#lolajohnson

Lola Johnson @ Bitter End Tuesday January 16th 2018, 8pm

Lola Johnson sneak preview ‘This Is What You Get’ (LP) ... stay tuned, and preorder at lolajohnson.bandcamp.com

Lola Johnson on her trip through Colorado with Wayfaring Photo: 

“Just to recap, Boise, Idaho…not much to say. I don’t know what I was expecting in Boise, really. It’s a nice town, but not a lot happening on a Sunday evening. The streets almost seemed dead, not accounting for 9th street, but even that was just a few people out eating in restaurants. So, all in all, a FAIL. 'You win some , you lose some’, so they say(whomever ’they’ is, are obviously not sore losers by any means).

I got back in the car and we drove through the night, across Idaho into Utah. Are plan was to get as close to Denver as possible, before we all needed a catnap. Somewhere thru the drive, I started slowly getting delirious. I’m not quite sure when it started, but I would call this an episode of ‘car’ cabin fever. This trip is perhaps the longest I’ve been in a car, in a long time, so going a bit crazy is a given. First, the english language becomes a hassle to relay, where I must use unnecessary hand gestures to get my point across i.e. pushing Blair’s face away slowly as she is trying to talk to me, because I wanted her to stop saying whatever she was saying. Second, even when attempting words out of my mouth, it just becomes an array of nonsensical slurs having nothing to do with anything at all. Third and Finally, I start seeing objects on the road that are not even there, nor exist in reality i.e. An overpass that I kept on saying was a monster that we were driving under. Eventually, realizing my delirium and the sun rising up, we stopped just short of Laramie to rest up in a Walmart parking lot (Sidetone: We wanted to sleep in Laramie, at first, but after talking about it, Blair and I realized that sleeping in Laramie freaked both of us out. Due to the Matthew Shepard murder. R.I.P.). Next Day(Well, way later, that same day), we awake from our so called nap, that turned into a full on sleep, in the hot steamy car. Blair looked all sorts of ready to get her Starbucks on, once the car engine started. As I was day dreaming away as to how great it was gonna be to be in Boulder, Colorado again, Blair and Emma kept on reminding me of my, last night, delerium. Strange, though, because I could barely recall half of the things they were saying (too much fast food in the brain, I guess). Speaking of road trip food (because the whole experience driving out of Wyoming into Colorado is much of a blur. Except for the usual singing songs and grossing out Emma with our loud unfiltered “adult” talks), I got myself, and the rest of the girls, hooked on Beef Jerky. There’s something about the road that makes me want to eat beef jerky. I think of truck drivers stopping in gas stations, picking up the paper, six pack (to consume when settled to the next motel. I assume ‘drinking and driving’ is not the ‘trucker way’) and Beef Jerky. It’s like a meal in itself. A REAL Man’s/Womyn’s(Yes, I dropped the ‘Y’ up in there, for my feminist peeps wink emoticon road meal. Back to the road, so arriving in Colorado was a great scenic experience. We were on our way to Boulder first, so I alerted everyone about the elevation, and told of my previous experience of dizziness in Boulder before. The clouds hung down so low, as if they were in arm reach. I picked up my cellphone to notify our social media peeps of our arrival in Boulder. My friend, Liz, who I haven’t seen in so many years (since the Bar On A, East Village days) reached out to see where I was gonna be and how long, so we could meet up. I was happy, but also I’ve been finding it hard to relay to people my exact whereabouts in the cities we hit because I’m not even sure of the exact location until I get there and figure out where is best to busk legally (and a bit illegally wink emoticon . 

We stopped to get some gas, and I tell Blair we should hit up ‘The Laughing Goat, the coffee spot I played in last time I was there. She agreed because Emma had homework to do (teenagers wink emoticon and she had to snag up some WIFI to finish out her Blog post. As we parked the car, I was trying to remember about Pearl St. Mall being a place that I saw a lot of buskers around, last time I was here. So we all split, and I headed to Pearl St. Mall to scour the place for some good busking spots. Immediately as I hit 13thst, this street dude runs up to me, to tell me how pretty I was, and asking what music I play. He seemed cool and safe to me, so I told him what’s up. There’s something about some street dudes/chicks that I trust more than somebody who looks like all sorts of cleaned cut and like they got it together. Weird. My new friend only proved my intuition, by helping me find a good spot to busk. Not only that, he brought his other street friends to watch and create an audience for me immediately. “Wherever you are, Guy, Thanks!”(I forgot his name. I’ll just blame the jerky on this one). Anyway, I started playin’ to the good ole pedestrians of the Pearl St. Mall. I gotta say, this definetly made up for Boise and the long ass car drives in between. The most classic tip drop, was by this guy who was driving by with his pickup truck. He yelled out, “Hey! Your great!”, as he extended his arm out of his window to give me a ten dollar bill. I reached for it, grabbed it, and said “Thanks, Man!”. I mean that is CLASSIC! As I continued to play along and engage with the Boulder crowd, I looked out a bit and saw my fellow songwriting traveler, Matt Pless. “Matt”, I yelled, “MATT!!” He finally turns, sees me, and walks over to say hey. I haven’t seen Matt in awhile, actually, I can’t even remember the last time I saw him in NYC, but we tend to bump into each other randomly at times. I took a mini break, and we got to catchin’ up and chattin’ about the road and such. I took a quick picture with him before he ventured off to find place to crash. Sometimes it’s hard to be on the road for so long and try to find places to crash after a show, but then again, we’ve been finding it hard to find that and we’re only doing this jam for a week and a half(‪#‎lastminuteroadtourproblems‬…. And yes, I hashtagged in a blog, Peoples). After the catching up, I went back to playing. As I went along, this other guitar player and djembe player came along to jam in. Just then Blair came along, to take some video and photos of us. Also, I had to do some song shout outs to some fan peeps of our event, who have been donating to support the tour(that was Blair’s idea, by the way. I would also take a bit of credit, but I’m pretty sure I was frozen in a brain fart moment or tunnel vision surfing, while she was relaying this to me).

Well, all said and done, Boulder, we thought, “U Rock!” and now off to Denver we went. I told Blair we should head to 16th St. Mall in downtown Denver. Now I played in a venue, in Denver, last time I was here. It was not so much a big crowd, but I got to take a photo shoot earlier that day with a photographer, Rachel Crick. She found out I was gonna be playing in town, so she emailed me to schedule a shoot. I looked a bit tired in some of them, but…(okay, I’m gonna stop here with the vanity. I get all nit picky about photos, videos…whatever…moving on). 

We got into Denver, down to the 16th St. Mall. I took out my guitar from the back, and Blair and Emma went to go get some grub. I walked up and down the pedestrian mall, reminiscing, listening to other buskers, watchin’ the bar hoppers, seeing the street kids…and of course, looking for a good busking spot. When I finally settled in this nook (which ended up being the same area that I was dropped off at, previously), I setup shop and started playing. I think I started by playing an original. I don’t usually do that, whilst busking, because I like to start out with tunes that are familiar to the ears of many, like Stevie Wonder “Superstitious”, The Letter “The Box Tops”, The Beatles “Come Together” and “Helter Skelter”(Well, with Helter Skelter, it depends) etc. So I started playing, people came around, here and there, dropping one dollar or five dollars. “Not bad, Denver, not bad”, I thought. Of course, no busking goes without the interesting encounters. As I shall list, as so…

Dude with trench coat, dancing fairly normal, at first, but then proceeds to enter into my ‘personal space’ zone. Creating further creepiness, while yelling at little children walking by. Really?!…I mean, REALLY?!?!!

Young Teen Girl, who needed to confess to me, loudly and continuously, that “ALCOHOL HAS SAVED MY LIFE! IT’S THE BEST THING THAT HAPPENED TO ME! WHERE THE FUCK DID MY FRIEND GO?...” . I feel as though, the verse, speaks for itself in the knowing of how I felt, right then.

Lingering guy…with the winking thing?…no thanks.

Though, I must admit I did have so much more light-hearted encounters. These two kids brought me coffee, this guy throw me a fiver to sing with his friend, “What I Got” by Sublime, the guy on the street cleaning crew throw me a tip, and I sang a sweet tune for this young loving couple. So, music goes a long way, no matter it be for the sane or insane, all is enjoying themselves. As I started packing up, I called Blair to come and get me. “What a long day”, I thought. Colorado was looking fantastic in my eyes, and definitely, turned this trip back up into good spirits for all. Real burger in my mouth, and we were off to our next destination. The long haul to Chicago.

- Lola

Links:

Altitude Sickness http://www.boston.com/…/h…/JK0YRLreg6PzziPKQlApSO/story.html

Matt Pless http://www.mattpless.com

Pearl Street http://www.boulderdowntown.com/visit/history-of-pearl-street

The Laughing Goat http://thelaughinggoat.com/

Lola Johnson with The Now Band perform “Shit’s Gone Wrong”  This SNEAK PREVIEW version is released to support Lola’s ongoing cross country busking journey, presented with Wayfaring Photo.  drop $5 or more in the virtual tip-bucket for the mp3, and request a busking location en route

Day One(Seattle):

           I would love to get into the whole plane trip of getting in detail, but my brain isn’t having that this afternoon, so I shall be brief…

           How I got to my terminal at LaGuardia was a miracle in itself. As if, Mercury Retrograde was telling me,”Hold on there! Can’t let you just leave NYC so easily. That’s ridiculous! How about some unnecessary afternoon traffic and a ‘barely’ hearable terminal call out on the bus, you cool with that?”. No.

           I get on my first flight (Side Note: Thank you American Airlines for letting me bring my hefty guitar case on board. You’re the best…for now at least ;). On the flight, I put in my earbuds and listen to the music that is coming out from a screen insert in the seat head in front of me. They have a selection of various artists and genres in there library. I love the eclectic music selection on the screen, but I think, ‘why is there no artists’ details? no artists’ song names?’. Fail.

           I get on my next flight, with a 3 hour layover in Chicago. As I’m sitting there waiting, the airport overhead voice alerts us that the carpet on a plane (not mine) has to be changed because the carpet smells like old milk. It gets even better and the delay gets even longer, but the voice proceeds to go into detail of the rank smell coming from the carpet about every 5-10 mins, “Again ‘sorry’ ladies and gentlemen, but we can’t let anyone on the flight till we finish changing out the carpet that is smelling like crusty, hardened two week old milk. That is unbearable and embarrassing to admit”. What?!!? The voice is loud and my stomach is doing back flips.

           Finally! I get on the flight, and sit next to this lovely couple from Wisconsin, who were traveling to Vancouver for a conference, regarding a Dictionary company or such. About two hours into the flight, the wife and I get talking about origins of words, politics and our mutual connection to St. Francis, Kansas (Side Note: We shall be passing through there, while leaving Denver, and I promised to go by the cemetery to see a relative’s grave site of hers. Weird? Not weird?)

           Hours later, exhausted as hell, I get off the flight. I immediately get my phone off of airplane mode to contact Blair, because she landed earlier than me and was getting a ride from a friend. Phone on, message as such, “Soooo Heather and I got rear ended coming back from the airport. We are okay, the car is kinda banged up, and I hate to do it, but after this fuckin’ day, the prospect of going back down there is pretty…Yeah I’m not gonna be able to convince her to. But the light rail to downtown only takes 30 minutes or so. Here is the link…” Really Retrograde?!? I thought I left you back in NYC. Ugh. So I make my way to the light rail (I would go into detail again about how that all went down, but I already made a Facebook Status about it. Also, I’m ‘blog’ lazy at the moment) Status went as such, brief and sweet…

“Got in late last night, took light rail downtown. Got offered a free extra train ticket from a couple, vodka from a hula hoop burlesque dancer and high five from a random fellow musician bc I had a guitar. All city welcomings should be done as such”.  

           Next Day, awaking from a basement room, I get myself together. Blair has left early to run errands and get the car. I run upstairs to grab some tea and yogurt, so I can go outside and practice some songs, and try to plan where to busk, non-permit style, in the fine city of Seattle. The home owner was a nice italian lady, who had the most flower flourishing front yard and back. I think, how it feels so great to be outside of New York City (as I get on my social media looking at what everyone is doing in New York at the moment). The lady comes outside to upkeep her plants, and we start talking about the road trip and activism. She points out where to be on Pike Place Market to play and Left Bank Books to get my political/social brain nourished.

           Blair gets back, we pack the car and head to pick up a friend of hers for some sights, scenes, and most importantly food (I was starving). All in car, we head to an area of Seattle called Ballard to eat at La Isla Cuisine.  Our server Woody, was a cool dude. The food was yummy Puerto Rican food and Happy Hour is always ‘what’s up!’

           We get back in the car, drop the friend off, and head to Pike Place Market, so I can get my busk on for a couple hours. I walk around Pike Place Market, but I felt it was too late to busk in that market. Quickly, I remember the hula hoop burlesque dancer telling me that busking at the entrance of the Westlake Station is a good spot and you don’t need a permit. So I went back to where I arrived from the other night, and set up shop. What I quickly noticed was that Seattle people (even the tourists) are very smiley and immediately friendly. I don’t know if it’s the $15/hr minimum wage they got going on (for shame NYC), the legalization of weed or both. I was loving it. About 30 mins into playing, and $7 plus change in the case, I get some harmonica accompaniment from a bike rider. At first, we sounded off key together (because we didn’t realize that we were both playing in two different keys ;), then we got the party started. I noticed the more upbeat songs was where everyone was giving more. It was a clear sunny day and nothing was gonna get anybody down. As my fellow player left, another biker came by asking if wanted a hit. I was like, ‘A hit of what?’, then before he could say anything, I said,’ Duh! No, it’s cool, guy’. Throughout the couple hours I was there, I got asked if I wanted some weed, something more…oh! and compliments, “Good music!, Great voice!”. The giving in this city varies in many wide ranges of compliments and amenities of no bounds.

           20 something dollars later, Blair picks me up after doing a photoshoot of a pregnant friend, and we head to meet up with a childhood friend of hers at The Outback. Yes, I said ‘The Outback’. I slowly start the snobbish NYC, millennial whine about fast food joints, then suddenly I get distracted by the machines on the table. ‘What the hell is this?!’, I say. The hostess (well it was a guy, so I’m not sure if I call him ‘host’ or ‘hostess’. I’m ridiculous) tells us that it’s a new way to go through the menu, order, and pay. Basically the server becomes, completely unnecessary, but it’s almost as if they just bring the food and don’t have to try to please you conversationally by any means. My mind is blown, and yet I’m saddened by the fact that I don’t get to interact with the servers as much. Luckily though, our server, Melissa, was friendly and was mind boggled by the use of this machinery as much as we were. After the consumption of fried onions (Not sure if this is even an Australian dish really?!) and shrimp, we get back in the car and head to Ellensburg.

           And so here we are! It’s late afternoon in Blair’s hometown of Ellensburg, and I will be hitting the Kittitas County Farmers Market in Ellensburg tomorrow morning, for some busking with some town folk. Til I blog again…That’s What’s up!  

 Sites:

Pike Place Market

www.pikeplacemarket.org/

 Left Bank Books | Independent Since 1969

www.left-bank.com/

 Westlake Station

metro.kingcounty.gov/

 La Isla Cuisine - Seattle's Best Puerto Rican Restaurant

laislacuisine.com/

Wayfaring Photo and Radian Records Present: Lola Johnson, on a cross country journey of busking performances and unpredictable encounters with the general public! 

Here are some updates from the road: 

June 3rd, 2015, NYC - “So as I am sittin’ and typing, I’m reflecting upon the fact that I have to catch an afternoon plane flight tomorrow to Seattle, Washington (incoming flight fears, stirring up!), I haven’t slept much (the insomnia is real), and I knew about this jam, enough in advance, to have prepared myself better(procrastination is no joke)…You know what?... Who am I kidding? I’m doing this Full On GUERILLA STYLE!   That’s what’s up. With the help of Wayfaring Photo and Radian Records, I’m hittin’ the road with amazing photographer, Blair Hopkins, cross country from June 3rd-June 12th, pure BUSKING. Starting in Seattle then back to New York City. Along the way, we will be media documenting the events, not just for ourselves, because vanity is real also, but for all you lovely ‘music lovin’ people!

As I said before, this is GUERILLA STYLE, so since we don’t have all the exact locations as to where I will be jamming, we shall be updating this daily. In the Twitter and Instagram world, perhaps every 2-3 mins (because seriously, you know that happens. Crazy).

If anyone out there knows some sweet spots to busk in, do tell. Friends I haven’t seen in a bit, let’s catch up. All you music lovers, let’s have some fun!” L.J.

Seattle Plans: Seattle, Wa: 6/3-6/6, I will be in Pike Place Market and Seattle Metro Bus Tunnel (Will update time in places) 

Seattle reality: “Got in late last night, took light rail downtown. Got offered a free  extra train ticket from a couple, vodka from a hula hoop burlesque dancer and high five from a random fellow musician bc I had a guitar. All city welcomings should be done as such ;)”