Sight and sounds from an interesting weekend: if you'll forgive a bit of braggadocio from a proud poppa, my nimble-fingered son has a pretty decent grasp of the blues / rock canon for a 14 year old who just got kicked out of middle school. I wish I could take some of the credit but it's probably a function of the drinking water in his native Texas and growing up in Chicago. Witness this Friday night performance of him and his pals covering the Leadbelly classic "Black Betty" (okay, the 1977 Ram Jam mulletrawk version thereof). Hawkspawn is taking care of lead guitar on the Hamer Explorer; the boys in the band are all between 13 and 15. I would note that none of the boys had ever played the song 4 days prior to the performance.
I will tell you it brought a tear to the eye of this crusty old late 70's high school parking lot dirtbag. So much so that as a reward I offered to take the lad with me the next day to the 2010 Crossroads Guitar Festival at Toyota Park Stadium just outside Chicago.
The Saturday festival brought together some of the biggest names in rock and blues to benefit Eric Clapton's Crossroads Center. In addition to Clapton, the lineup included Jeff Beck, Buddy Guy, B.B. King, Ronnie Wood, Jimmie Vaughan, ZZTop, Sheryl Crow, John Mayer, the Allman Brothers, Los Lobos, Robert Cray, Johnny Lang, Vince Gill, Robert Randolph, Joe Bonamassa, James Burton, on and on; a firmament that contained, as you can imagine, many of my kid's guitar idols.
Best part? The kid and I would be backstage. Long story short, my car was invited to be on display by the Fender Guitars artist courtesy tent lounge, and I was offered two comped backstage passes for the trouble. Turns out that many of the artist are serious gearheads -- most notably Billy Gibbons, Beck, Clapton, and Vaughan -- and it was thought a little hot rod display would be a pleasing between-set distraction for them. Here's my heap at the show:
Getting boxed in by some tour buses.
Since we were in front of the Fender artist tent...
We decided to bring along Hawkspawn's Strat of Destiny to display inside the Coupe of Justice. It's an Olympic white & maple American Standard, same specs as the one Jimi Hendrix played at Woodstock. My grudging payoff to the boy after he finally bested me in a jam session last year.
On with the parade of rock stars! We were in the al fresco dining area, catered by Lou Malnati's, when Slowhand sauntered by. According to ancient rock club graffiti legend this is God. If so, apparently God likes Chicago deep dish. We were too shy / polite to go intro ourselves, but between bites he gave us a thumbs up on the car.
Saw several other notables milling about the chow, including Sheryl Crow, Buddy Guy, Joe Bonamassa, Jimmie Vaughan. Vince Gill was a nice guy. Our passes gave us access to the pit in front of the stage so we wandered out to catch some of the show. The emcee was the ultimate Chicago mensch, Bill Murray, who appeared in rotating costume. Here he is as Hendrix (introducing Jeff Beck, as I recall).
A shot of the crowd from the back of the sold out stadium; announced at 25,000.
Speaking of Beck, here he is backstage after his mind bending performance. Beck is a hot rod fanatic in his own right (and a musical hero to Hawkspawn) so we were hoping to have a chance to chat cars and guitars with him, but alas; it was not to be. Next time.
But after we took in the John Mayer set we arrived back at the car to see Billy Gibbons of ZZTop taking pics of my coupe.
Billy, as you might know, is a huge hot rod enthusiast. A friendly car chat ensued when Billy asked, "you boys wanna see something?" It was our ticket to come aboard the tour bus to see pics of Billy's new hot rod project at SoCal Speed Shop. It's a '33 Ford 3-window coupe, a new take on the classic ZZTop Eliminator from the 80's -- more than that we were sworn to secrecy. Here's Billy showing us pics of his last project -- a Black Watson-style scalloped SquareBird -- on his MacBook.
Billy and Hawkspawn -- two of my favorite guitarists.
"Sorry boys, I'm on in an hour and need a nap," said Billy. We disembarked the tour bus, and an hour later we were back in the stage pit when Billy and his cohorts from the Best Little Band in Texas put on a monster set.
Afterwards, back to the car. One of the Fender folks noticed the Strat in the car and asked if I played, and I pointed at the boy. "He does," I said. "And not half bad." He invited us into the artists tent to enjoy the air conditioning and the vast array of Fender Custom Shop guitars and amps for the pleasure of performers relaxing between acts. Hawkspawn noodled with a few guitars while I wandered over to watch the US soccer team lose to Ghana in the TV lounge area. When I got back to Hawkspawn he was going through some blues riffs which earned a thumbs up from David Hildalgo and Cesar Rojas from Los Lobos. More rockstar spotting and free pizza, then back to the concert area at twilight. Hawkspawn rapt as two of his alltime stringbending heros took to the stage: Clapton and Beck.
And then grand finale -- well worth the cost of the DVD that will be out soon. In approximate L-R order: Derek Trucks and Warren Haynes from the Allman Brothers, John Mayer, Joe Bonamassa, James Burton, Susan Tedesci, Keb Mo, Jimmie Vaughan, Johnny Winter, Johnny Lang, Robert Cray, Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood, Ronnie Wood from the Stones, Jeff Beck, Buddy Guy, B.B. King, David Hildalgo, Vince Gill, Albert Lee, Cesar Rojas, Robert Randolph, and a few others who are currently escaping memory. The song? "Sweet Home Chicago," natch.
All good things must come to an end, tho; we packed up and headed back home as workers began deconstructing the massive stage. On the road home I looked over and saw that the 'spawn still had that big grin painted on his face. Over the engine noise, I said, "got some bad news for you pal."
"What's that?"
"I gotta believe it's all downhill from here."
