Krispy Kreme. A Story of Love, Music, Chicago and Donuts!

We lurched the car into the drive-thru and bought a mixed dozen for the lads and carried our hung-over heads to the pre-gig practice.

"You know what we really need are Krispee Kremes – best donuts in the universe."

I didn’t pay Bob much mind, thinking KK’s were a special brand of sugar fried dough that Dunkin Donuts makes from time to time. Then, on our way back from a gig at Cal’s Liquors the following Saturday our trumpeter, Matt, from nowhere observes;

"Man, I wish you could get Krispee Kreme donuts in the city. Have you ever had them? No? They have a sign lit up when they’re baking so you know you’re getting them hot."

I was still not getting the message, I was still immune. Then there was the email from Carla, and I quote;

"Hmmm! One of my office admirers smuggled me a Krisppe Kreme. Ever had one? They’re like sex. Actually they’re better than two thirds of the sex I’ve ever had! I had an ex-boyfriend drop off flowers today, flattering, but he was always clueless. He could have gotten me a dozen Krisppe Kremes and a serious re-consideration!"

How American! But I was curious now, as you may imagine. It was at rehearsal that the ludicrous idea of a donut safari into the ‘burbs finally became unavoidable;

"Man, things aren’t so hot at the house right now. Seems one of my room mates bought a dozen KK’s, and left them unopened on the kitchen table. Well, you don’t do that unless you expect to share – a bit at least. So Amanda and I had a couple, - each. Then we left. Heck, we came back at 4pm to the hysterics of Pat:

"Who ate by f**kin’ Krispee Kremes, who did it?! I had to drive all the f**kin’ way to Glenn Ellyn to see my Goddamn in-laws and this was the ONE redeeming part of the whole trip!! And now they’re GONE!! I haven’t even had one! WAAAH!!!"

"Josh walks in, hangdog. "I’m sorry man, it was me", and they haven’t spoken now for a week."

So two days later there was Karla and I parked at 45^th & Pulaski greedily licking frosting off our lips. They really are super, and you can see the whole process in the store! And I turned up to our next rehearsal with a dozen. Good for band moral that (though there were a couple short).

And the postscript to this daring tale of delicious fried dough? Well, here’s the news on "News Radio 780 AM" from Tuesday, February 13^th, 2001;

"Two Chicago Police officers were indicted today on charges of being out of jurisdiction while on duty, after witnesses reported seeing the officers eating donuts at a Krispee Kreme Drive-in at Glen Elleyn, IL."

No kidding! The company went public in June, and apparently shares had gone up five fold by the end of the first day of trading. This is for donuts you understand!

I wonder if they need a band to do jingles for them!!

Street Blues in Chicago;

It is not too hard to describe the blues street scene in Chicago nowadays – there isn’t one. Maxwell Street Market, the legendary bustling busker paradise where many major Chess artists were discovered is now mostly a parking lot for the University of Illinois at Chicago. It is true that the market was relocated to Canal Street on the south loop with little protest, but the vendors are all licensed with the city now, and any musicians are encouraged to do the same with the enforcement of a $60 street performer license. Actually, apart from the summer stages, there’s very little street music at all in Chicago. What you do hear is mainly on the subways, usually the Blue and Red lines between Washington and Jackson Street exits. And it’s rarely blues.

Not that musically there was much left in the old Maxwell Street Market worth saving. The few times I was there, usually around four or five am after a Saturday gig (and bear in mind this is a seasonal phenomenon – few traders would be out in a Midwestern winter when the average daytime temperature may be –8C), the few blues bands that had set up were AWFUL. The first time in 91, after watching Junior Wells at the New Checkerboard Lounge, a large friend of mine, Big Jim McCreedy of the Cat Daddy’s, and I ventured there for the usual blues lover’s reasons. What we found was endless piles of junk, a fellow coming up to us with a set of golf clubs asking, "only $300 for my cocaine habit", and all manner of mendicancy on the make, that might have appeared "authentic" if there was some decent music. The two groups and one guitarist we heard playing were just bad, and not "hey man, you’re bad, real bad", they were just plain bad – there would not have been a club anywhere that would have hired them and their distorted out of tune guitars. The redeeming qualities of that visit was a super Mexican restaurant (though I mistook the dish of fresh Habeneros for sliced green peppers – I was new to town), and the outdoor Mexican grocery where bandana wearing machete wielding vendors quartered Florida oranges to wash the carpet mouths of drunks including us. Indeed, if you want to pimp daddy your dukes, the clothing stores on Halsted, just south of Roosevelt (12^th Street) and just north of where the market used to me is still the place to go for value in outrageousness. The band was there last week on the recommendation of Killer Ray Allinson to look for some juicy stage gear and, although the leveled market is now sprouting condos, the stores appeared to be thriving, and boy did we tog up!

It would be super to be nostalgic about Maxwell Street, but the truth is, even blues lovers in the City were not so much passionate about saving it as about the ruthlessness with which the UIC proceeded to close out it’s lease. Most of the concern over Maxwell Street’s demise came from oversea’s blues junkies who probably had never even been there. Crime was rife in the area, most of the stalls were amazing collections of absolute junk, the place was a quagmire of mud, garbage, potholes, and associated disrepair, and pretty much the last Maxwell band that actually caused any kind of a stir was Hound Dog Taylor’s three piece in the early ‘70’s. If anything happened since, you can be sure that Alligator and Delmark would have snapped it up. Nothing did of course.

In case you think I’m just being crusty, and no fun, and don’t have a clue what I’m talking about, let me at least tell anyone who is interested in the blues scene in Chicago that it is alive, irrepressible, and better established now than in the late ‘60’s of ‘70’s. Those times when soul and then disco threatened the scene with near total annihilation was when the music was surviving in pockets, including, at the time the more presentable Jewish market at Maxwell Street. Now times are more enlightened in Chicago and blues is getting it’s mainstream support long overdue, so that any musicians worth their salt are back in the clubs, and not scratching around outdoor junk yards.

That doesn’t mean that outdoor playing itself has vanished. Far from it. The summer festivals usually have at least one stage dedicated to the blues (Taste of Lincoln, Taste of Chicago), and there is, of course, the great Chicago Blues Festival.

However, anyone who is an atavistic champion of the Chess sound, who would love to hear the real thing, and not the "tourist blues" of clubs like Kingston Mines, and Blues on Clark, anyone who would love to experience the intimacy of legendary clubs like Theresa’s and the old Checkerboard, won’t find this on the streets, or at the festivals, or from the tourist guides. It is there though.

But you’ve got to know where to look.

Next issue – Some of the places tourists don’t go.

The Cotton Club

The Cotton Club - where worship was of music, flare, and "cool". Where about a year ago, I discovered that the phenomenal, red-rimmed raging eyed, gargantuan gargling gargoyle of a drummer Killer Ray Allinson, was not dead as had been rumoured, but was still alive, still raging but now doing it standing up playing guitar and fronting his own band.

Playing ripping, riffing, lead guitar after picking the damn thing up only two years ago!

A couple of friends of a friend were in town from England for a week;

"IF you come down to the Cotton Club on a Wednesday, you will be forever grateful that you didn’t go to bed early, and actually heeded my advice. This I guarantee!"

Of this I was sure. Alas, they were not my friends, and all my earnest, and enthusiastic recommendations that have hitherto always resulted in utter glee for the lucky followers of my wisdom, had so far been completely ignored by this boring duo. Tonight was no exception.

And for better or for worse, that night at the Cotton Club sadly was. Killer Ray’s greeting was ebullient as always, but something was different.

Inconspicuous they were. To one side of the bar, on a small round ebony table, the flowers stood next to a photograph of a stunning young black girl.

Someone must have died. Someone I didn’t know, but even so . . . . .

I walked up to the bar where the ever-changing fashion queen and self-appointed blues’ Czarina of the Cotton Club, Deborah (pronounced "Dee-bora"), asked if I’d heard the awful news.

"Carla was killed in a car accident last week!"

Reeling – that photograph was of Carla! Carla, elegant, skinny, fun-loving charming, chatty, colorful, exquisite, and really tall. Carla!!? Regular of the club, befriender of my nervous north side friends, and Fast Eddie’s girlfriend. Fast Eddie!!?

"Oh, God, poor Eddie, is he okay?"

"We don’t know, he’s discharged from the hospital, but has brain damage and doesn’t remember anything – he probably won’t be able to play again."

Fast Eddie – gold toothed, sharp dressing, always grinning. Just LOVED playing with Killer. When he heard we were gigging in England the dapper funkster turned blues drummer wanted to know if he could get a Knighthood from the Queen – or at "least a cuppa tea".

So what do you do – one of Chicago’s undiscovered Wednesday night blue’s gems – now turned wake?? Maudlin was not an option – the band was here to play, and everyone kind of guessed that upbeat was the best way to handle the moment. That’s what Carla would have wanted right?? There was tasteless competition for attention by one blue’s singer touting her mother’s birthday as if nothing had happened.

But something special DID happen. A fellow in a blue sparkling suit (80% blue polyester, 20% metal), hunched shoulder, all soft soled gliding and jerking away with his limbs, grabbed the microphone at Deborah’s behest, and started singing a personal tribute to Carla over the "Soul Heaven" gospel refrain. And folks swayed and waved, and crooned in unison, and the Cotton Club was not a secular place anymore. Elsewhere, different, eerie, magic, and a communion with the dead.

Their car had stalled out on the highway on the way back from the gig. A friend of theirs was not far behind when he saw them pull over. A car doing about 80mph shot by him and drove over the back of their car while they were still seated in it.

"Carla was tall you know, that’s what killed her."

I wanted to do something, but didn’t know what.

The band was now on break and Deborah then grabbed me by the arm, took me to the front of the stage, and told the congregation that Carla had always loved the way "this English boy played his harmonica", and I was going to play a hymn for Carla.

I thought I was going to accompany Deborah, but she left me on the stage – alone.

And I played a hymn – at least that’s how it ended, finally, after a tentative start, in white golden light that you had to close your eyes to see.

I couldn’t stay much longer after that – and I hadn’t even known that lovely lady very well, or even her equally effusive boyfriend who now would have to live both without her, and without the longest love of his life, drums.

My band mates were gutted when they heard, and offered unconditional support – that was three weeks ago, and there should be a benefit soon. There will be quite a few Northsiders there.

Viva Las Vegas

Well you’ve got to go at least once right? The city the mob built from the money of addicted losers. Heck, not one of us in the band had ever been, but we were more than willing to go when Judy Alberti, VP of Entertainment at Boulder Station sent us an email asking if we wanted to play at their Casino.

They couldn’t pay our travel, but free food and booze, a two-bed hotel room for each band member (did we really have that reputation ahead of us?), and $1000. Had we but known they were willing to pay up to $5000 for the back-line we most certainly would have re-negotiated. Our back-line imaginations were stretching just to go beyond $2000.

So at 7am, Friday, May 18^th there we all were on a plane filled with bachelor party gel haired twenty-something guys talking about renting Humvees and Harleys to take into the desert, and bachelorette party big haired twenty-something suburbanites talking about absolutely nothing, but doing it loudly. The journey to tack City had begun.

We looked for Boulder Avenue and found it on the map not far from the strip.

But the limousine was headed further, and further from the architectural colossi of the Strip. Miles in fact. On past Sam’s Town and beyond. Six miles actually, and into the desert to pull up opposite the "Redneck Express" – Nevada’s number one country music venue where you can stroll in for "Cold mugs, and warm hugs." An early morning prostitute tripped over her heels across Boulder Highway. We were well on the "other side of town". The limousine driver warned us not to hang out in the nearby trailer parks because of the daily shootings, and pulled up to the monstrosity opposite. It was vast this Boulder Station. Covering acres and acres, 7 restaurants, three theatres, and 5000 slot machines. A place where Las Vegans go, and not the tourists.

The buffet was extraordinary and nobbled everyone except Darin (our bassist) and I. We headed out in thirsty 96F heat to round up folks to see the show. We didn’t get to the Univeristy Library before it was time to head back, but we did meet our friend Rebecca on the bus again who had, on the ride out, offered to pass our flyers around the trailer park. We watched her eyes glaze over when she finally realized that we are an original band and weren’t going to play any George Throroughgood covers of covers. Knew then that she wouldn’t be there at the show (she’d just lost her Adult Videos telemarketing job anyway).

But the show was a blast – a stage 50 feet across and 30 feet deep. Brand new gear that looked nothing like the beat up stuff we lump around with us in Chicago (it was kind of eerie seeing how my amp looked like in ’96 before I embarked on a strict ageing regime to make the Tweed Bassmen look like an original from ’66). We buggered up the first song of course. "Bob what are you doing?" As our guitarist enthusiastically begins a gentle little ditty entitled "Smoking in Germany" that is normally started with the bass and drums. This had a knock on effect of course. Our bassist had a complete brain fart and couldn’t summon the riff for the second song, "Cissy Strut" – a Phish like mélange ensued before we found ourselves. For the third song of the set I craftily re-arranged all the verses to enable our drummer to miscue the bridge.

Somehow none of this mattered. Probably thanks to the urban legend oxygen that is pumped continually into the rooms. The crew and management loved us. We found out why later – there is no original music in Vegas. We also found out that the cab drivers are certifiably insane. The women at the Boulder Station Casino are large, drunk, and overly friendly. Roulette sucks (our trumpet player would disagree – jammy bugger). 25c slots rock, stage managers are Mafioso, though they get things done. You can drink way more than anywhere else, stay up longer, but there are no beers in the dressing rooms. The rock station that promotes your show never played one track from the album because an unsigned band out of Chicago's payola just isn’t ticking. The sound system is excellent. The 24 hour K-Mart does not sell size 14 shoes so our trumpet player could not discard his sneakers and get into Studio 54. One certifiably insane cab driver has a bizarre and unwholesome onanistic use for raw livers. Another certifiably insane cab driver giggles while blowing red lights at 85mph.

Romance in the city of sin was limited to our guitarist getting his leather clad buns pinched by a drunk guy in a yellow shirt, and me running away (literally) from a particularly large and overly friendly native woman.

Viva LV!!

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