Super 400 – PapaSweenBean’s Friday Night

Super 400 – PapaSweenBean’s Friday Night – by Liam Sweeny.

My night began in inauspicion. Having given myself the pre-door pat-down (wallet, keys, phone) I was one short. Now dear reader, these are the brain, heart, and lungs of my earthly business, so the loss of any was a code blue. My wallet, containing cards, license and, lucky me, my check from work, uncashed.

Smart thing to do would’ve been to go back to the last place I was, Price Chopper, and ask if anyone returned it. And a trusting individual would’ve done that before cancelling all the cards. I am not such a trusting individual. I thought of all the useless garbage one could buy before I got there, which I eventually did only to find my long lost accoutrement in the lost-and-found. So I was victim of a cashless society last night.

Being a functional “man without a country” I still went to the Twisted Fiddler on First Street in Troy, where they’ve had the ability, nay the genius, of blocking off that section of street to play host to great Friday shows. And last night’s show was Super 400, so I wasn’t going to let the few scraps of folding money in my possession stop me from enjoying the musical stylings of a band that has notoriety, and such serious chops.

So it’s hard to start with this band, a conspiracy of equals with steel-toe wingtips and memo pads. So maybe go left to right. No, my left. Kenny Hohman. I cringe when people play “Are You Experienced” by Jimi Hendrix because it is a hard song to play lead on. Kenny hit the sweet spot every time. He had a rack of two other guitars, and I could just picture him burning through the pickups of the guitar he was on, throwing it off his shoulder and grabbing one of the other ones and not missing that next note.

Then we had Lori Friday on bass. I consider myself a bass player in the same way that I consider myself a med student when I have a pain in my elbow from sitting there looking up “elbow pain” in Google. She’s the real deal. She had some sweet walking basslines, which really hung back, but like I said, “I’m a bit of a bass player myself” (picture Willem Dafoe.) Top notch stuff.

What can I say about Joe Daley that they don’t say about him at Parkway when it’s slow and they had time to chat? He really brought Kenny and Lori together with the glue that you make with the careful application of wooden sticks to mylar and bronze. Again about hanging back, really just losing himself to the music he was putting out. Phenomenal.

Saw a couple of people. Saw my buddy Keith Twomey, who was making it happen in the crowd, a role that is underappreciated in reviews; well, no more. I did see drummer extraordinaire Joe Barna, who told me he was playing in the after-party inside Twisted Fiddler. I did stay for that, and saw Joe, Rich Ertelt on guitar and Chef Dave on harp. I didn’t know the bass player. I’ve covered Joe, Rich, and Dave before separately, so I’ll just say everything you expect of these quality cats was in their cup, and it runneth over.

Aside from that, I went to the station and cut some keyboard tracks. I also cut a three a.m. show with my favorite music. A little treat for the sleepless folks on the witching hour.

And that was my Friday.

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