LOCATION: Kaldi's, Cincinnati, OH
LINEUP: Karin, Linford, Jay Bolotin
Announcement from OtRhine@aol.com
REVIEW BY: Melissa
Kaldi's was packed, which I guess is a good sign since most people seemed to be there for the music and not the food. I did get to see Karin, though my view of her while performing was obstructed most of the time. She's blonde now and I think she looks great that way. Jay Bolotin and Karin took turns performing. This was my first time to hear Jay and I can best compare his voice to that of Jack Henderson. Linford stayed close by the whole time she sang/played and he joined her on several songs, playing guitar at times and accordian at others. She did perform at least four "new" songs last night, my favorites of which were "Show Me How It Feels" and "Fairpoint Diary." One of the songs (forget which one) was described as being written eight years ago, which led me to ask "where has it been all this time?" Jay and Karin did sing together on a couple of tunes...I enjoyed their voices together more than I enjoyed his alone. Despite the crowd, the room grew incredibly silent every time Karin took the microphone. Kaldi's staff was amazingly respectful and tried their best to keep the background noises as minimal as possible. Towards the end of the set, Karin performed a few of the "classics": Go Down Easy, Poughkeepsie, My Love is a Fever, etc. She told an interesting story about Go Down Easy. Karin said that she listened to Dan Fogelberg during her moody, teenage years and that she was drawing on some memories of one of his songs when she wrote "Go Down Easy." It turns out that Jay Bolotin was the one who wrote that song that Fogelberg recorded. Thus, last night she sang GDE which was followed by Bolotin singing *his* song by the same title (also referred to last night as "It's hard to go down easy.") Jack Henderson was there, as well as Michael Wilson. Dave Purcell from Pike 27 was also in attendance (you're on the list, right? give us your thoughts...) along with a handful of listees. After the show, Linford came over and spoke to Bruce for a while ... reported that September still looked like the release date for the new cd, though Karin did make a comment that implied they were still trying to decide what songs would be on it. There. I've written a lot without really saying anything at all. Maybe now someone else will pipe up and fill in the gaps I've left.
4 cats. 4 hours driving. 4 songs at Kaldi's. We were very late. He sounded like Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, Mark Knopfler. Seemed a good fellow. Played a guitar. She sounded like Karin. Played a guitar. Had blonde hair. The cat with the soul patch played accordian and guitar. The blonde sang Go Down Easy and My Love is a Fever. Worth it, even on a school night. Amy Joy found us and hugged us all. A beautiful, unknown woman behind me tickled my rib cage. She said, "Oh! I thought you were someone else." This destroyed our relationship. That's life, cat. We ate food in the back room with the pressed tin--me an' Molly Shaw an' Amy Joy an' Drew Billups an' Sara Jo Weinraub. I was wearing blue shoes. That's my story.