Back around 1989, I used to go see Carrie Newcomer every Wednesday night at “The Cork” on Sagamore Parkway in West Lafayette, IN. It was like a religion - Paula Bauer and I would go and drink coffee or wine and enjoy a night of awesome music - deep originals and tasty covers. Paula and I had been Stone Soup groupies and had converted to the New Testament of Carrie, still enjoying a visit to the Old Testament of Stone Soup on vinyl and cassette on a regular basis.
Carrie used to audition new material to us and fine-tune old faves. She ended up moving to Bloomington after a couple years and her career took off in a country-folk direction. I was thrilled that she was going to be able to follow her muse and also be able to put bread on the table. I really, really wanted to enjoy her “new” music, but after Visions and Dreams, I just had a hard time getting into it, no matter how hard I tried. It was much more highly produced compared to her Stone Soup and solo stuff. It also tweaked my anti-country reflex (n.b., I used to love country in the days of Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, George Jones, and Loretta Lynn. Shania Twain and Garth Brooks broke my country bubble).
The Cork has sat abandoned for, oh, a couple years now (I now live a few blocks from it). A few months ago, the building was demolished and only the sign was left standing. Over the last couple weeks,, they’ve finally started building a Dog ‘n’ Suds in its place. Life moves from the sacred to the profane.
I recently signed up for Yahoo! Music Unlimited. I can dowload and copy any of a million songs to my portable player. I found that Carrie was on there and decided to put Betty’s Diner on for a listen. I gotta say, I really, really enjoyed hearing it on the way to work this morning. I think that I have spent too much time trying to relive my “worship sessions” at The Cork and have not opened my ears to the great music Carrie has been making all along. Now that The Cork is gone (including the sign), somehow I’m able to let it go. I suppose it also helps that my anti-country reflex has been tempered a bit by Lucinda Williams, Kasey Chambers, and Gillian Welch. Here’s to years of catching up on some great tunes.
Jill
| 28-Jul-05 at 6:46 pm | Permalink
Hey Jason–I enjoyed reading your post about Carrie and your connection to her in the early days of Stone Soup…..(I met Carrie when I was in grad school at IU in the early 90’s). We kept in touch and in the last couple of years, I have been working with her as her manager. I am passionate about Carrie’s music…by the way, she has a new cd “Regulars and Refugees” that comes out August 9. We are all very excited about the new project….All the best–Jill
Garrett
| 17-Aug-05 at 3:20 pm | Permalink
Nice I think I will check it out I was very close before….