granada comes pouring through the window in sunlight streams filtered through green forests that tend to strobe the cabin nicely.
we arrive at 9:00. it’s a beautiful sparkling day. we head up to my favorite hotel here, that Alhambra palace just beside the majestic alhambra palace. its orange, this hotel, up on the hill over looking the town. the view stuns. we set out on the balcony and sup the morning coffee. swallows are in full throng whippin by and diving like they know what is up, as they get down with the start of the day.
we are here so early i opt for a tourist stroll, and so head to the ancient palace down the road… we let it take up the entire morning.
i text matt to meet us for lunch at the hotel, and funnily he is already here somewhere in the ancient palace.
so back to the hotel and our new rooms that teeter on the verge of toppling over on the town so high up the hill, and the narrow ledge they try and call a balcony.
then matt shows up. so good to see him again, and we all set to lunch back on the coffee balcony. we let lunch eat up the afternoon. then a slight power siesta and we head down the hill for the soundcheck.
i am the first to recognize the driver is severely coked. am sensitive to drug takers. it’s the kind of ride that usually gets filmed.
we make it alive to sound check and proceed accordingly. its our first night doing this 3 night mini tour within a tour within a tour within.
i mention that maybe we should try some shuffling. i’ll start with 3 songs, then he should come out and sadly shake his head and then take over as if to show how its done. then i come after his 3 songs, do the same, but hand him a glass of wine too. and this is how the rest of the evening gets handled. it feels like the best tour ever. i get to enjoy a batch of 3 songs from matt every few minutes and then think about what i will do next too. i group them accordingly. first are 3 songs with no wires, using only the new perez brothers guitar built for me and a single mic, my voice carries well in that place. next is the old ’59 martin, wired up with its original d’armond pick up. then the 3rd set of 3s has only piano in it, and it sounds good tonight. and finally for the last batch, the big red distortion pedal gets hauled out . and that is that. a fantastic method of attack.
matt and i then do a couple songs together, but we’ve worked nothing out yet. they are funky. and i try that “light my fire” with the new chords, and that eyebrow twitch comes into play again.
then matt motions for a double bow actor style. that always seems funny to me. a posture more then a homage to the tradition. i awkwardly manage it, and then it makes sense in a way because of our theater between songs tonight.
after the show we eat at a restaurant that is randomly playing giant sand’s “center of the universe” from 1991: the re-issue verison.
i thought it sounded familiar. but its not great dinner music.