Making Drunks Happy, or My Life As A Professional Musician [VIDEO]

I’ve spend most of my life digging. Searching for lost things. Forgotten songs. Unknown artists. Singers that wandered the backroads of America picking tunes on cheap guitars. Old bluesmen (and women) from deep down in the Delta. Loggers and lumberjacks in the north woods. Hobos and cowboys. Gamblers, whores, and church goers. Anyone with a certain vibe from a certain era (1850 to 1950, give or take). Lost songs, lost people, lost times.

I’ve wandered junk yards, junk stores, and talked to junkies. Spent hours in mildew soaked basements digging through old trunks and boxes covered in mold. Picked records, sheet music, and books in 48 or the 50 United States. Driven hours on a lead that turned out to be nothing.

Along the way, I’ve earned a PhD in something, what that something is I can’t really say. I failed at high school, dropped out of college, and I don’t know much, but I can tell you who Tony Jackson is (all but forgotten black pianist from New Orleans who had hundreds of songs stolen by rich white folks), who played trumpet on yodeling-pianist Roy Evans’ first session of 1928, or what song Hank Williams was working on the day he died. All useless information, but somehow important nonetheless.

I’ve successfully (and not so successfully) parlayed this useless information into a career (of sorts), singing songs by Blind Blake, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Boy Fuller, Blind Willie McTell, and Blind Willie Johnson. Written books about Freddie Fisher (the paint-fume huffing jazz clarinetist from Winona, Minnesota) and about the minstrel comedian Emmett Miller. Yeah, it hasn’t exactly been a profitable pursuit, but it’s been a dang ol’ fun one. I learned some old vaudeville jokes, put on a hat, and sing at pubs and clubs, bars and breweries, henhouses and whorehouses.

And if you take all the information I have gathered, and condense it into the one single (and most important) thing I’ve learned, it’s that if you really want to make some good tips, all the drunks want…is to hear ABBA.