Making Life with My Brother
I didn’t fall in love with music first. I fell in love with my brother Steve. Same as today, Steve is four and a half years older than me and that was a chasm growing up. I worshipped him. Whatever he did, I did. Whatever he liked, I liked. He didn’t always like me. And that meant that sometimes I didn’t like myself. I only need to explain this to the non-younger siblings in reading range. All the little brothers and sisters got it immediately.
My love of my older brother was the north star for my personality for at least the first 16 years of my life. Probably more like the first 25 years of my life. I am so eternally grateful my brother was into cool shit cause I would for sure be into whatever he was into cool or not. But he was into The Roots, The Black Crowes, tennis, Monty Python, weird little models of airplanes*, stand-up comedy, baseball, guitar pedals, The Pharcyde, old ass blues records, De La Soul, video games, Dungeons and Dragons, sneakers and sushi.
Now we’re getting up there in years. My brother turns fifty this month and he’s celebrating at the White Squirrel on Saturday. In a lifetime of doing cool shit like raising an amazing family, ushering professional soccer back into Minnesota with his work for MN United, writing about basketball and music professionally at the highest levels including for the New York Times, being an absolutely murderously talented trivia buff and one time bouncing a little-ass ball in Bethesda, Maryland so high that it never came down and is still orbiting our planet, it’s possible that the coolest thing Steve has ever done is be a ferocious blues guitar player. He doesn’t go full on blues-guy in most of the bands he plays in now but he’s bringing back the band that played their first show on the night of the series finale for Cheers (May 20, 1993). That band is Catfish Blue. I had the honor of being the primary bass player for that band for most of their history. It’s the band that made me love bands. It’s the band that made me play bass. It’s the band that made me love blues. And at one point it was the band that made me hate my brother.
Brothers aren’t supposed to do everything together when they’re young. Too many cooks in not enough kitchens. Too much pride to comfortably share a spotlight let alone a lyric sheet. But those were young man problems and now we’re not young. We’re grown. And we love each other. And we love the blues. And I love my brother. I hope you come out and help us celebrate 50 years of Steve. If you want to know a little more about Steve, check out his recent appearance on “No Brains, No Lightbulbs”.
And look, Heiruspecs is retired with no plans of a reunion. But my brother wrote some amazing jams when he was in Heiruspecs including “Life as a Superhero”. And Felix is coming out and we’re playing that song on Saturday. That might be the closest you’ll get to a Heiruspecs reunion this lifetime and if that matters to you, don’t miss it.
*I never really went for that stuff
*Steve and I will die on the hill of this being absolutely a fact
Kaepernick, Mason Jennings + Why Communism Won’t Work + More
Kaepernick
I have been given very few jobs on my illustrious blog but one is to tell Chuck Terhark when there are uniquely good episodes on a podcast. Chuck let me point you to The Right Time with Bomani Jones. There is a beautiful four episode arc (ep. 1) providing some ten-years-after reflections on the legacy of quarterback-turned-activist Colin Kaepernick. It was ten years ago this August that Kaepernick decided to sit by the water cooler instead of stand for the National Anthem. That water cooler move transitioned into kneeling for the anthem and the response to Kaepernick’s activism then becomes part of the Black Lives Matter movement that is familiar to us all. Chuck and the rest of you, the most telling thing is looking backward from Kaep in 2016 and reflecting on how sports’ relationship with the United States changed after 9/11.
Within 18 months of that decision by Kaepernick it had been decided that kneeling during the National Anthem was a fireable offense in a way that killing dogs, obstruction of justice surrounding a murder case and a litany of domestic violence accusations and convictions were not. What a damning reflection of who we are as a country and how we feel about football.
I am a doofus about football but in Jones’ conversations with a tremendous group of non-doofuses it is immensely clear that Kaepernick had every football qualification to remain in the league after his protest in some form or fashion. I admire Colin Kaepernick for his bravery and his activism, I agree with the general consensus arrived at on “The Right Time” that it is quite likely that Kaep did not think his football career was over due to that activism. The NFL, and most specifically the owners of the NFL teams made an example of Kaepernick, one that likely muzzled other would-be acts of athletic activism. Some might say, myself very much included in that some, that Robert Kraft, and his fellow stadium owners who he colluded with, is doing the same thing right now to Ed Sheeran and Macklemore. Heartfelt speeches read from a teleprompter aside, it seems that Sheeran is on team muzzle-me-Bob! and Macklemore is on speaking truth to power and putting his money where his mouth should have been rapping. The freedom of musicians relative to athletes and the tenor of the time suggests that Macklemore might have a career renaissance compared to Kaepernick’s sidelining. I praise Macklemore for his largely successful attempts to keep the focus on the suffering of the people of Gaza and his attempts to widen the aperture away from his own story. Let us not make the mistake of believing that Macklemore’s act of courage crowns him the sole determiner of where the movement heads next, something that Jones and some of his guests believe happened with Kaepernick during and after his protests.
Mason Jennings
We are now a couple weeks past the state fair but I’m just getting the chance to write a post now so it’s going to be a long one. I caught Mason Jennings at the State Fair and got to see him and Dan Lawonn play tunes at the Current’s booth. I ordered the french fries from next door that my wife loves and then Kevin and I ate most of them as Rachel slowly trooped up to the concert with our children. Don’t worry, we bought her more fries when we got there. Don’t worry, we ate most of those fries too. Mason Jennings was one of the most universally beloved Minnesota musicians of the early 2000s. He was selling out the 400 Bar every Thursday. He was commanding big ass crowds in large swathes of America and everyone in my high school thought he was just perfect.
A note about overindexing. How big was anyone during the less measurable era of the 1990s and early 2000s? Mason sold “a lot” of records locally and regionally. He played to large crowds. But I thought of him as this JUGGERNAUT. He was a juggernaut when Martin Devaney opened for him at St. Olaf. He was enough of a juggernaut that I was gassed up when Traditional Methods, a short-lived live hip-hop group I was in, opened for his bass player, Rob Skoro, at the Entry. Mason came to that show wearing glasses and I think a hockey jersey. I think it’s fair to say Mason Jennings came to that concert in costume so as to not be recognized by his rabid fanbase. I bring all of this up to mention that Mason Jennings was hot bizness for some amount of years in the Twin Cities in particular and in the country in general. It is hard to quantify yesteryear’s success on today’s scorecard. Mason doesn’t have crazy Spotify numbers. Mason is not buzzing in any measurable way. But he has fans, he sells records, he has a career as a revered songwriter.
A note about personal connections. I don’t know Mason well. But Mason and Heiruspecs shared a manager for a number of years. This didn’t actually create that much shoulder to shoulder engaging but it did mean I had a lot of visibility to his career. I believe that local musician and radio host Doc once put out a post that read “So you can’t afford Charlie Parr? A guide to booking Doc.” It is fair to say that Heiruspecs picked up a lot of Mason’s runoff and we spent some memorable weeks opening for him in different parts of the country. But besides for throwing the football around once in Breckenridge, I have done nothing I would describe as hanging with Mason Jennings.
He’s a hell of a songwriter and I can’t tell you why. I pride myself on being able to put my love, fascination or disdain for certain artists and certain songs into words. But I fall short with Mason and that’s why I’m trying to fix that here. I can’t tell you what works about the best Mason Jennings songs. I think some of it is nostalgia. Mason’s music was what a lot of us were listening to in those special early college-age years. The sky is the limit and whoever is the soundtrack sticks with you. You’d put the CD on and assume that you’d be the next Joe Local to sell out the 400 Bar every Thursday. I also think that Mason Jennings is unpretentious and non-clever without tracking as working class. Mason Jennings’ writing is also defiantly simple. Even when it’s about a complex thing like losing a son to a war, Mason finds the simple part. Does that make any sense at all? Let’s just do a quick report on some other songwriters.
Sufjan Stevens - without thinking about it you are aware he is pretentious, just be honest. Also, Sufjan is clever as shit.
Joni Mitchell - clever and complex.
Bruce Springsteen - not clever, tracks as working class in spirit
Marvin Gaye - unpretentious and tracks not necessarily as working class but as class and race conscious particularly as it applies to the uneven treatment Black people and poor people got when it came to Vietnam. Clever doesn’t feel right, but maybe coy. Especially when we are talking sex.
Phoebe Bridgers - clever, often complex, also able to weave relatively obscure pop culture references into universal songs. Far from a Mason Jennings strong suit.
For me, Mason Jennings sounds like what he is; a dude who worked at a burrito shop and wrote songs and thought it might be a better life to just focus on the songs part. This is why I think he first caught love from the surfer world of Jack Johnson et cetera. It was dudes who wrote what they knew and maybe they elected to not know much? I am okay with that as a reduction of the late 90s surfer rock ethos. So then how does Mason start getting name checked and ultimately signed by Isaac Brock from Modest Mouse who is not in the surfer camp whatsoever? How does he get love from the big songwriters of the day? I think it’s because the dude can write. When he’s on point he’s writing songs through focus and simplicity that give you a more unadulterated raw nerve of certain emotions than I can get from any other writer. When he’s off the mark it’s a god damn cliff because there is no cleverness, no artifice, no turn of phrase to save him. When a defiantly simple writer is on an off day, there is nothing to distract from it being an off day. Do you want to know Mason’s best songs? I got you.
To start a song about a love interest moving to California with the lyrics “don’t you know baby I’m a leading man” is a great beginning. I don’t find a lot of layers in this song, I just find that the single layer that the song represents is so well done. Do you remember the part in “Six Degrees of Separation” where the second grade teacher says she “just knows when to take the drawings away from them”?
Since the beginning of his career, and perhaps most strongly at the beginning, Mason Jennings has known when to take the drawing away from himself and share it with the rest of us.
“Sorry Signs on Cash Machines” makes me feel like if The Band listened to the Fray a lot. And now listen, I’m glad The Band didn’t listen to the fray but hell, it’s great. How about the lyric “I need something I can feel, cigarettes and a driving wheel”. Also, Noah Levy is on the drum kit and Rob Skoro is on bass, backup vocals and production. I remember Heiruspecs getting offered the opening slot for Mason at the Barrymore in Madison and his manager Vickie (soon to be our manager) told me to “advance” the show. I didn’t know what that meant. But I knew our career had just gotten a little more serious. During Mason’s set I sat downstairs and heard Noah Levy playing the drums upstairs and I thought I was gonna die it sounded so good. I was so convinced I was in the right place. What. A. Song.
This is the one. I was waiting to pick up my girlfriend from her job at Half Price Books in Highland on a Sunday. Andrea Swensson was DJing the Local Show on the Current. I hadn’t thought about new Mason Jennings music in some time. He wasn’t in my orbit. Didn’t share a manager and generally just didn’t see him around. And this song came on I just remember crying when I realized the plot. A father is seeking simply a heartbeat from his son who died in a war. Not a victory. Not vengeance. Not comfort. Just a heartbeat. And suddenly Mason doesn’t sound like a dude who wrote songs and worked a burrito shop. He sounds like a man who has pushed himself for decades to pull the drawing away at the right point and leave us with a masterpiece.
Why Communism Won’t Work
I actually think Communism might work if we all changed our spirits. But changing spirits is hard. When we think of the greater good we are going against the capitalist impulse to think of ourselves first. It’s number one. Everyone thinks of number one. People you love, people you think would give you the shirt off their back, some of those folks won’t even be in the back row for your funeral. Some of those folks won’t even chip in on the tip at the group dinner. Communism will never work.
Plowing - In St. Paul we have a stupid thing where the city doesn’t plow the alleys. Some sucker becomes an alley captain and drops slips of paper asking for usually about $20 per house to cover a private company to come plow whenever it snows. It is so weird and arcane a system that my friend who just moved on to the block verified with me that it wasn’t a scam. Turns out there are asshats who don’t pay their share. Maybe they just ignore the piece of paper. But some of them make sense of it: I don’t use the alley, what do you I care? OKAY. Where is your garbage can shitbird? Do you think you should pay less cause you don’t park your car back there? LESS THAN $20? It’s $20 dollars. $20 dollars! Communism will never work.
Education - I really enjoy the writing of Nikole Hannah-Jones though I haven’t gone as deep with her signature piece (1619) as I should. But when I see her name in the New York Times I know I’m in for a great piece of writing. She just bared her soul and talked about how she made some decisions that aligned with her values for her kid’s education but realized that some of them were a disservice to her kid. The brief summary is that Nikole Hannah-Jones elected to send her child to a non-selective public school that served a poor and largely Black population in New York City though Nikole and her husband had the tangible money and know-how to make a “better” decision. The writing is beautiful. The hurt is raw. It’s clear that Nikole Hannah-Jones and her husband made some decisions that they regret. And I understand that. I also understand where their values are coming from. BUT I MADE THE DUMB DECISION TO READ THE COMMENTS. People just find it absolutely absurd that you might navigate some decisions surrounding your kids life with the larger community in mind. HOW DARE YOU NIKOLE? Just think of number one. Just do what works for your family. Communism will never work.
A.I. and Billionaires - Don’t you wish Big Brother existed right now so somebody could just go unplug the thing? This technology is good for such a small amount of human beings. If you are making your decisions based on questions of how many humans benefit you just aren’t picking A.I. under any circumstance. We are racing toward a future that will suck. Why are we racing to suckville? It’s complicated. There’s China. But I just can’t listen to it anymore. I can’t listen to another podcast about it. I can’t listen to another podcast about the way that these companies are racing with China and there’s no way to slow down. I have never felt more out of step with general societal sentiment in my 45 years on earth. We are going for this? We all just want the very minuscule upside that bad? No, we don’t. But we throw our hands up cause we can’t imagine us working together to change it. Communism will never work.
One Year at City Cast
A handful of days ago I celebrated one year at City Cast. With the exception of full-time touring with Heiruspecs and Dessa I’ve never worked this closely with a team before. With Anna, Tiffany and Adam we’ve made hundreds of podcasts. It’s an absolute whirlwind of a job. Sometimes I don’t feel like I have time to tell the Twin Cities what we’re working on because we’re working so hard on it. I love the team. I love the work. I love the challenge. Humbly, I think we’re a clear net positive for media coverage in the Twin Cities. Arrogantly I think we’ve created a great way for people to go deeper with the metro area they live in. A way to bring the good and the bad into bold relief. I’d love to have your ears on some of our episodes and hear what you think of what we’re doing. I believe in it, but it’s really only gonna work if you believe in it too. Please also don’t think because you see some of our social media coverage that you’re connected with everything we’re doing. We are making great social media content. But social media is a small slice of what we’re making and honestly, social media is such a limited scope for communication. Dive into our newsletter. Give a podcast a try. Check one out.
Playing Music with Big Trouble + Bill Caperton on Saturday
My midlife crisis is knowing that Big Trouble is making some of the best music I’ve ever been a part of and it disappears the minute we unplug our amps cause it’s fleeting and it’s special and it’s live and it’s site specific. We might even release a nice recording one day, but we are locked in to something special that I believe you have to see live. It’s a level of responsiveness and comfort with one another that translates to this one little bar at W. 7th and Randolph and I don’t know what else is supposed to happen but I know what is happening is special.
Music Trivia on Gorman in the Morning with KQ Every Wednesday
Now that I’m making this the longest blog of my blogging ass life I want to make sure you know that every Wednesday morning circa 8:25 a.m. I’m running trivia on Gorman in the Morning on KQRS. The show features my dear friends Steve Gorman, Ryder and Fletcher as well. I’ve known Ryder for the longest and I adore her. She’s awesome on the mic and a dynamo behind the scenes in the world of radio. Fletcher was my lunch room buddy when Jazz88 was at iHeart and he accidentally taught me so much about programming a music station. I didn’t know Steve Gorman til landing this gig, but shit, he was THE drummer in the Black Crowes. I’ve been with him kinda since 5th grade. I just finished reading his book “Hard To Handle” and wow, great rock memoir. We have a bunch of fun every Wednesday morning with trivia but also just shooting the shit and sharing a love of music. They sound like they’re always having fun. Join us!
Ran an Hour of Trivia on the Power Trip Morning Show
Chuck and I got a nice call from Cory Cove with KFAN to provide an hour of trivia on the KFAN morning show. This is a big deal for us for reach. This show has great reach and to get to share an hour of what we love doing is a spectacular amount of real estate to play with. Chuck absolutely killed it with some ingenious rounds with really special formats. I brought some vanilla love to the mix but I’m still happy with how it all played out.
Thanks for reading this massive missive. Go Lynx.
The Final Patio Hurrah for Big Trouble this Season and Awesome Podcasts
A Big Trouble Flyer
You could be forgiven for thinking that the world is perfect at the end of August when you have some time off from your job and you go camping with your kids. I certainly briefly thought that when I was camping at Afton State Park last weekend. Of course the world is not perfect. Shit, the camping wasn’t even perfect. But it’s a good time of year to clock in a little extra R&R.
I’m writing you while watching the White Sox ground the Twins into a powder at Target Field. I took the bus to the State Fair today and made content with the team from City Cast Twin Cities. I like making content. I hate saying the words “making content”. I also miss the quiet dignity of hosting radio at the State Fair. Pressing play on CDJs feels a little better than asking a sweaty kid from Hastings to write you out a paper receipt for a $13 container of fried pickles and then neither of you can remember today’s date. But also, I walked around and asked people questions in exchange for a cookie and I drank the best lemonade on planet earth with my buddy Sam Choo before he returned back to his house.
Mediterranean Lemonade from Holy Land (City Cast)
It was a beautiful day, wonderful weather, wonderful people. And tomorrow I get to play music with Big Trouble. It’ll be the last gig on the patio for the year. We’ll be out tomorrow in the mid 70s playing from 6-8 at the White Squirrel. And we’re playing Jolene by Dolly Parton to honor her beautiful legacy.
We’ve been having fun and the opposite of fun at City Cast Twin Cities. It’s the State Fair. It’s back to school. That’s fun. We also marked one year since the Annunciation shooting. That’s not fun. That’s tragic. But we’ve been covering it all and I think we’re doing great work. I’ve fielded some compliments from some tough customers lately. I’ve fielded compliments on City Cast from people who have given me under five compliments in over twenty years of friendship. If you haven’t given City Cast Twin Cities a try toss us a subscribe and check out some of the episodes. Hear some episodes and see if you connect with it. Stop going to the same restaurants and reading the same four paragraph stories about local politics. Branch out and dig in.
Jen Wittes
Josh ‘Jellyfish’ Williams
Why would I limit myself to just one podcast? NO REASON FOR THAT. Trivia Mafia is going ham once a week with new episodes and we’ve had some awesome guests on as of late. We had Jen Wittes on last week. This week, we’re dropping a podcast features Josh ‘Jellyfish’ Williams. Do you like trivia? Do you like hanging out. This is your reminder that there’s a podcast for you.
Sean on the porch with a CCCC Vol. 3
Writer Sam Homan who contributed to CCCC Vol. 3 and is also a fly-fisherman
I should also urge you to buy a copy of the Country Cabin Crapper Companion Volume 4. It’s a tour-de-force of cabin writing and you can order it online or buy it at this weekend’s Big Trouble show (that’s Saturday August 29 at 6pm at White Squirrel). Grab a CCCC Vol. 3 to elevate that final cabin hang of the season.
Proud of City Cast Twin Cities’ Political Coverage + Check Out Amy Siegel + David Cava on “No Brains, No Lightbulbs”
Friends, I hope you’ll give the City Cast Twin Cities podcast a listen or a watch if you are the type of very common and still completely confusing type of person who absorbs whole podcast episodes on YouTube. I am working with an amazing group of people who are trying doggedly to add a new angle to an already amazing town for local media. But every town has blind spots and stories that go untold and we are doing our best to fill in some of those blind spots and also look at major stories with a different lens. I’m really proud of the work and I hope you’ll legitimately check it out, not just a little social media clip, but some full conversations. Lately we’ve talked encampments, Rondo and Low Power FM radio, and Boundary Waters. We are also connecting with a bunch of the individuals running for office in Minnesota. The Hao Nguyen interview is up and we have lots more coming including Angie Craig, Cedric Frazier and more. I’m humbled to be doing this work and so grateful to be having these conversations. I hope you’ll check it out. The YT version of our episode that includes Nguyen as well as chats about Fat Beach Day, Heritage Park and the State Fair is below!
One of the Trivia Mafia Originals, Amy Siegel
Chuck, Producer Beth and I have also been going hard with our “No Brains, No Lightbulbs” episodes. We’ve hit a stride with some awesome questions and some really fun banter and the guests have just been god damn top notch. I’ve known Amy Siegel for I don’t know. . .23 years? 25 years? I’m old as shit. Amy’s awesome as shit. She was a joy to ‘cast with. Check that one out right here!
A man who has failed people but in a reasonable way, David Cava
And on Saturday August 8 at 5 a.m. we are dropping our latest episode with David Cava. Let the Twins jersey fool you, this dude loves the Twins. David is an amazing dude; he’s a physics teacher, he runs Trivia Mafia and he knows a blinding amount about Prince. Get that episode right here.
The bugs are biting a little bit out here while I listen to Radio K, drink champagne and finish some random loose ends up after an absolutely stunning day off from City Cast Twin Cities. I went back to Jazz88 and talked trivia with Manny, Travis and Yonci and then I got an awesome haircut from Mike at Good Neighbor. Tonight my youngest and I walked to Tono and I got their shockingly good pesto burrata salad. What a treat. Maybe I’ll see you at the Lynx game or the Fort Road Folk Fest my bestie Martin is running at the White Squirrel. Whatever you do I hope you really enjoy your weekend.
Country Cabin Podcastin'
The Country Cabin Crapper Companion Volume 3 is out!
What the hell does that mean?
It’s the vanity magazine I publish every summer cause I’m an ambitious idiot!
Guest writing from Meghan Mahar, Sam Homan and Bill Caperton. Heavy writing, hot takes, jokey stuff and more from yours truly.
I hope you’ll pick up a copy. I’ll have them for sale at the Big Trouble gig at White Squirrel tomorrow. They cost $10 or they’re often free if I’ve had two drinks and I know you. But I also have them up on Bandcamp. Let’s do this.
Fun Times on West 7th this week
Greetings earthlings in general and residents of the West 7th neighborhood in particular. I’ll be part of two fun events. First is a live podcast taping for City Cast Twin Cities on Friday morning at 11 a.m. at Claddagh. We’re buying you coffee and talking about stuff. What a treat.
Yup. Podcast taping on West 7th. Anything is possible.
On Saturday I have the pleasure of playing with Big Trouble on the White Squirrel patio from 6-8pm. This is outdoor bliss with awesome food compliments of the Angry Line Cook. The music sounds excellent and the scene is great.
Grand Rising from the Grand Twinkie
Maybe it’s the temporary end of the smoky air. Maybe it’s because the wind had me feeling like the heat spell was over. Maybe it was because KFAI played seven Abbey Lincoln songs in a row on Mostly Jazz.
Something has me feeling lifted up a couple inches this morning. It was good sleep last night. We had a big meal at Tono after going to temple services. I fell asleep promptly after we started a new Larry David thing on HBO and put myself to bed on the early side. Put myself to bed before Rachel which is wildly uncommon. Rachel had pulled down the blinds. The sun didn’t get through. I slept with no interruption besides for the middle age middle-of-the-night pees until maybe 7:30. After that the kids came into bed and I read a magazine out on the couch.
I fooled myself into thinking the heatwave was all the way over, but it’s a little better. My six year old daughter read me an unconscionable and uncountable amount of jokes from a kid’s joke book, I did my little round of exercises and I started on making pancakes for everyone else and potatoes, eggs and toast for me. Good coffee and music from my favorite, Dee Henry Williams aka the Grand Diva on KFAI. She plays a lot of the same songs every week. She says a lot of the same things every week including “Grand Rising from the Grand Diva”. But I can tell you that it is still fresh and timely. How does she do that? I don’t know.
Maybe all of this good music, and good energy and calmness comes from a huge cocktail of good things. I DJ’d at Berlin on Wednesday and not only did it go great, it was a great time. It's such a clarifying experience to be with your records that you picked out and you try to share them in an order, volume and energy that speaks to what is happening in the room. I also had a great brief hang with my friend Amy and then an awesome convo with Cecilia and Gabby who are both on staff at Berlin. Also, in holy-shit-the-world-is-small-but-Saint-Paul-is-way-smaller: the soundman and I worked together at Cheapo/Applause the holiday season going from 1998 to 1999. That was a different century. After I played I listened to Deltron3030 on a great set of speakers and just marveled at the instruments that Del and Kid Koala that they share with the world. I love Dan the Automator but I think of his greatness more often. I heard things in Del and Koala’s rhythm and placement I had never heard before. First time I ever saw someone do coke I was listening to that record in Colorado. I’ve never done coke but I bet you guessed that already.
Maybe the good feeling is because I received back the “Country Cabin Crapper Companion Volume Three” magazine run and I’m happy with it. I’m proud of what I wrote. I’m grateful for what Meghan, Sam and Bill wrote. And that project was one uphill after another so to see it through and done feels good. I’ll have copies up for sale on Bandcamp soon and I’ll celebrate the release at the White Squirrel on Saturday July 25 (next Saturday).
Maybe it’s completing difficult thing after difficult thing at City Cast Twin Cities including hosting a really different kind of episode that was quarterbacked by my colleague Tiffany Bui. And after all that I had a half-day on Friday and I spent a lot of it reading the New Yorker while my kids played on an iPad at Makwa Coffee while by wife got work done on her laptop. Makwa Coffee’s Ziigwan Sugar Maple is the best iced coffee in the city.
Magazines elaborate on the terrible things happening around the world in a pace I can metabolize and act upon. This one from the New Yorker laid bare the absolute barbarity of ICE detention camps are. We are painting a new stain on our country’s history methodically and inarguably. If you’re from the Twin Cities here’s one of the sentences that hurts the most:
This appeared to be one of the starker realities of the Eco tent: even by the low standards of Camp East Montana, detainees who’d been arrested in Minnesota were subject to an exceptional level of neglect, as though the unbridled spirit of Operation Metro Surge had carried over to West Texas.
Imagine living a worse life in a detention camp in Texas simply because you were abducted in the most lawless and violent of the surges happening across the country.
——-
Today after all the breakfast was cooked I opened up the Atlantic and read an article by Rose Horowitch about the death of literacy. I thought about all the gifts that reading has given me. All the universes that reading not only invited me into, but let me create. I think about the fact that in a workplace where more and more of the prep work is coming via Claude I was able to quickly reference an amazing summary of the creation of Heritage Park by Justin Ellis in “The Cruelty of Nice Folks”. It was the reading of the book that gave me that. I don’t know that it helped directly when I got the chance to interview him, I just know that reading that man’s whole ass book improved my life, my brain, my world. Claude can kiss my ass while stealing my style!
The one positive in Horowitch’s article was that “literacy as a subculture” is growing. We might never see John Cheever on the cover of a magazine again. Hell, we’ll never really see the cover of a magazine again in the same cultural impact way, but we can keep reading. We can keep loving books and magazines. We can love the way that our perspective broadens by reading in general and the way our attention tightens in specific when our nose is in front of one sentence and our hands are holding onto something. We can love the patience we are forced into having when a challenging song comes on a record but we don’t want to get up and flip it and we can love the focus of the record spinning, the handful of liner notes available on the Deodato record we’ve been listening to for the last 15 years in our hands wondering what happened on September 13.
I don’t know why but as KFAI DJ and culture bearer par excellence Kenna Cottman gets into the set for Mostly Jazz they play one thousand Lakecia Benjamin songs followed by a thousand of Abbey Lincoln. The sounds wash over me and I’m washing dishes I don’t even really have to wash at this very moment just to hear the original of “Throw it Away” when I’ve only heard the Terri Lyne Carrington version. I’m grateful for the afternoons of my life I spent just playing jazz records in a room in North Minneapolis or St. Louis Park and letting the music come out of the speakers, and checking the weather, and writing the news and hearing the jazz and hoping it’s all working.
Today it’s all working again. I take the dogs for a walk. Aaron and Melissa’s garden looks better than it ever has. But they tell me they are just trying to get more work done on the fence they’ve been working on most of the summer since the storms. Luis and his brother let me struggle through my Spanish while we talk about the World Cup finals tomorrow, and who might win (they are rooting for Argentina). Kenna is still playing unbelievable music and then Jon Jon takes over for Sound Verite. I’ve known these humans. I’ve bought records from Jon Jon. I’ve interviewed Kenna. It truly is community radio. Jon Jon plays Equinox, a John Coltrane song in C#m that I’ve heard hundreds of times. But I’ve never listened to McCoy Tyner’s solo quite that way. The way each idea talks to the last one but says something new. I know how the chords move, it’s one of the few songs I can play on piano. Then Jon Jon plays “Like Sonny” again by Coltrane. The band sounds insanely fresh, vibrant, communicative. And then Fela Kuti “Water No Get Enemy”. That’s the song that made the biggest move from Fela’s discography into a favorite of neo-soul stans like myself. I hear a guitar part I’ve never heard before. Never. I’ve listened to this song lots. But I’m older. I’m more patient. I move slower. My ears work better. I hear a lyric I’ve never heard before:
If water kill your child, na water you go use.
I want the moment to last forever but I’m also at peace with knowing it won’t. The new neighbors are outside, using a bench I thought they’d never use (pet peeve is people putting seating in their front yard and then never fucking sitting out there). But Ally and shit-I-forgot-her-name are outside cuddling on the bench. Ally is trying to change an appointment. I’m trying to come inside and write it down. By the time I get to this point Jon Jon is playing another Coltrane song, Impressions. The energy has changed, but it’s still good. The kids are on an iPad. They’ll read real books later. They’ll take their guitar and ukulele lessons later. It’s good to touch things, it’s good to write things, it’s good to read things, it’s good to change things. It’s good to be alive compared to the available alternatives. Grand rising from the grand twinkie.
DJ at Berlin on Thursday
Cory, Jake and Ben alongside ol’ Sean McPherson on Steels of Wheels
You’ve been looking for a reason to get out of the house and I’ve been looking for a chance to share some records. Worlds come together. I’m playing before and after the friends from Hired Goons on Thursday. Make your way to Berlin and hear some great music. Here’s a link to tickets.
Rest in Power to Felix E. James Jr.
Would You Look at That! It’s Thursday Again
Tomorrow morning I’ll say goodbye to my dear teacher and mentor Felix E. James Jr. Felix James taught me at Walker-West and I wouldn’t understand jazz to the extent that I do without him. I wouldn’t understand music to the extent that I do without him. I wouldn’t understand collaborating with care to the extent that I do without him. I can’t believe how patient he was. I can’t believe how passionate he was. It didn’t feel like he was clocking in to teach jazz.
It felt like he was just born to teach jazz. I remember one day playing the maybe-Miles-Davis tune “Four”. There’s some thought that Eddie Cleanhead Vinson actually wrote it. We just played it for conservatively thirty minutes straight. Going through solos, trying double time, walking half notes. There was so much time to try everything. There was Saturdays at 2pm at the old old Walker-West which was in a two story building on Selby that is still there. Some weeks we did so much. Some weeks I thought we did so little, but actually it was the first time we all played bossa, or maybe Kevin played brushes for a long ass time for the first time. Or maybe Kevin played brushes on a bossa for the first time.
Felix would take us on professional gigs that got booked through the school. We played at the St. Paul Hotel to receive August Wilson who was back in town. We messed with an equipment cart in the loading dock and accidentally pulled the top handles off of the cart and slipped them into Felix’s van. When Felix figured it out he was furious. He told us it was just a boneheaded thing to do on a gig. You don’t act like that on a gig. This is serious business. Even if it’s fun.
I don’t know, four months later we are playing at the Mall of America. It’s a Real Book gig with a comparatively small band. Maybe Rob Coleman keys, deVon Gray alto, Martin Devaney tenor, Sean bass, Kevin Hunt drums. We’re in Felix’s white van. I am relentlessly asking about what songs we’ll play. What order we’ll play them. Who will take solos on them. When we will trade 4s? Have you ever traded 8s? Should try it. Felix leans over to Martin: “He asks too many damn questions.” Simply, playfully, but clearly he made his boundaries clear. You don’t act like that on a gig. This is fun. Even if it’s serious business.
If you are a jazz bassist you get to learn to walk twice. And every bassist I know can mainly credit one person with showing them how to walk on a bass. Maybe it’s a piano player. Maybe it’s a bass teacher. Maybe it’s Felix James: stubby alto sax fingers on the low end of the piano simply picking out the notes of a walking bass while showing the elegance, the dance, the tip toe and the hard hit. He looked at me. I didn’t get it yet. I kept on I III V VI b7 VI V III - but bit by bit I got it.
When I got a little better he’d quietly show me how little I actually knew. He’d peel back another layer of chromatics, or 6/8 or some other piece of the puzzle. But the thing was Felix never made it feel like a puzzle. He’d show us how we actually already knew how to do it, we just didn’t the name for it. He never asked us to believe him. He showed us how the new concept worked, how it really was the old concept flipped upside down and still landing.
He’d have the saxophone strap on almost all the time. He didn’t play the sax all that often but oh when he did it reminded you that he wasn’t just a gifted teacher. He’d immediately sound tens of time better than us, smooth, soulful. Like Cannonball, like Sonny Stitt. He’d push us to a different song that would teach us a different thing. He had to meet me where I was at. He had to meet Rob where he was at. DeVon the same. Martin the same. Kevin the same. Tasha the same. Giving us the material. Recommending the OMNIBOOK when it was time. Telling me to work with Laurie Lang. Telling me to try to write something sometime. Looking at it, pushing his fingers around the changes. Asking a question. Pointing out when I wrote it wrong. When it wasn’t a full measure, when it was way more than a full measure. He never asked us to believe him. He let us count it ourselves.
We’d walk in some Saturdays and he’d simply announce that we have a gig. Maybe somebody couldn’t do it, but enough people always could. Just immediately load up the van. The older kids some of them had cars. Yup, we’re going to the Hubert Humphrey School at the U to do something. He gave hundreds of people these experiences. Before Rob, Martin, DeVon, Kevin, Tasha there was other groups, other rhythm sections, in fact sometime they’d come back and say hello. And as college comes, or people move on to different things they might still stop by sometime. Sometime we’d play a “gig” just outside in the courtyard to maybe nobody, maybe a couple people from the neighborhood come. Just playing songs. A guy swinging by to play a little keyboard cause they knew him from church.
It was how we all learned. We’d play in downtown St. Paul for the fundraiser. Polishing off our best openings. All Blues in 4/4. I’m overplaying, there’s a tenth on every note, there’s fills that make no sense. Kevin’s snare is tuned so high with a FIBERSKIN stretched across the piccolo frame. It’s the pinnacle of funk that we knew at that time.
Sure, a lot of the same players would play at Central. But we didn’t sound like we did when it was Felix picking the tunes, calling the solos, setting up the mic if we needed it. Felix, you pushed the tradition along. You gave it to people. You taught it the right way. You raised us the right way. You helped us grow. You guided us. This is fun. Even if it’s serious business.
Photo Gallery from Lime Toss Olympics
Lime Toss Olympics is an annual competition of outrageous games organized by myself and Amy Wielunski. These beautiful photos were taken by Casey Peterson.
Big Trouble on Saturday
I haven’t been blogging cause I’ve been working wild hard on City Cast Twin Cities, No Brains No Lightbulbs and the Country Cabin Crapper Companion Volume 3. Lo siento. But I do play music on Saturday at the White Squirrel from 6-8pm. Food from Angry Line Cook.
Patios and Podcasts // Two Show Announcements
The rugged good looks of Big Trouble
I just feverishly worked on City Cast Twin Cities and Trivia Mafia stuff on the patio of White Squirrel. I enjoyed the faint smell of cigarettes, the smell of a perfume that only awesome women in their 20s and 30s who dig beers drink and the smell of a an outdoor flat top grill in action making delicious burgers. I smelled summer this evening.
And on Saturday I won’t be sitting at my laptop trying to think of cross streets of Grand Avenue. I’ll be standing on the patio stage at the White Squirrel playing bass with Big Trouble.
God I love playing with Big Trouble. My brother is writing his ass off for the group and we have this awesome schedule going. Practice once a month, play once a month and always add at least one new song. We are, as they say: dialed in.
I hope you will free up your schedule and join Big Trouble on Saturday, May 30 from 6-8pm. The Angry Line Cook is cooking up burgers and more and my god is the food delicious. We are going to have fun this summer and it all starts on Saturday at White Squirrel. I’ll see you there.
Am I allowed to put a little song on this here post and ask you to listen to it? I think I am. This is Steve’s tune Chicane and we recorded it down in my basement. Great solos from both guitardudes and Peter and I channeling our love of The Meters. enjoy!
Chuck Terhark and a very attractive man advertising a live podcast recording.
Couldn’t we have some with podcasts? I host two podcasts. I’m the host of City Cast Twin Cities and the co-host of No Brains, No Lightbulbs. My life is very podcast-centric right now. And I am loving it. The Trivia Mafia podcast is a once a week affair recorded right about the White Squirrel. Our producer is named Beth and we have an awesome guest every week to answer some dumb questions and play some awesome trivia. We are doing our first live event on Saturday June 17 and I hope you can come on out. It’s at the Bryant Lake Bowl in Minneapolis and after the taping we are going to join and play Trivia Mafia out in the bar with Molly. Grab your tickets! They are only $10 in advance. I think it’s going to be a really fun time, but of course I would say that. But of course I actually think that too.
What to the Residents of the Twin Cities is the 4th of July?
Hidden Beach April 2026 in Minneapolis
“America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be
false to the future.” - Frederick Douglass, 1852
Let no lemonade, firecracker or tubed meat pass through my hands for the rest of my Julys without thinking about the unkept promises of the Fourth of July. If you are proud of America you should be worried for America. I love America and I fear for its future. We are 250 years in and we are at the nadir of the American experiment within my lifetime. There are many pain points but Operation Metro Surge looms large in my mind. The Federal government waged an invasion of choice against many cities but none with the cruelty and volume they used against our Twin Cities.
There was no justification for the focus on the Twin Cities. There was no unique measure of immigration related infractions that would justify the Twin Cities defending ourselves against a federal force 12 times the size of the one deployed in Chicago, a metro area three times as large as ours.
I cannot compare the modern day cruelties forced onto immigrants and protesters with the cruelties of chattel slavery. But I do compare my disgust with the larceny of my times with Frederick Douglass’s disgust with his.
This summer will be filled with the American flag and with declarations of pride for America. I have no doubt that the Trump administration will be in on the photo shoots, the barbecues, the speeches. They deserve none of it. I hope the first slice of ice cream pie that Stephen Miller eats on the White House lawn gives him sight for the first time. Sight that his campaign of American terror has no place in the path our country should be carving. I hope that Donald Trump sees that the police force he commands is inhumane and criminal. As ICE-related cases make their way through our legal system, their wins amount to a rounding error. The actions of ICE agents will not be defended in our system. The actions are indefensible, immoral and murderous.
In the Twin Cities we now live in the wake of Operation Metro Surge. Listen closely to the people who know it best and the operation is not over, just slowed. The Whipple Building still shuttles immigrants in without due process and ships them off as quickly as possible to circuit courts more favorable to the cause. And we still pick up and drop off our children off at schools that have signs that say that no federal agents are permitted on site without a judicial warrant.
Our Twin Cities fought against Operation Metro Surge because it was un-American, because it was inhumane, because it was antithetical to morality, because it was vicious and because we love our neighbors. In our country’s history, and in our country’s present, we are loaded to the gills with un-American acts, with inhumanity, with droughts of morality. I celebrate our stand against Operation Metro Surge and I mourn the moments I and we have come up short in the past. We can do better and this year we will. And next year we will. If Frederick Douglass had hope in 1852 I will have hope in 2026. And if on this Fourth of July I think only of the fireworks and of the varieties of potato salad I prefer, I have failed.
Let the Fourth of July belong to the people who know this country can be better. I have never been less certain that we will win. The bastards may win. The criminals who further sully the already sullied reputation of the United States may win. I fear that my great grandchildren will be told that Sean McPherson was a part of one of the last generations to fight for a moral world that valued equality and liberty for all. As clear as I can say it, the pursuers of liberty for all are my lot. If my great grandchildren feel differently, I swear them off. The spirit of evil and of white supremacy is too foreign to me to be in one family with it.
I reserve the taste of a hot dog with relish and mustard and the joy of modest fireworks viewed from the parking lot of the Eagan Lunds to those who fought and continue to fight. I would love nothing more than to slap the taste of a well-prepared hot dog out of Trump’s mouth, out of Miller’s mouth, out of Noem’s crooked smirk. The Fourth of July belongs to my lot, not theirs.
The Fourth of July celebrates nothing immaculate. It celebrates the birth of a country riddled with problems and lousy with solutions. The mistakes we made can be acknowledged and can often be righted. The impulse by many Americans is to omit our mistakes from our history or to repaint them as successes. Shame on those who don’t acknowledge mistakes. Shame on those who don’t learn from them.
There is always the opportunity to be better, to be more righteous, to give more to humanity than we take from it. In “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July,” Douglass celebrated the opportunities our country’s relative youth gave to the 1850s:
May he not hope that high lessons of wisdom, of justice and of truth, will yet give direction to her destiny? Were the nation older, the patriot's heart might be sadder, and the reformer's brow heavier. Its future might be shrouded in gloom, and the hope of its prophets go out in sorrow. There is consolation in the thought, that America is young. Great streams are not easily turned from channels, worn deep in the course of ages.
In the Twin Cities we have rallied and resisted against evil forces in our country’s spirit and in power in our capital. The Twin Cities are the tip of the spear in the fight to point America towards its most giving, generous and familial spirit. I will celebrate that fight, that resistance and that future this Fourth of July. My community are those who celebrate in that spirit. And to them and only them I wish a Happy Fourth of July, 2026.
I’ll Play the Blues With You
I’m playing bass for a blues jam my brother is throwing on Saturday at Sarah Jane’s. It’s at 2pm. Bring your guitar. I’ll play really quiet if you ask me to.
Big Trouble at White Squirrel Saturday March 28
Saturday belongs to No Kings. Time Magazine thinks it will be the single biggest day of domestic political protest in our history. Amazing. Run it up. When you’re done and you feel like you can’t leave St. Paul until after you’ve heard some guitar solos, come on over to the White Squirrel from 6-8p.
Very Small Awards
I’d like you to nominate some musicians for some very specific awards. Good luck to all of our soon to be nominees.
A 6 Candle
I’m sweeping up a lot of glitter today which is a medium length way of saying that the youngest had her sixth birthday party today.
I thought it would mean a very particular something. Two years ago my oldest turning six did feel that very particular way I thought today would feel. I had sixth birthdays circled in my head because I’m convinced my mom had done a number on me when I was five. And by done a number I mean treated me wrong. Yelled at me. Yelled at me for being fat. Yelled at me for being loud. Yelled at me for existing. Swore at me. Told me she was going to feed me paper towels instead of food to help me lose weight. Told me I was a dumbshit relentlessly. Really swore at me. Not letting a swear slip around me. Not letting a swear slip at me. Swearing directly at me, on purpose, most days.
So I had today circled, if she blows out the number six candle then I did something better. I gave my kids something better than I got. I’d kick me feet up in my miniature triumph. But I don’t know how I’m fucking my kids up. And I must think that my mom didn’t think she was fucking me up. For all I know she was kicking her feet up at my sixth birthday party thinking she was doing something better than her parents did to her. And I’m pretty sure she was.
I can find and celebrate the triumph if I make it miniature and measured. I think my girls feel more at home in their bodies than I did at their age. I think my girls see their parents relate to their own bodies in healthier, more supportive, more welcoming ways than I saw in my house growing up. I can’t with any great confidence open the lens wider than that. We don’t know what pain will stick. We don’t know what joys will stick either.
I had a series of bizarre and truly beautiful conversations with my Dad a handful of years ago. At some point it was sort of just me sharing different emotional bruises I had from my childhood. The ones that stuck, the ones that shaped me, the ones that I had flipped over and over in a therapist’s office across from the St. Paul Cheapo some years before that. What was strange was how masculine the conversation was. The vibe was not dissimilar to when I show someone the weird fatty bump on my right knee from when I feel down hard on a bunch of rocks at Camp Shane in the summer of 1995. But he was also asking after certain emotional bruises he thought would be there. He mentioned a stressful night we had in England when I was a boy. He brought me to a fancy dinner for a work trip he was on but did not realize the fancy club had a strict dress code that involved ties and maybe even certain shoes and a blazer. I was not up to code, nor did I have anything on that continent that would’ve brought me up to code. He didn’t think they’d make a kid wait in the lobby due to a dress code. He was wrong.
I had to wait in the lobby for a handful of hours while he did his dinner. He would come and check on me from time to time and I believe he made some effort to get me food. It was a long time. . .2 plus hours maybe? It was like having your kid wait outside while you had a whole dinner party. I didn’t find this night to be particularly difficult. I thought the rules of this club were insane, I thought that enforcing them on a boy in low double digits was doubly insane. But the night didn’t wear on me cosmically. I was bored out of my brain but that was just the status of being a kid pre-iPad. I remember spending hours tying knots with blades of grass while lying in my backyard. I was comfortable with boredom. My dad shared that he thought that for sure that night at the dinner club in England would be one of the bad ones for me, one of the ones that I’d be stuck sorting out for years. It wasn’t. Life goes on, let’s get a sandwich on the way back to the hotel.
It’s pointless to guess how you are fucking up your kids. You are fucking them up and you are loving them. You are trying your best and you are failing miserably. You are doing a great job and you aren’t. I thought that on this night of the sixth birthday I’d be lifting off of some plateau, I’d feel like I had entered a new level on the video game.
What do I really feel? I feel happy that the party went off just fine. I feel unexplainably exhausted. The party wasn’t that stressful and it was two hours long but I feel like I’ve been up for 21 hours. There is a small amount of glitter everywhere. There are clear ways I haven’t yet fucked up my kids and they aren’t insubstantial. There are Thin Mints in the house, I read an entire new Karl Ove Knausgaard novel and JS Coffee still had the Guji coffee I’ve been into and I bought a pound of it today. We had kids throw lightning bolts onto a homemade Mount Olympus today and I’ll remember sitting inside in my outside camper chair in the kitchen and handing kids a grape as a prize no matter where the lightning bolt hit; my daughter had found the pin the tale on Bandit to be too stressful last year.
There will be ninth birthdays, and seventh birthdays and experiences, good and bad, that I think that my kids will remember forever but they won’t. They’ll be random trips to the doctor, to Hudson and to KidsHair that I’ll forget about as they’re happening but they’ll be burnt into their memories in deeper relief than most of their adult birthdays. Maybe, a generation from now one of them will be writing about being proud to get to their kid's sixth birthday, knowing they had sidestepped some mistake that I had not. May they celebrate their miniature triumph, clean up the glitter, and stay unready for the next disaster, even after it happens.
Bill Caperton is Joining Big Trouble on Saturday
Big Trouble is ready for some musical guests. On Saturday February 28 we are hosting our good friend Bill Caperton to sing a couple tunes. Bill is the writer/leader/figurehead of the group Ela. Peter Leggett (drums) and I (bass) hold it down for Ela and I love playing Bill’s music. Bill is also an amazing student and steward of music. A link to a song recommendation gets clicked on blindingly fast. Sparklehorse, The Alchemist, Brazilian funk, Neutral Milk Hotel, Haruomi Hosono. Those are just a couple I remember Bill sending to me and changing my day/life/direction. He picked out a Tom Waits tune, a Radiohead tune I’m playing bow on, a Clem Snide tune and a Tom T. Hall tune. As per usual, the show is free and it’s all ages. As per usual, you should come.