Goodbye barn

We had gotten to The Palms early, taking up our position in line with the rest of the middle-aged people. While sitting on a log next to a tractor, the cat with the white-tipped tail had come by for scratches. The moon was rising. All good signs.

This would be quite the Saturday night. The start of the last week for the renowned Palms Playhouse in Davis, and we had tickets reserved for Joe Louis Walker and the Boss Talkers. Where else would you want to see some blues shouting than in a wooden honky tonk? Where else would Joe Louis Walker be, if not here for this show?

Palms manager Dave Fleming didn’t know where Joe was. The band booker looked downcast as he announced a … problem. It seems Joe had been late before, but not this late. The show was being cancelled on account of no musicians.

Damn. How could they do this on the last week?

I remember reading the listings in the New Yorker magazine as a teenager and imagining all the great venues, little jazz clubs and rooms where the greats played. The introduction to the nightclub listings had a caution something like this: Musicians and nightclub owners lead complicated lives. It is best to call ahead.

So Dave did what he could do and opened up the barn doors for a little party. Everyone was invited in for a beer and a final browse around the old place, including a look at the backstage where the artists had signed the wall. Louden, Etta and Odetta, and members of both The Liquid Hotplates and The Laurel Mountain Bluegrass Band. Oh, and the late, great Joe Louis Walker.

It was somehow OK. Just one more story to tell about the beloved old barn.