Monday March 3

I'm on Spring Break. The last time that happened was 1997, by which time I'd already been a college dropout for a year. I joined a group of friends on a weeklong trip to Hilton Head, South Carolina where we drank impressively and agitated the local retiree populace as only drunken youth can.

This year, my friend Serge invited me on a weekend road trip to Newport, Kentucky to see Robyn Hitchcock at Southgate House Revival. It’s the successor to the late Southgate House, a grand old pile that for decades served as a staple of the indie rock touring circuit until its abrupt closure in 2011. GLMS played a show there sometime in the mid-2000s, though my memories of it are hazy. We opened for an Oregon band called the Stars of Track and Field in the tavern room and played mostly to the staff. We might have caught a couple strays who wandered in for a beer, but neither band had any fans there. Somewhere there's a photo of me in one of my occasional touring moustaches posing next to an oil portrait of some colonial chap who may or may not have been the manor's original inhabitant. 

The revival occupies an old church just a few blocks away and carries some of the original’s historic gravitas, even if it feels like a work in progress. But, a santuary seems like a good fit, especially for Hitchcock who was in top form. His set consisted almost entirely of requests, a detail I didn't learn about until I overheard his partner, Emma Swift, asking fans at the merch booth if there was anything they'd like to hear. I can hardly remember the songs I've just practiced, let alone dredge up curios from the distant past; this gig would be my nightmare. In fact, I've probably had this nightmare. But Robyn was game, and as a result I got to hear songs I never thought I'd hear live, foremost among them the timely "Don't Talk To Me About Gene Hackman," a cut so deep it was the second of two unlisted secret tracks buried at the end 1999's Jewels For Sophia. He closed with the Soft Boys gem “Queen of Eyes,” a song I’ve included in my own set many times. As an encore, he unplugged his guitar and paced around the congregation leading a sing-along of the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life.” My kind of sermon.

The next day we drove an hour east to see the great Serpent Mound, a 1,348-feet-long effigy built thousands of years ago, probably by the Adena culture. The gates were closed when we arrived, so we took our chances and trespassed on foot. Relative to this country's size, America has preserved so few of these ancient earthworks. Past a small visitor center and rickety observation tower (closed for repairs) the curving burial mound stretched serenely out of view, bordered by a paved footpath. With no one else around, it seemed especially peaceful and we grokked it with reverence for its prehistoric creators and apologies to its present-day stewards, the Ohio History Connection.