The Melody Creating Continues Into 2019

Since reading Jeff Tweedy's memoir I've been more inspired than ever to try and create something new (almost every day).  It doesn't have to be good or that different than what came before.  The act of creating is the goal not the end product.

With that in mind, the tunes have continued into 2019.  I found an old Guatemalan Marimba Chapinlandia LP at a thrift store and this one called Liquid Yepocapa is inspired by the music on that album.  Guatemalan marimba music often has a ragtime or foxtrot feel.  This was written from January 4 to 5.  I recorded this on 1/5/19 using my Ome tenor banjo.  The tune is a little tricky to play and I was still getting the feel of it when this was recorded.

Fortunately I've never really gotten into too much of a rut, but when I am feeling that way one option is to scan through this book of scales I have called Musical Scales of the World by Michael Hewitt.  It's one of the best music books I own.  On January 9 I was looking through the section of this book on Japanese pentatonic scales and happened upon this melody while playing the Minyõ scale (page 157).  With C as the starting note, the Minyõ scale is C, Eb, F, G, Bb, C.  This is a super simple melody that is fun to play.  Here I am today playing it on glockenspiel.  Hopefully this year I'll get a better mallet instrument.

On January 10 I came up with this melody called Walls and Ceiling while playing my Keith McMillen K-Board.  I'll spare you the placeholder words I used to flesh out the melody, but this was an example where by syncing the syllables of words to the sound of the melody helped solidify it in my mind.  This is just a one part tune.  It's rare that something feels complete without at least a 2nd part but this one feels good as it is.  I hadn't played guitar in a few weeks so I was figuring out where the guitar notes were for this melody as I was recording it.  This is one of the first takes where I got through with no major note flubs.

Last night I picked up the banjo at about 10pm with no intention of playing for a long time or doing anything in particular.  Three hours later it was 1am and I had been playing that whole time, with a bunch of musical notes written out on tab paper.  Some of those notes come from here.  No Hamsters Allowed.

***

Quote From Jeff Tweedy's Memoir Let's Go (So We Can Get Back)

At the bottom of page 168 in his memoir Let's Go (So We Can Get Back) Jeff Tweedy writes:

I try to make something new, something that wasn't there when I woke up, by the end of every day.  It doesn't have to be long or perfect or good.  It just has to be something.

Those words really resonated with me.  For my own purposes, I would re-phrase that statement to read something like: "Try to create something new, something that didn't exist before, every week.  It doesn't have to be exceptional, or original, or vastly different than what came before.  It just has to be something."

I also like on page 158, when Jeff describes going through Woody Guthrie's writings for the Mermaid Avenue project and found a note by Woody that read "Write a song every day."  Jeff says That's the best advice I've ever gotten as a songwriter, and it wasn't directed at me. It was written by a man who died two months after I was born, as a reminder to himself.

For the last year and a half I've been trying to write about one tune a week (by "tune" I mean an instrumental melody).  I'm up to about 80 now so that's right on pace.  So far I've really enjoyed this process.  There is a high that comes from creating something new that wasn't there before but now is.  However, I've also given myself permission to let go of this goal if it ever becomes too demanding or no longer fun.

***

I ordered Chinese take out on Christmas night and drove by myself to pick it up.  On the way back from the restaurant a melody came to me along a dark stretch of road which I then hummed into my phone and didn't think about again for the rest of the night.  Then yesterday, December 26th, I had a bug or some kind of mild illness all day.  Even though I wasn't feeling one-hundred percent I decided to transcribe the melody I had sung into my phone the night before.

In my sickened state it didn't make me feel better to realize that my sung melody was not very original and pretty scalar, something I've been wanting to avoid.  So I cast it aside and then tried to gain inspiration from an obscure LP of Guatemalan marimba music that I had found in a thrift store on December 22nd.  That didn't work out so well either and I think might have inhaled some dust mites which made me feel even worse.

This morning I slept in late, to like 10am, which has pretty much shaken off whatever malady had me down.  The first thing I did after getting up was to revisit that melody I had hummed on 12/25 and transcribed on 12/26.  As is usually the case, something I wrote a day or two earlier that didn't seem to be any good at the time becomes a little more likable after sleeping on it.  This made me think of that Jeff Tweedy quote, "It doesn't have to be long or perfect or good. It just has to be something."

Here's what I wrote today.  If it survives, which I think it might, it'll be tune number 81 and will carry me through to 2019.

***

Tunes 78, 79 and 80! Inspired by John Kadlecik, Dorothy Ashby, Steve Kimock and Hailu Mergia

I've got a little catching up to do because I've neglected to share tunes 78 and 79, and just this morning I wrote number 80. So here goes.

John Kadlecik has an excellent new CD called ON THE ROAD.  My favorite track on that album is the song Seen Love.  It's very well recorded and there are some jammy composed bits that really stand out.  So I came up with my own melody (hopefully my own melody) called Shooby Doo Weep based on parts of that song Seen Love.  A third part got added to Shooby Doo Weep and for that third part I pulled from the Dorothy Ashby composition Action Line.  (Dorothy Ashby was a jazz harpist.  Look her up, especially her album AFRO HARPING).  It would be best if the similarities between what I wrote and the source material is only in my head only not straight up plagiarism, but I don't have a good enough ear to tell.

Shooby Doo Weep



In early December I was reading Joel Selvin's book Fare Thee Well on the "Grateful Dead's" post-Jerry years, which made me want to re-listen to those April 1999 Phil and Phriends shows featuring Phil Lesh, Trey Anastasio, Page McConnell, Steve Kimock and John Molo.  I remember those shows being a huge deal when they happened almost 20 years ago and the music made across those three nights has stood the test of time.  On the first night 4/15/99 before going fully into Uncle John's Band the group plays around with a really cool sounding Caribbean melody, which I just learned for the first time is the Steve Kimock tune A New Africa.  I searched for another version of A New Africa and the first thing that came up was a Steve Kimock show from 2/22/2002.  I had never really listened to any of Steve Kimock's original music, but I was really taken in by this 2002 recording from the Gothic Theater in Colorado.  In addition to A New Africa, I found myself loving the tunes Cowboy and Cole's Law.  Long story short, Sudden Lee was brought to life by listening to that Kimock music.

I had an initial part that I recorded on glockenspiel which I'll share below.  But I had actually been adding more to this when playing it on banjo.  So here's the main theme on glockenspiel, and then the full version on banjo.

Suddenly glockenspiel


Sudden Lee tenor banjo


Saturday mornings have recently proven to be a very productive time.  If I get up early, around 7AM, and get straight to work, usually by noon I will have created something new that didn't exist before.  That happened again today, thankfully.  Today's tune was inspired by sounds heard on Hailu Mergia's WEDE HARER GUZO album.  (Hailu Mergia is another musician you should look up).  I'm calling this tune Za'atar after the middle eastern spice I used last night in an out of this world vegan-keto fattoush salad with baked ground flax seed in place of the bread.  I really like this one!  But of course the most recently written piece is always going to be a favorite.

Za'atar


OK - that catches it all up to now.

My Favorite Books of the Year (2018)

I started off the year reading pretty heavily, had a mid-year lull, then got back on track in September and pretty successfully read about a book a week from then 'til now.  Enough to compile a list of this sort. These aren't necessarily books that came out in 2018, although most are fairly recent.

Many of my fiction selections for this year were what you might call magical realism.  Not quite traditional fantasy or sci-fi, but something a little weird was going on.  My favorite novel like this was GALORE by Canadian author Michael Crummey.  The book tells the story of the unusual residents of a small Newfoundland settlement over a period of many decades, starting in the 1800's. I've never read anything quite like it.  GALORE is now one of my favorite books of all-time.

Other novels I enjoyed include THE SNOW CHILD by Eowyn Ivey, THE SEAS by Samantha Hunt, and a quirky little book called THREE TO SEE THE KING by Magnus Mills.

2018 is also the year I was introduced to sci-fi/weird fiction writer Jeff Van DerMeer.  ANNIHILATION - the first book in his Southern Reach trilogy - is another that is now an all-time favorite of mine.  I loved the spell this book put me under...sci-fi with elements of Lovecraft or THE ROAD.  I feel like ANNIHILATION stands on its own as a complete work.  I also read the next two books in the series, AUTHORITY and ACCEPTANCE, but those didn't sparkle for me as well as the first book.

For short stories, I loved, loved, loved Neil Gaiman's retelling of the Norse myths, aptly titled NORSE MYTHOLOGY.  Believe it or not this was the first Neil Gaiman book I had ever read and it led me to others such as THE GRAVEYARD BOOK, CORALINE, and THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE.  This also inspired me to read other tellings of the Norse myths.  For example, NORSE MYTHS: TALES OF ODIN, THOR AND LOKI by Kevin Crossley-Holland.  I even, gasp, enjoyed watching a Thor movie!

 Another book of short stories that I loved this year is TALES OF FALLING AND FLYING by Ben Loory, which is a follow-up to his equally entertaining STORIES FOR NIGHTTIME AND SOME FOR THE DAY.  Loory's stories (hey that rhymes!) are so unique and imaginative that it makes me wish I had written them myself.  They are almost like Russell Edson poems expanded to a few more pages.

Speaking of Russell Edson, this year I became aware of another poet I would consider to be in the same league as him.  I'm talking about James Tate.  Tate passed away in 2015 but he left behind a lot of work.  I purchased his DOME OF THE HIDDEN PAVILION and have been perusing it when the mood strikes.

In the world of non-fiction, when I found out there was a book covering the inner squabbles and struggles of the four surviving members of the the Grateful Dead Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann in the post Jerry Garcia years, I just had to read it.  The book is called FARE THEE WELL by journalist Joel Selvin.  It was an eye opening read.

Last night I finished the Jeff Tweedy memoir LET'S GO (SO WE CAN GET BACK) and it is probably in my top three or four books this year.  Even though I had an Uncle Tupelo and Wilco mini-obsession period about 15 years ago, I wouldn't say that I am a regular listener to Tweedy's music.  I've never seen him perform live, for example.  Still, I had an interest in this book and turning its pages over the last few days has been a calming and oddly pleasant experience.  I laughed, I cried. I can't recall ever enjoying an autobiography to this degree.  You're a good writer Jeff.  We knew that already from your songs, but now we have further proof.

The book that had me laughing out loud the most this year wasn't CALYPSO by David Sedaris, although I liked that one a lot.  No the book that had me chuckling uncontrollably was VACATIONLAND by John Hodgman.  Don't let Hodgman's previous books of hobo facts be a deterrent.  VACATIONLAND is a turn towards dry, whimsical, nerdy, essays.  Like dad-rock in written form.  I'm hoping there's more where that came from.

Lastly I need to mention a cookbook.  It's a book, so technically it can be on this list.  The cookbook is called VEGAN KETO by Liz MacDowell.  It was the title that got me.  This is exactly the book I've been needing.  I've flirted with and had great success with the Keto diet since 2016 but you eat way more meat and cheese on that diet than I am comfortable with.  On the flipside, I also like to romanticize a vegan way of eating but that has always been too high in carbs for my body, among other excuses.

Along comes Liz MacDowell's VEGAN KETO - a compilation of recipes that take take into account two restrictive diets and through what must have been a lot of trial and error finds the Venn diagram where they can deliciously meet.  What I love about this book is she doesn't in any way sacrifice her Vegan Keto principles in an effort to gain flavor - she holds fast to the format and then finds ways to create incredible meals within those restrictions.

I haven't gone completely vegan or completely keto or completely anything in my overall existence, but I have cooked almost exclusively out of this book at least for dinner almost every day since after Thanksgiving and everything I have made has been not just tasty but also healthy and positive.  These are meals you have no complaints about afterwards.

OK I think that covers it!

Best Albums of 2018

My top five albums of 2018 are, in this order:
1) Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids - An Angel Fell
2) Phish - Kasvot Växt í Rokk
3) Eamon O'Leary - All Souls
4) Mary Halvorson and Bill Frisell - The Maid with the Flaxen Hair
5) Andrew Marlin - Buried in a Cape

The next five, in less particular of an order, are:
Alina Engibaryan - We Are
Khruangbin - Con Todo El Mundo
John Prine - The Tree of Forgiveness
Jimi Tenor - Order of Nothingness
Circles Around the Sun - Let It Wander

Below I have categorized these in more detail.

Best Singer-Songwriter Album - All Souls by Eamon O'Leary
Eamon O'Leary beat out one of the all-time greats (John Prine) to take the top slot in this category.  John Prine's The Tree of Forgiveness falls in the top ten overall, but All Souls probably ranks in the top three for me this year.

On All Souls Eamon has fine-tuned his brand of self-penned melancholy ballads and distilled it into a near perfect ten song package. There's a charming, seductive edge to these songs and still another quality that for some reason brings to mind the sounds of Wake of the Flood and From the Mars Hotel era Grateful Dead studio albums.

Best Acoustic Instrumental Album - Buried in a Cape by Andrew Marlin

I'm a sucker for CDs of all original fiddle tunes and Buried in a Cape is perhaps the best album I've ever heard in this category.  The primary influence seems to be vintage late 70's/early 80's Newgrass ala Tony Rice and Sam Bush.  But there's also stately compositions like the type found on Norman Blake's Natasha's Waltz, jazzy numbers that wouldn't sound out of place under the fingers of Jethro Burns or Tiny Moore, and crooked old-time fiddle tunes that seem as if they were plucked straight from the hills.  

Andrew Marlin is best known as a songwriter in the increasingly popular duo Mandolin Orange.  With the all-instrumental Buried in a Cape it's clear that he can add "formidable tune composer and instrumentalist" to his reputation.  It doesn't quite seem fair that a lyricist of Andrew's caliber should also be capable of writing such memorable fiddle tunes but here is the proof.

Best Electric Instrumental Album - Con Todo El Mundo by Khruangbin

This is the most competitive category for my musical taste.  I had several contenders in this style, including Five Star Motel by Gitkin, Spacesuit by Robert Walter's 20th Congress, Road to Knowhere by Tommy Guerrero, The Serpent's Mouth by Bacao Rhythm and Steel Band, and Let It Wander by Circles Around the Sun.

Khruangbin wins, however.  Con Todo El Mundo expands upon the retro thai funk they established on their full-length 2015 debut The Universe Smiles Upon You while still keeping that signature blend of guitar melody, counterpoint bass-lines, and "snap" drumming.  Whether you approach this music as chilled-out psychedelia or uptempo exotica, there's a dependable magnetism to Khruangbin's unique take on the art of music making.

Best Album Featuring Mary Halvorson or Bill Frisell - The Maid with the Flaxen Hair

It's true that I eat up almost everything Bill Frisell or Mary Halvorson puts out.  In 2018 the choices were many.  In Mary's case, among the releases she participated in, I returned frequently to Theirs by Thumbscrew.  In Bill's case it's hard to overlook his long-awaited solo studio album Music Is.  Nonetheless, crushing everything in its wake is the monumentally demure and completely unexpected collaboration between Mary Halvorson and Bill Frisell called The Maid with the Flaxen Hair.

On this duo record, Halvorson and Frisell meet on middle ground by interpreting music associated with 1950's era guitarist Johnny Smith. What could have turned into a competitive battle of notes is actually the exact opposite. The two guitars blend in a delightfully cooperative way that is way more meditative and far less noisey, flashy or "out" than one might have expected. Hearing these innovative guitarists' immediately recognizable and iconic individual characteristics being played in tandem, as on the track Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair, is quite satisfying.

Most Unexpected Album - We Are by Alina Engibaryan

A random choice caused me to duck into 55 Bar late in the afternoon of Saturday, March 24, 2018.  The place was empty and it looked like a nice, quiet spot to have a Guinness before going to the Village Vanguard later that evening.  Little did I know that an hour later I'd be taking in one of the most memorable live sets of my life.  The bartender mentioned that the band starting in a few minutes was going to be good.  Soon the room was packed and the music had started.  Not being familiar with Snarky Puppy I had no idea that this ensemble included Michael League on bass and Chris Bullock on sax.  I just knew it sounded good, incredibly good, and that I really liked the songs by the keyboardist and vocalist, who turned out to be Alina Engibaryan.  She was featuring material from her brand new CD titled We Are.

We stayed for the entire first and set and would have stayed for more had it not been for other commitments. It was not until the next day that I started to look up who and what that was we had seen play.  Moments later I was listening to We Are on Spotify knowing that it would likely end up on my best of 2018 list.  And here it is!  Alina's music is a little more poppy than I'm used to, but having seen the organic live at 55 Bar version I know it's the real deal. And with that backing band (Michael League, bass; Chris Bullock, saxophone; Ross Pederson, drums), her jazz-informed songs are nothing less than ear candy.

Best Surprise Album by My Favorite Band - Kasvot Växt í Rokk by Phish

This is what space smells like.  Phish started the now common live band musical tradition of secretly covering an album on Halloween with The Beatles' White Album in 1994.  Subsequent years have included Remain In Light by The Talking Heads, Loaded by The Velvet Underground, and the Rolling Stones' Exile on Main Street.  Faceplant into rock.  Phish occasionally turns this tradition on its head by using the Halloween "cover" set as an opportunity to debut an album of all new original material.  Perception is spoon fed.  That's what happened for their middle set on 10/31/18 when they performed a 1981 record called í Rokk by the so-obscure-they-are-fictional Scandinavian band Kasvot Växt, even going so far as to plant back-dated album reviews, interviews and crate-digger articles on the internet as proof of its provenance.  I'm the glue in your magnet.

All of this proved to be a hoax of course....Kasvot Växt í Rokk was simply an excuse to inhabit the persona of a fake band of Phish's own creation as a means of debuting ten new original songs in a style that does and doesn't quite sound like the Phish we know and love, with lyrics that are however so Phishy that they could in fact be lost in translations from a mixture of Icelandic, Norwegian, and Vonlenska.  Say it to me S.A.N.T.O.S.  Even if these songs weren't so damn good and catchy Phish would still deserve an A for the artistic design work that went into this (stage setup, wardrobe, choreography, performance...).  We are come to outlive our brains.  But the songs are good - better with each listen.  I hope someone notices.

(I might as well create another category called "Best Improvised Music Played Live on Stage That Leaves Behind the Song Structure".  If so, this category would be created so that it could also recognize Phish based on moments during almost any show they played during their Summer or Fall 2018 tours.  There's a type of improvisation that Phish does which its fans have named Type II Jamming in which they leave the song structure behind and compose new, (usually) awesome sounding music on the spot while on stage in front of live audiences in excess of 10,000 peeps.  Phish is the best ever at this type of in the moment full-band live composition and that skill was on full display this year in a clean, melodic way that is unique to the last year or year and a half).

Best Party Album - Order of Nothingness by Jimi Tenor

Spotify has been helping me hone in on the sound I'm looking for and now it probably knows what I'm going to like better than I do. Jimi Tenor is one of those that popped up on my new release radar. I started with the songs My Mind Will Travel and Quantum Connection. Those made it to a summer playlist I put together and primed my taste for this album of full-on trippy and soulful Euro funk jazz.

My idea of a party album is for the party in your mind.  And I hope it never stops.  Order of Nothingness meets those needs.

Best Overall Album - An Angel Fell by Idris Ackamoor and the Pyramids

If I were to make up a special category for this it might be "Best World Music Meets Spiritual Jazz CD" or "Best Album in the Sun Ra or Mulatu Astatke Lineage".  But those qualifiers are unnecessary since An Angel Fell can simply be labeled Best of the Year.  

Coming from a cosmic, here-and-now globalist perspective, the rhythms and melodies that are traversed over the course of this album's hour are so dead-on that it had no peer in 2018. The music is patient and freely spread out; the groove never dissipates, and the chant-like vocals are quite profound, not throwaway.  For me a highlight is the tones band member Sandra Poindexter is able to summon from her violin.  She takes an instrument - the fiddle - that doesn't always shine in a jazz setting and makes it growl.  With her at the controls the violin acts as a co-lead match to Ackamoor's sax.  For a band whose first album came out in 1972, An Angel Fell felt as fresh as anything I heard this year. 

Best EP (tie) - Cardamom Garden by Habibi and Down in the Basement by Mauskovic Dance Band

I think I found out about Mauskovic Dance Band by searching for bands that might be influenced by Liquid Liquid or Arthur Russell - both of which are apparent in their songs.  In the case of Habibi, the liking of them stems primarily from the allure of it being a kick-ass all female rock band.  I'm still waiting for that all female jamband that takes the music out there on twenty-minute rides like JRAD, by the way.  Back to the point, make a playlist of these two EPs back to back and you've got a killer 25 minutes ahead of you.  

Best Archival Compilation - Sun Ra Exotica

The folks at Modern Harmonic who put this three LP collection together really hit the nail on the head by calling attention to Sun Ra's connection to Exotica. The Saturnian prophet is not usually recognized as a member of or contributor to this style of music, but you can certainly notice an exotic thread there now.

Even those who don't know they know it, know the genre of Exotica when they hear it. Also called Lounge, Bachelor Pad Music, Tiki Music or Cocktail Music, Exotica was popular in the 1950's and 1960's as people opened themselves up to a post WWII sense of wordly culture and prosperity filtered through a clichéd idea of what Polynesian or Island music might sound like overlapped with the growing hi-fi stereo technology of the space age. All filtered through a white, middle-class, Disney-like, pre-Beatles perspective.

Who knows where Sun Ra was coming from when he made tracks like the ones found here, but he elevates the coolness of Exotica just by association.  It doesn't matter where you start or stop with this Sun Ra compilation - it's all good.  

Best Archival Live Release - The Grateful Dead Pacific Northwest '73 and '74

As someone who listened to a massive amount of Grateful Dead during my twenties, I do have to say that the GD's position as the nucleus of all my music listening and liking has shifted somewhat over the last 15 years.  This might explain why my jaw dropped and then remained there as I first listened to this music recorded between 1973 and 1974 in Oregon and Washington.  Those two years have always been favorites among Deadheads.  I've always thought of myself as more of a Brent Mydland era kind of guy (1979 to 1990) but this release puts that opinion to shame.

Maybe I had just forgotten how incredibly good - on every level - this post-Pigpen yet pre-hiatus time-period is, but these recordings make that explicitly clear.  With standout version after standout version, songs such as Bird Song, Eyes of the World, Brown Eyed Women, Row Jimmy, Playing in the Band and Dark Star demonstrate that there was some important historical music being made back then.

Tunes 76 and 77 - Helen's Bridge and Baked Zizi

I had a goal of writing just one tune the week I was in Asheville earlier this month.  On the drive down we listened to the Phish 10/31/18 Halloween set and during the third set in both Tweezer and a A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing there were cool melodies being played during the improvisational Type II jamming, and I made a mental note and even some had some phonetic lyrics to go with the sounds.

Once we got to Asheville I realized how close where we were staying was to Helen's Bridge - the most haunted place in Asheville according to local folk lore.  I knew I wanted to title this yet to be written tune Helen's Bridge.  The first full day we were there I worked on trying to write something, but I was a little hung over and nothing came of it.

After a good night's rest, I woke the 2nd morning before dawn and jotted down the following song titles to think of as inspiration: Down in the Willow Garden (Red Clay Ramblers), Cold Blows the Wind (Ween), All of These Dreams (Phish), Peggy-O (Grateful Dead), Been All Around This World (Grateful Dead), Blackberry Blossom (Bill Frisell version), Off To Sea Once More (Jerry Garcia), As I Went Out One Morning (Bob Dylan), Far Far From Me (John Prine), Moma Dance (Phish), Wayside/Back In Time (Gillian Welch), and Slow Train Through Georgia (Norman Blake).

Basically I wanted something sort of minor key sounding with an old-English ballad or Blue Ridge Mountain type feel.  Before I really even had a chance to use the above songs as inspiration I picked up my guitar and sung a melody to these made up words: Lost on Beaucatcher Mountain is a place called Helen's Bridge.  There I first felt the tapping and the dawning of the midge.  The notes on the guitar that matched this melody fell right into place.  Then I needed a B-part so with a different melody I thought of the following words:  Now that my car won't start, I'll just have to walk, over the mountain to, Helen's Bridge.  That became the 2nd part.

I don't know if I really needed a bridge, but I did want a third part, so I listened back to that Tweezer jam from 10/31/18 3rd set and added something like that as the "C" part.  So the structure of Helen's Bridge is AABBAABBCCCCCCAABB.  It's the only tune I have like that.  Or basically it's AABBAABB, then the C part as many times through as I want - usually six times through - before going back to AABB for one last time through.  Here it is.

Today is 11/17/18.  Last night I woke up at 4am with a melody in my head that was like a combo of the Haitian Folk Song Zizi Pan Pan and the Irish tune Rakes of Mallow.  I even saw in my head how I would write the first part out on paper.  Then I went back to sleep.  By 7am I was up and working on it.  The A-part came out similar sounding to my 4am revelation.  To construct the B-part I reminded myself of how the B-part to Rakes of Mallow actually goes and then tried to come up with a variation based on it but far from it.   And here's Baked Zizi.

Helen's Bridge is a more guitar-friendly melody, while Baked Zizi definitely feels better on tenor banjo than guitar.

***

A Week In Asheville - bars, restaurants, hiking and more

Several times back in the early 2000's I would make the six-hour drive from Richmond, VA to Asheville, NC to see bands like Yonder Mountain String Band or Sound Tribe Sector Nine at the then newly opened Orange Peel in this progressive, hippie-friendly city in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  We would always stay at the now closed Days Inn on Patton Ave. (must have been cheap), and besides seeing those shows the extent of my exploration in Asheville mostly consisted of drinking at the Jack of the Wood pub across the street.  The last time I was there was in 2009 for Phish so having now returned for a week as a tourist in Fall 2018 I found a bustling city more cosmopolitan than the dreadlocks and patchwork oriented town I remembered, with a food scene, bar scene, and hiking opportunities that more than matched my current interests.

Restaurants

We tried out several restaurants in Asheville including some of the more buzzworthy or well regarded places, but the two restaurants I'd like to give a shout out to are Calypso and Rosetta's Kitchen.  

Calypso is a Caribbean restaurant and rum bar offering St. Lucian style dishes and island cocktails.  They might not be as popular as some of the nearby restaurants like Salsa's or Nine Mile, but for me Calypso had the best food of any place we ate at in Asheville.  And they make great rum drinks like painkillers and mai tais.

  

Rosetta's Kitchen was my other favorite restaurant in Asheville.  Plant may get more recognition as the go-to vegan/vegetarian restaurant in Asheville, but for my taste you can't beat the laid back feel of Rosetta's Buchi Bar, where they serve flights of Buchi Kombucha and even make kombucha cocktails.  Rosetta's signature dish is called Family Favorite - peanut butter baked organic tofu, sauteed kale, and smashed potatoes with gravy.  Better than any words can convey.  Yep, vegan comfort food is a real thing.

Cocktails

I guess I like fancy cocktails, at least while on vacation.  Topping my list of cocktail bars is the tenebrous Crow and Quill, a gothically decored speakeasy found behind an unmarked door on Lexington Avenue where the lighting is dim, the conversation is low, and the drinks are strong.  Inside you can try one of their 700+ liquors - top shelf - or one of their finely crafted mixed drinks.  Crow and Quill is a place to sip and look calm, cool and collected on the outside, pretending to read a book while getting drunk and weird on the inside.

My other favorite cocktail bar, or just "bar", was Little Jumbo which is located a few blocks north of downtown proper in an area at the edge of either North Asheville or Montford.  Anyway, Little Jumbo had more of an upscale neighborhood bar feel - less touristy than places in downtown.  Definitely worth the walk or Uber to get there.  This would probably be my local favorite if I lived nearby.  We went to Little Jumbo on two separate occasions.  Most fun for me was when each night's bartender, Kaitlyn or Lindsay, ventured off the menu to concoct special drinks worth trying.  

I'll also add The Social Lounge to this list.  We happened to notice this downtown staple on our last night in Asheville and the two drinks I got there (called Thalia and Wondermint) were tasty and refreshing.  

Actually, my cocktails rundown wouldn't be complete without recognizing my two favorite restaurants from above - Calypso and Rosetta's Kitchen - which each served up awesome and unique mixed drinks to go along with the delicious food.

Beer

I'm not as much into beer as I used to be, but craft beer is still trending hard in Asheville.  Without too much arm-twisting, I delved into some brewery sampling that included highlights at the Funkatorium (an unparalleled selection of sours), Dirty Jack's (home of Asheville's legendary Green Man Brewing), One World (cool downtown basement location with live music), and Burial (rocking the South Slope with its Tom Selleck meets the Grim Reaper ethos).

Hiking

Evenings might be devoted to food and drink, but during the daytime in the Asheville area your hiking options are seemingly endless.  We were rained out a couple days, but still got some good walks in during our week there.  My favorite place was the North Carolina Arboretum at milepost 393 on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Through an improvised route utilizing the Arboretum's Carolina Mountain Trail, Bent Creek Trail, Azalea Collection Trail and Wesley Branch Trail, among others, we were able to put together a fantastic two-hour hike that was adjacent to a flowing creek (Bent Creek) for much of the way.

When a cloudy day became a sunny one we took the opportunity to do the short but scenic Craggy Gardens hike to its 5,892 foot summit at Craggy Pinnacle, where the trailhead is located at an overlook just north of the Craggy Gardens visitor center on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  Closer to Asheville there are many opportunities do hikes along the Mountains to Sea Trail.  A couple starting points include the trailheads at the Blue Ridge Parkway Visitor Center (MP 384) or the Folk Art Center (MP 382).  

Within the city itself there's a paved footpath/bike path/moms-with-strollers path called the French Broad River Greenway, which parallels the mighty French Broad River.  It was unclear to me how far this greenway stretches, as we only walked on it for about an hour one casual day starting near the dog park.  That said, I think it runs for several miles all the way from New Belgium Brewing to Hominy Creek.  This is a pleasant, low-key option for folks looking to stretch their legs but not have to venture too far.  

  

Music

Asheville is a live music destination.  Like I said at the top of this post, I used to not think twice about driving six hours to see a band play there.  This time around I managed to encounter some good music without even seeking it out.  For example, who should be playing at Jack of the Wood as part of their weekly bluegrass "jam"?...a pick-up band consisting of guitarist Jon Stickley (of the Jon Stickley Trio), his fiddle playing cohort Lyndsay Pruett, and up and coming mandolinist Thomas Cassell.  They were doing a set of mostly David Grisman or Dawg-like tunes.

Although I failed to make it to Salvage Station for what would have surely been good times, we did pop into One World Brewing on the night of their Soul Jazz Jam and I was impressed by the musicianship of the musicians taking part in an open jam.  Another musical highlight was a jazz trio at Little Jumbo (they have live jazz there every Monday).    

Bookstores

One of my favorite things to do on vacation is to check out book stores.  Downtown Asheville has an outstanding indie bookstore called Malaprop's.  I enjoyed sampling their staff selections area where I picked up a short story collection called North American Lake Monsters by a local author named Nathan Ballingrud.  So far the stories in it are sort of like Raymond Carver meets Stephen King.

For used books, I liked Downtown Books and News.  There I randomly found a book I had not been expecting to find and got a kick out of just poking around its selection of second-hand books.  

When venturing into West Asheville, a somewhat disheveled yet left-leaning locals-only neighborhood across the French Broad River, a must stop is Firestorm Books and Coffee, where one could easily spend some time perusing the shelves.