The new Largo is quite up-scale, but, as you fans know, Justin and Peter are very well dressed, so he fit in as well as any f---ing Scotsman could expect to. It’s a big room (280 seats) and the acoustics are great, so I was very pleased — you can both hear every word and not be jammed into your neighbor’s elbow.
Flanagan seems to have spent willingly on the new place and was eager to show everyone around. Couldn’t have been more different from The Viper Room, which is way too small and way too loud as far as I am concerned. Not a place Justin would want to play in this new solo career, though perfect for the old days, I guess.
Certainly The Viper was the right place for a rock star like Rob Dickinson [The Man from Catherine Wheel] — I don't mean to put the place down. We had a great time there squeezing into the telephone booth they call a green room and the band was great [not just because Peter was in it]. There was Peter's old friend from the Boston days, Michael Eisenstein [USA Mike of Letters to Cleo fame], on guitar — that was a very pleasant surprise. Then, there was Rob's friend, Tim Friese-Greene, on keyboards — even more of an eyebrow raiser; an awesome shocker even, since Peter and I grew-up together musically listening to Talk Talk and similar British pop bands from back in The Day.
But I digress more than usual— For Justin's Largo show I brought along an extra handkerchief just in case it got to be too much — his songs are so heart wrenching I can barely stand to listen sometimes. Happy to say I managed to survive even though they ended the show with two incredible Del Amitri B-side classics: ‘Driving with The Brakes On’ and ‘Sleep Instead of Teardrops’.
Imagine this! After an hour and a half of the slick-tongued Scotsman plucking your heart strings, you get [back to back] a guy being driven into the long night by the girl he loves toward some place so desolate that no one where they come from would ever go there, followed immediately by this shot to the now unguarded solar plexus—
Cry, cry out your eyes forever It won’t go away I, I’m just a dumb observer It’s so stupid what I say
Like everyone else will do I’m gonna lie to you Tell you that life is cruel but someday you’re gonna wake up With sleep instead of teardrops in your eyes
And so, nobody lives forever The crassest of clichés Like time, time is the greatest healer But it’s a murderer today
Like everyone else will do I’m gonna lie to you Tell you that life is cruelbut someday you’re gonna wake up With sleep instead of teardrops in your eyes
You know my holding you won't change anything I can’t stop this whole charade continuing As each consoling kiss remains on your face like a stain
So cry, cry out those tears And let them succumb to gravity And try, try as I might I’ll neverfill that vacancy
Like everyone else will do I’m gonna lie to you Tell you that life is cruelbut someday you’re gonna wake up With sleep instead of teardrops in your eyes
Someday you’re gonna wake up With sleep instead of teardrops in your eyes
By now Justin is safely at home in Glasgow. Peter is probably down on Sunset enjoying The Submarines' show at The Echo. And I am left here to reassure you that someday you're gonna wake up with sleep instead of teardrops in your eyes.
I descend upon Los Angeles this Saturday just in time to hear [get this] Rob Dickinson[June 10 at The Viper Room] followed by Justin Currie[June 11 at Largo]! I expect Peter to be singing with both guys, but I'm really there for the duo with Justin. [If you're in LA you can always join us, you know.]
On top of this huge musical treat Peter says I'll probably have to take in a rehearsal earlier in the week because a couple of friends [Butch Norton & David Sutton] will be joining Justin and him for part of the show at Largo. Tsk. Tsk. Sure hope I can endure it.
Part of the fun will be checking out the clubs.
As we pass under the purple awning at The Viper will the ghost of River Phoenix rise from the sidewalk where he died [Halloween,1993]? How about the steam of Mick Jagger and Uma Thurman locked in embrace or the smoke from Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche lighting up? Oh, the nostalgia.... Maybe Bugsy Siegel will still be waving his rod around in the cloud of imagination gone wild. (Note to self: bring ear plugs...leave fantasy visions at home.)
Looking for Larry David at Club Largo will surely "Curb [my] Enthusiasm" — yeh, the club is billed as a comedy as well as music stop. But the music is really serious here (the words matter). Michael Penn, Rufus Wainwright, Jon Brion — now that's a musical tradition to live up to, isn't it? It's going to be tough leaving this place.
Three words that will ring from coast to coast.
