If at any time in the last 14 years, you’ve listened to my guitar playing and wished it were better, hey, it’s not my fault, it’s Alan’s. Writing a few months ago from Baltimore (or as they helpfully point out Charm City), he and Stacey recall: Okay, way back in late November of 2000, we saw the band at Bowery Ballroom with Damon and Naomi opening. I asked you and Georgia why you didn’t play “Red Buckets” more often. Alan attempted to describe the virtues of Jorma Kaukonen’s guitar video. He offered to send you a copy, a gesture you good-naturedly accepted. He later realized this would be pirating and thought better of it. This was the first show we ever went to together and we’re still at it, married 11 years last November.
Happy 12th anniversary! Here’s a retroactive memory for the next time you tell that story. It was the first of a three-night run at the Bowery Ballroom. I don’t have to remind you that Damon and Naomi sat in with us on a few songs that evening, and maybe you even remember us inviting a member of the audience to play bongos on “You Sexy Thing.” Did you recognize him? Though we like to flatter ourselves that we’re cinéastes, I sheepishly confess that between Georgia, James and me, not a one of us figured out our percussionist was screen star Jason Woliner! We had no choice but to burn our Film Forum cards. It wasn’t until years later when Jason had moved to the other side of the camera and we were (re-)introduced that he told us of our previous meeting.
