We had a great show last night at the Treelawn Music Hall in Cleveland! All three shows with the Deke/Crazy Joe/Kyle Eldridge Power Trio were super fun, and it was so good to be back playing for those hardcore Ohio fans. Not sure why I haven’t been through Ohio in eight years, but it was great to connect with everybody again. I have lots of friends here! (Special shout-out to Joey Simeone of the Bellfuries, he and I opened up the show last night—that was a gas!)
The reason for the trip to Ohio? I’m bringing Link Wray’s 1958 Danelectro Guitarlin “longhorn” guitar to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on Monday. It’ll go on display there for a few years, so go and check it out if you’re in Cleveland (and thanks to Andy Leach, senior director of museum and archival collections at the RRHOF, who not only was at the show last night, but got up and played bass with us on Merle Travis’s “Merle’s Boogie Woogie” and did a GREAT job!).
One song I’ve been meaning to sit down and learn for years is one Link wrote for his mother, “Lillian.” This is a deceptively difficult song to learn. It’s not that technical, but as I say in the video, it’s the guitar equivalent of a tongue twister. I wanted to play “Lillian” on the Danelectro before it went into the Hall of Fame, and we did it last night in Cleveland at the Treelawn. Two of my friends from Pittsburgh were there, Heather Mull and her boyfriend Dan. They were in town shooting stuff for the upcoming Cynics documentary, so I asked them to shoot me performing “Lillian” just to have recorded proof that it happened! Thanks, Heather and Dan! Also big thanks to Jimi Cooper in Duluth, who helped me figure out all the little juicy details of this guitar arrangement. Thanks, Jimi!
Enjoy this video! I will miss performing with my homies “Crazy” Joe Tritschler and Kyle Eldridge (and our tagalong drummer, Brian Hoeflich). We had a blast!
