Brian King and Nathan Cohen have performed as the band What Time Is It, Mr. Fox for years. There have been many mutations of the band in those years. I had seen Brian perform solo and I have seen the band with drums and backup singers, cellists and aerialists. Brian's compositions, Nathan's virtuosic playing, and their accompanying circus always captured my attention.
Renee and I met Brian through his brother Dan and Bandit Kings. Renee and Brian had worked together with Dan in the 80s cover band Safety. I worked as Nathan's teaching assistant in the elementary school strings program the past two school years. Brian and I had played as a duo. Brian, Nathan and I had played as a trio. We had played together as a seven piece group but never this particular quartet. We did not rehearse before we left for the tour.
I am not sure whose idea this tour was. I think Nathan was supposed to pick up baby things from a family member in Memphis, but nothing like that ever happened, and good thing too because there was not the smallest amount of space to spare in the truck. Time and Space are slippery beings, but Nathan and his wife Eileen are having a baby and that somehow relates to a band touring.
One: Brooklyn
The drive from Gloucester to Brooklyn was two hundred fifty miles. I was driving and Renee was my co-pilot. Nathan and Brian were in the back of my Ford Escape with a teetering wall of instruments and bags between them. The drive took five hours. We had no trouble finding parking right around the corner from the gig. My worries about the truck were a recurring theme throughout the tour. I have made five payments out of seventy-two on this truck, but for some reason volunteered the vehicle for the tour.
Our host Richard was a handsome man with a handsome brownstone that he graciously opened to twenty-five friends and fans of the band who were essentially strangers to him. The band performed a set of six songs, Renee & I played two of our originals as a duo, and then the band did another eight songs. The crowd sat attentively in rows of chairs and couches. The band responded with energy. The crowd sang along. Everything felt good, the real good you can't fake that you see in someone's eyes when they tell you about it. After the set I was on the back porch overlooking the back yard and the neighbors back yard and erasing my assumption that you didn’t have a backyard in Brooklyn. I bummed a cigarette from a stranger named Mikala in a black wig who said, "I hope you don't mind Virginia Slim 120s." I did not. Strangers were being friendly and tour was off to a great start. Strangers were also a recurring theme throughout the tour.
A treacherous drive to Raleigh, North Carolina lay ahead so we opted to tackle it head on. We left Brooklyn around midnight and arrived in Washington, D.C. at 530 a.m. Along the way I composed three haiku:
Thirty eight miles
to Baltimore. And then some.
Three sixteen a.m.
Exit 12 Greektown
Our arms press together.
He sweats thru my shirt.
Morning birds sing.
We did not see the sun rise
but it was close.
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