Keith at Irvine Spectrum -- 16Mar2013

I picked up an "extra" Spectrum gig due to lucky timing of an email exchange with the booking lady. And it was not only a Saturday; the weather was (or started out, anyway) nice.

So lots of people out, and a pretty good response all night. The teens are back out in force, too -- some groups joining in, and some being far too cool to listen to the dinosaur play. Had some dancing kids (to whom I gave finger lights), and a group of Mexican ladies who wanted to take a picture with me -- even though I didn't have the top hat that I wear in Laguna. And lots of people taking pictures or videos with their phones or sometimes big professional cameras. It seems like, the better I get, the more people want to take my picture. Weird.

I had one group of all tween boys, horsing around and looking at the list and trying to decide which kids' song would be the funniest to ask for. Before they came to a decision, I said, "You know, I didn't come out here to be made fun of", and they instantly switched to respectful, "Oh no, we didn't mean..." mode. I was surprised that that worked so well.

But the best part was later in the evening when I had lots of people stop to listen and cuddle in the unexpected cold breeze. I was freezing, but that (extended) second half is always the best. I had a couple cuddling and slow dancing over to one side, so I started playing all love songs 'til they wandered off.

And there was a big guy who settled into one of the comfy chairs and listened for a long time. At one point, some girls came by and asked for "Landslide", and after it was over he came up and told me something that I could hear little of, and understood less, but apparently the song had some kind of great personal meaning to him -- I caught something about weight loss? Um, OK -- glad you liked it. (And I suppose your explanation of the nonsensical lyrics to that song is as good as Stevie Nicks' insistence that it's somehow about her dad...)

After another half-dozen songs he came up again, and walked past the tip jar to personally hand me a twenty and thank me for the music on his way out. My pleasure.

Anyway, with all the people coming by to hang out, listen, and "extend their dates", that last hour stretched into two and a half when I finally shut it down at 11:30. Five and a half hours is probably sufficient, especially since I'd already played 4 hours the night before in Laguna. I had the recorder running, but most of it is unlistenable 'cuz of the noise, until the fountain shut off entirely at 11:00. I do kind of like my simple, sparse arrangement of this song:

Ruby Tuesday