I seen her, ages ago, and lived to tell the tale.

Last month I took a little trip to Northampton, Mass to see little a singer-songwriter named Patty Griffin. And behold, everything that I saw was good.

So Patty was basically her bad self all night long. I've got to say (this being the first time I'd seen her in concert) I had built this show up in my mind more than a person ought to. But Miss Griffin hit one out of the park that night. Except for the first two songs (a French lullaby and a guitarless "torch" tune that I was unfamiliar with), it was a night of day dreams come true.

Patty without her guitar at the beginning was a bit disconcerting, for both the audience and Miss Griffin. She was doing some uncomfortable hand gesturing/dancing that you see women twice her age trying during that concert by The Tokens that PBS kept showing during Pledge Week. But once she strapped on that guitar....good Lord. Songs from all over the place came out -- Living with Ghosts, Flaming Red, 1000 Kisses, Impossible Dream, Children Running Through -- even some love from Silver Bell. My stomach nearly flew out my mouth when she started playing the chords to Truth #2, I kid you not.

The only drawback was how much the damn show actually cost. $30 bucks for a ticket? This is the reason I liked Chicago so much. $14 for Joanna Newsom and The Handsome Family. $12 for Sufjan Stevens. $8 (yeah, $8!) for Damien Jurado. But I guess you can get away with that when most of your audience are Baby-Boomers. And oh how those Boomers showed up that night! I was surprised by how few people my age were there. Except for the nice lesbian couple I sat by, there was no one in my section who was within 10 years of me. Good golly, Miss Griffin. But what can you do?

All in all, a very good night of music. Even if it looked more like a Simon & Garfunkel show that it ought to have. But those tunes! O my those tunes!


Photo courtesy of Rick Harris' photostream. Don't be mad, Rick. I'm real poor. Pity me.