Dancing Barefoot

Last night I played in front of "people" for the first time in about twenty years. When I did it then, I sucked. That was a Street Magazine party, organized as a talent show. I made up some Devo-ish thing about art school people. They were an easy target. People dug it, and some guy asked me to play his cafe. I had one song I was good at at, and a handful of others that sucked. I declined.

Last night Revel and I did Dancing Barefoot in front of maybe 125 people at the Nickelsville Benefit. Then I did a fast, hard Have Mercy, which I managed not to tremendously fuck up (I'm prone to forgetting lyrics), and closed with a loose and hammy I Like Pink.

It was cool to have a sound guy giving me some reverb and making it sound nice. I've gotten very comfortable in front of audiences as a speaker, but performing as an artist is different. You're much more exposed. You kind of have to let go for it to work. When it works, you feel very high and very focused. I do, anyway.

Doing Dancing Barefoot in a christian setting brought out more of its god stuff for us. It's about intense love, connection, ecstasy, God, the universe, redemption. The big stuff.

The version posted here is hot. Revel and I did four takes on this song today, thinking that maybe after more practice and new strings on the guitar we'd get something good. None were better than the first, done at 9 am the morning after we learned it. I added a little reverb and a lead track tonight, and, well, it's pretty damn good. Really. Put on some headphones and listen.