Ramsay Midwood and Randy Weeks, Live at the Cinema Bar in Los Angeles
November 6th and 7th, 2009
Is the Cinema Bar the coolest live music venue in Los Angeles? Erin and I like it a lot, and we always like to see who's playing there whenever I make it down to LA. It's a funky old dive in Culver City that books the hippest Americana (whatever that is) acts in Los Angeles. No cover charge. Beers are 6 dollars. Dinky stage. Terrible sound system. Great crowd of good people. Coolest place in LA, according to Lost Hills.....
We've seen Randy there before. He's been a key player on the LA country rock scene for years, with his former band, the Lonesome Strangers, and as a solo artist. He's moved on to Austin now, so it's a treat to catch him at the Cinema, one of his old hangouts. Ramsay has been on my radar for a couple of years now. He's an enigmatic songwriter who sounds like an old hillbilly spinning tales of a life gone weirdly awry. They were doing two nights together right before my birthday, and I was going to be in town building Erin a laundry room, so went both nights. Hell, why not? It's the coolest place in LA.
You could think of them as the odd couple. They met at open mics when Ramsay was coming up and Randy's band had split up. Randy's the ultimate professional, and Ramsay's a shambling dude that looks like an unlicensed house painter or a shade tree mechanic, with a couple beat to shit pawn shop prize guitars. Ramsay is one of those rustic American roots performers that tours Europe but no one you know has ever heard of. They're missing out on a unique American artist with depth and vision. He's got a rootsy finger picking style that makes you want to get up and boogy while you're listening to twisted tales of Jesus, 450 pound hounds, prison gangs and rednecks with monster trucks. The band could not have been better. Kip Boardman on bass, Danny McGough on Keyboards and Don Heffington (Lone Justice, Emmylou Harris's Hot Band) on drums. Randy Weeks threw down smokin' hot lead guitar on Ramsay's songs, and tossed in a bunch of his own best country rockers as well. All of these guys played on Ramsay's album, Popular Delusions & the Madness of Cows (produced by Don Heffington,) and they were both tight and loose in the best sense of both terms. Randy's lead guitar playing was a real eye opener for me. I knew he was a great guitar player, but the last time I saw him at the Cinema he had Tony Gilkyson playing lead guitar in his band. In these two shows, he was the lead guitarist and his guitar playing was one of the major highlights of the whole deal.
These guys had a lot of fun, and so did the audience. Ramsay's songs have a way of being dark and humorous at the same time, and they are all steeped in traditional folk, country and blues. One of the things I really dug was the way Ramsay would weave lyrics from gospel and bluegrass classics in and out of his songs. He even found a way to work verses from BTOs Takin' Care Of Business into two of his songs the first night. He's a guy that can throw a Woody Guthrie song into his set, and it fits seamlessly. He's the real shit, my friends.
Well, Erin and I were already Randy Weeks fans, and now we're Ramsay Midwood fans as well. Somewhere in the night I turned 56. The next day I stopped somewhere along the road and got a haircut, and the beautician was tripping out that I don't have grey hair yet. I told her she should see my beard..... I drive out of LA and out toward the mountains and I have a new saying that I can plug into most any conversation, "If you don't like it you can kiss my ass, 'cause I drive a monster truck." Lookin' forward to my next pilgrimage to the Cinema Bar, the oldest bar in Culver City.
Randy Weeks
Ramsay Midwood
The Cinema Bar
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