Feed the Birds

Eban Schletter renders "Feed the Birds" on the theremin in tribute to Robert Bernard Sherman (12/19/1925 - 3/5/2012). Schletter is both 'evil' genius (see "Eban Schletter's Witching Hour") and friend of Peter's. His "Fantastical Musicorium" is still in residence at LA's Steve Allen Theater.
Isn't the theremin a fantastical instrument!  Here's Eban, again,  playing the Intermezzo from Pietro Mascagni's "Cavalleria Rusticana".

A Telephone Call

A Telephone Call is a short film by Melissa Sullivan based on a classic short story by Dorothy Parker. 
     " God, aren't You really going to let him call me? Are You sure, God? Couldn't You please relent? Couldn't You? I don't even ask You to let him telephone me this minute, God; only let him do it in a little while. I'll count five hundred by fives. I'll do it so slowly and so fairly. If he hasn't telephoned then, I'll call him. I will. Oh, please, dear God, dear kind God, my blessed Father in Heaven, let him call before then. Please, God. Please.

      Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twentyfive, thirty, thirty-five.…"

He gives life!

It may be hard to imagine seeing a horror show with a bunch of people who are howling in laughter, but that's "Re-Animator:The Musical". I saw the show in March, but it refuses to die. Herbert West gives life! ...not merely the semblance of life, as he proves here in a scene that usuals gets an audible gasp from the audience.



And this is just ONE scene. Music Director Peter Adams is no longer playing every night, but even that can't kill this show. There's talk of opening another venue in Chicago, but for now it's all yours LA!

Re-Animator: The Musical finally opens!

Re-Animator: The Musical finally opens this Friday (March 4) at LA’s Steve Allen Theater! For months rumors have predicted this hilarious staging by Stuart Gordon of his 1985 comic/horror film “Re-Animator”. It’s for real fans: I saw it in preview last week, sitting center stage just one row beyond the “Splash Zone” where blood-shy patrons ducked as they howled in laughter.

George Wendt (Dean Halsey) is the name star, but for me the story really comes to life in the hands of Jessie Merlin (mad –and headless- Dr. Hill) and Graham Skipper (uber-kook Herbert West). Then, of course, there’s the music —

Mark Nutter (composer and lyricist) has done himself proud. You’ll go home chanting “He’s dead, Dan!” and laugh  yourself silly all through Dr. Hill’s amorous vocal pursual of  the shackled Megan Halsey (Rachel Avery). Nutter’s songs really come to life in their full-orchestral* arrangements by Music Director: Peter Adams and the singers are mostly up to their challenge. 

Fans of the film will find most of the original dialogue right there in the songs. Some critics compare the disturbance Nutter's songs engender to Tom Lehrer's acerbic wit.  I heard a more profound connection to Gilbert and Sullivan farce.

*As keyboardist, Peter Adams produces all of the sound from five octaves of keys running one computer. Looks like a really simple rig to those who know no better. Musicheads watch him with one sharp eye while wiping away the laugh tears from the other.

 Jessie Merlin

Graham Skipper 

Rachel Avery 












The trailer from the film sets out its romantic plot:

Justin & Peter hit the road again

It all starts again on Thursday in Lincoln Hall, Chicago.  They'll come whistlin' through Boston on the 18th.
But, then, it ends all too soon a couple of days later
and it's back to Scotland — The Great War is over
in record time.

Spotlight Floodlight

Keyboardist Peter Adams has been writing, recording and performing music since grade five, but for much of that time he has stayed in the background supporting other musicians - often pretty great musicians. Now, from Intelligent Noise, comes his first fully produced personal album, "Polarized". But still modesty reigns, collegial collaboration abounds behind the scenes, and it is the mysterious doppelganger, 'Spotlight, Floodlight', who steps up to take the bows, while the phenom artist, Peter Adams, slips away back to the studio, already deeply into creating ACT II.

Since his 2003 move to Los Angeles, Peter has played keyboards, guitar, and vocals with great local artists - Michael Penn, Josh Groban, Greg Dulli, Five For Fighting, Lex Land, The Submarines, even while his old friends from Boston keep on callin' - Juliana Hatfield, Tracy Bonham, and Kay Hanley. And - look here! - now he's playing with some of the very British artists that influenced his early musical development - Rob Dickinson (The Catherine Wheel), Tears For Fears, and, most recently, Justin Currie (Del Amitri).

 

Tracy Bonham plays "Josephine" - Live at Hotel Cafe

Tracy Bonham (w/ Butch Norton on drums, David Sutton on bass and Peter Adams on keys) - "Josephine" - Live at Hotel Cafe - Los Angeles, CA - January 22, 2010. Recorded by Joshua J. Smelser

Peter Adams Trio at the Downbeat 1/30

Peter Adams [keys], Billy Mohler [acoustic bass], and Aaron Sterling [drums] having way too much fun Friday night at the Downbeat Cafe in LA's Echo Park playing music from Peter's new release, Spotlight, Floodlight.

Juliana Hatfield and Peter Adams on The Tonight Show (8/25)

At the Largo with Justin Currie (6/11)

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 cruel but 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 never fill that vacancy

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

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.

Justin Currie & Peter Adams at Joe's Pub, NYC

Justin Currie PLUS Rob Dickinson — Wow!

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.

If I Ever Loved You — Justin Currie

As you can see, Peter and Justin had a great time on their tour across the country and northern Europe, but now its just about over — for awhile anyway. Hopefully they'll play around LA while they rest up. Peter has a film score to get back to, but I'm sure that won't keep him in the house if Justin wants to play. Will he be just 'too busy' when it comes time to jet off to record at London's Abbey Road Studios? [What do you think?]

I hear the title track on Justin's new release, "What is love for?", playing on my supermarket's speakers. It feels really weird trying to take in such heart felt thoughts while shopping for peanut butter and crackers.

My own fave is "If I ever loved you". I guess I could image writing something like this in response to my own sometimes strange apprehensions of life:

I try to figure what has gone
I seem to look the same
Maybe there's a tightness around my eyes

Sometimes the evening comes
I think I miss someone
And then I realise

That, if I ever loved you, shouldn't I be crying?
Shouldn't I be cracking up
And drinking all the time?
Yeah, if I ever loved you, how come I feel alright?
How come the nights are so easy
And the mornings look so bright?

When I hear Justin sing this, I don't hear him questioning his love for 'her'. He believes that he did love her. His question is about his own reactions: "Why am I not crying? Why am I not cracking up? I'm taking this loss in stride — what is going on in me?" The singer is discovering something about himself that he didn't know before the break-up and is confused about who he really is as a result. He accuses himself of not being conventional in his emotions.

No wonder the song is interesting; not just your usual pop fare.

The Storm Is Passing Over

Two nights ago we brought our dog home from surgery — both right-side legs shattered by confrontation in the night with superior forces (automotive). The stillness is wonderful as we sit or lie in our peaceful house; together at last after our five days of forced separation.

Sometimes the soft sounds of Peter’s latest songs lull us. Sometimes the silence cradles our stillness and rocks us gently home to our stronger selves.

The nights are hardest for him, and so for us. So much can go wrong when you can only shuffle along leaning against the walls for support while your splinted and pined together limbs splay about striving for a control that never comes.

We are so dependent — he on his gods; I on mine. But the storm is passing over, as Dr. Tindley* says: “O courage, my soul, and let us journey on, for tho’ the night is dark, it won’t be very long.” We’ll pull ourselves along with hope as our guide and our soul’s resolution as standard bearer.

“By and by, when the morning comes,
When the saints of God are gathered home,
We’ll tell the story how we’ve overcome,
For we’ll understand it better by and by.”

*Charles Albert Tindley (1851-1933) composer of such other black gospel standards as Stand by Me, We’ll Understand It Better By and By, and the original version of the civil rights anthem We Shall Overcome. Tindley’s songs were the inspiration that led the great Thomas A. Dorsey to begin writing his popular blend of spiritual and hymn with blues and jazz underpinnings.

Beware! Justin Currie

Be careful Justin Currie! You may be able to handle the Black Thunder* served up at Glasgow’s “Persian’s Forehead” pub, but here in the new Fortress America we look askance at any foreigner ordering any beer but Bud Lite.

When you fly into Nashville (or wherever) to begin your tour of the pubs and music spaces of America, you will not be able to see the shinny glint off our new wall along the Mexican border, but, be assured, our ever-ready border guards will be waiting to frisk you. Let us pray they do no more!

Beware! When hired guns hear your cock and bull story about being born in a van near Paisley in a “hailstorm so vicious that it took a team of panel beaters a month to separate [your] forehead from the roof”, not even your pale American keyboardist may be able to rescue you from the collective terror with which our chest thumping politicians so gleefully besmirch our beloved soil.

Above all refrain from unseemly co-mixing with other Scotsmen (notorious for their libidinous skirts and bad whiskey) or musicians (all suspect, except for country western singers, for any may be supporters of the Far Left 's coddling of God’s enemies in our innocent midst).

Not that we wish to seem unfriendly! We welcome your self-labeled “thunderously dreary dirges”. Your sonorous wailing of “What is love for?” on your just released record is well known here, albeit in a pained sort of way. My only wish is that I could hear better the finely played tones of this American keyboardist, Peter Adams, whom you attempt to drown out at your tour engagements.

Finally, should you prove able to pass our ‘fair and balanced’ border inspection — perhaps by disguising yourself in suit and tie, we rejoice at our brief opportunity to applaud your tired versions of withered hits in this your latest American tour (April 13 — April 27). G_d willing, see you at Joe’s Pub!
*A vile mix of Guinness and red wine...gag.

Justin Currie & Peter Adams at Joe's Pub, NYC