeah, I remember the Lounge Ax show we did outside of Lounge Ax, which is no more right? Which is too bad. I loved that place.

Daddy Jums: Yeah, we keep waiting for them to pop up somewhere else.

Gary: I'm sure Sue (Miller co-owner of Lounge Ax) will show up with something.

Daddy Jums: So in the last few years you've got a new record company, isn't that right?

Gary: Yup

Daddy Jums: And you've got a new record producer for this new record, you've got some guy who produces KISS, so now you're sounding more like KISS.

Gary: (laughs) Yeah you should see us here, we all have these new costumes and Tim's dressed up like a puppy (everyone laughs) and Kraig's a snake. Uh yeah, Bob Ezrin. People say why him it seems strange but you know, we grew up listening to a lot of different music. The folk and country, alternative country that people seem to know us for is only one piece of what we really listen to and like.

Daddy Jums: Well he's done more than just KISS. He's produced Lou Reed for example...

Gary: Lou Reed's Berlin which is a great record, Pink Floyd's The Wall, first three Alice Cooper albums, the first three (Peter) Gabriel records and ...

Daddy Jums: And the new Jayhawks record!

Gary: Right

Daddy Jums: Which people will be saying down the road, oh yeah he's the guy who produced that Jayhawks record Smile (Gary laughs). We still have four, five, six weeks until that record comes out, you're not playing anywhere, we can't say you're over at such and such a place playing tonight or even next month, you're here with no mission, you've got nothing to sell, no tickets, no records. What are you doing here already? It's been three years and you can't wait to get out on the road is that it? (everyone laughs)

Gary: I don't know, what are we doing here? Let's go! Pack her up!

Daddy Jums: As long as we've got all five of you here why don't you play a song before you take off. Ok, Jayhawks...

...Gary counts off and they play " I'd Run Away" (acoustic guitars, keyboards, tamborine, light drums)... When they finish there is clapping and hooting.

Daddy Jums: All right, how about that, the Jayhawks ladies and gentleman right here live on your radio on 93 XRT, from the Tomorrow The Green Grass album which came out awhile ago now.

Gary: Yes

Daddy Jums: Now you mentioned Lounge Ax a minute ago, when you mention Lounge Ax you're getting real close to mentioning Wilco (LAx owner Sue is married to Jeff Tweedy), when you mention Wilco you're getting close to mentioning Son Volt and when you mention Jayhawks a lot of times people mention Wilco and Son Volt. They say "Oh yeah, they're kind of like those bands." Don't you hate that, you hate those guys don't you?

Gary: No I actually really like those guys, and uh, funny isn't it? We dig those guys, actually every other show you always hear some guy going: "T-W-E-E-D-Y ! ! !" No they're an inspiration, they're friends, it's cool to have friends who are inspirations.

Daddy Jums: (laughing) Yeah, that comes in handy. There was a whole, I don't know maybe there wasn't a scene, maybe there was just a phrase, the No Depression phrase that was being applied to the music of those Illinois bands as well as to yourselves. Weren't you a part of that No Depression thing?

Gary: We never felt a part of anything. We just felt like a band that, it sounds trite but it's true. Scenes are always things that people do to group things together so that they can write an article about it or something. We're friends but we have a lot of friends in other bands too. We never felt we had this thing going, movement you know. We didn't have seminars and workshops or anything like that.

Kraig and Marc: Maybe we should have.

Gary: Umm, now what was I saying, I forgot. We try to be a big rock band, you know we can only do it so well, we leave some of that to the (Black) Crowes and stuff like that. They just seem like they're built to be a rock band. You know we can do it to a point.

Daddy Jums: Now you've got this big label behind you now.

Gary: The Machine

Daddy Jums: So you can say goodbye to the vans and the buses and you're flying in the private jets and staying in the five star hotels...(everyone's laughing)

Gary: It's sooo Radisson. We have time for one more?

Daddy Jums: Yeah, I think so!

Gary: This is the new single and it's called "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me."

...the Jayhawks play "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me"...

Daddy Jums: "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me" a new single and maybe we'll even have a chance to play it before the album comes out in a month. New by the Jayhawks from the soon to be released album Smile. You guys have a couple little new releases of your own. Jen aren't you the latest addition to the band, replacing Karen because she has a new baby?

Jen: That's right.

TM: And Gary don't you also have a new baby?

Gary: Yes I do.

Daddy Jums: Ok, Sue from Lounge Ax and Jeff from Wilco you're mentioning, right, with the little baby boy. Well thanks a lot for coming by, good luck with the new album and I hope to see you back soon doing a concert and we'll look forward to that announcement coming sometime soon.

Gary: Yes we will, thanks for having us. (the rest say thanks)ks for having us. (the rest say thanks)