Do they call this exhaustion?

I slept late, or what passes for sleeping late for a 46 year old man—maybe 9 am? Stayed in the room until the maid knocked on the door. Curtains closed, air con blasting, pillow over my eyes for maximum darkness.

Then I limped into the Super 8 shower, got clean and drove off in search of coffee, which I found at the local punk rock girl Decatur Georgia coffeehouse. Iced coffee; it’s 100 degrees today.

Drove back to Nashville, listening to Kathleen Edwards’ “Summerlong” over and over again. It’s one of those perfectly aching, wistful anthems, with perfect chiming 12 string electric guitar and her sweet vocal. This is a great song, not unlike those great Kim Richey songs, like “Girl in a Car” that make your heart ache and also make you hit repeat over and over again. Buy it now.

It’s been a wild roller coaster ride ever since “Wings” came out. An obvious high point was playing the concert at Gulf Shores with Jimmy Buffett, Allen Toussaint and Jesse Winchester in front of 40,000 fans and millions of TV viewers. But there have been many other high points, like the Daddy duo tour of the UK and Europe, like many of the small venue shows all over the country.

Don’t get me wrong; it ain’t over. But for the first time in a long long time, I don’t have a show to play until September 8 (or something like that).

I have talked a lot about being thankful and trying to live in the here and now, especially when talking about the songs on “Wings”. I am still thankful. But I will freely admit to doing a lot of living in the future and living in the past over the past few months, as exhaustion set in. I would get a night or two at home if I was lucky, then haul my bones back into the van or the Camry and zoom around the country. The countries. The Western Hemisphere.

I am truly lucky, truly blessed to have a passion for my family, my friends, and my career. It’s a complicated existence, but who’s adult life isn’t complicated from time to time?

I’ve hooked up with Burriss Amps, Novelli Guitars and Recording King Guitars this year, and having the support of folks who make great amps and guitars for someone like me who gives his amps and guitars a very hard time out there.

So even though I’ll be back on the road in four of five weeks, I feel like I’m at the end of one long run, and looking at the beginning of the next one. So I wanted to say thank you to everyone who has come to a show, bought “Wings”, kept up with Lick of the Day, paid attention to musicians like me who live a little bit outside of the mainstream. And thank you to my fellow musicians, whose soul and talents are treasure to me. And thank you to my family, who have the patience and tolerance to let me run around on these crazy trips. They were with me in Gulf Shores the other day, by the way, and it was a good day for us all.

Take care. See you in September. Now go buy that Kathleen Edwards song:
“Summerlong”. I’m taking my almost 15 year old daughter to see Paul McCartney tonight! On Aug 12, Jessica and I are going to see Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers!

Read more: http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.create&editor=True#ixzz0upRemsKi

If you had told me back in the Spring how busy Summer would be, I might have told you to dream on. But since April, I have been running around like the proverbial chicken with its head cut off. A good thing, to be sure. Especially these days, and I am thankful to the promoters and booking agents and managers who keep the treadmill turning.

And of course my family for letting me run around and do all this stuff. It helps pay the rent, anyway.

I’ve been all over Europe and a good chunk of the United States, zigzagging from Tennessee to Wales to Houston to Cleveland to Gulf Shores to Kentucky to Baton Rouge to Cincinnati. East Germany to Brussels to a stage on the beach in front of 35,000 alongside Jimmy Buffett, Allen Toussaint, Jesse Winchester and the Coral Reefers! And there’s more. Leaves me a little dizzy but real hopeful and invigorated just the same.

Oil well’s been corked for now.

Troops in Afghanistan. Iraq, too.

The kids are alright in strange times. Tell me this: when have times not been a little strange? The Little Ice Age? The Middle Ages? Tudor England? The Civil War? World Wars One and Two? The Great Depression? Wallace and Nixon? W? Bill Clinton’s nocturnal prowlings? President Obama stressing out w/ a Marlboro Light in the Oval Office?

Gigs in Memphis and Houston were fabulous. I am headed for a homecoming of sorts in Baton Rouge. It’s been years since I have played there under my own name. It was one of the first towns that embraced what I was doing, way back in the Ground Zero days. I was still in my teens.

OK, folks, I’m headed for Coonass country with high hopes and a bellyful of coffee.

Will

I’ll be there, along with Jesse Winchester, Allen Toussaint, Sonny Landreth, Kenny Chesney and the Zac Brown Band—and 35,000 fans.

See you in Naples, Florida this July 4th weekend!

I was up at dawn on Tuesday, prepping for the Rodney Crowell/Chely Wright show at TPAC in Nashville that night. Load in was 8:45 AM, followed by soundcheck and rehearsal. We went onstage that night around 11:30 PM. It was great to play with Rodney, Denny, Eddie, Lonnie and Chely. Also got to hang out with ace drummer and dear friend Keio Stroud. It’s been too long!

Wednesday night, DADDY played at the Loveless Cafe for WSM’s Music City Roots radio show. Great show. Bryan Owings subbed more than ably for Paul Griffith, who is suffering through a stint in Key West.

Thursday was more or less a day of rest.

Friday we loaded up the van and took off for Jackson, Mississippi, to play the Art Museum. I was excited to have Jessica with me, and Bryan Owings and Byron House in my band. The show was great, and we got to visit a bit with some good friends.

Byron and I were on a Southwest flight at 7:25 Saturday morning. After stops in Chicago and Baltimore, we parted ways: he to Norfolk, me to Providence, where Mr Womack was waiting to pick me up and drive us to Bellows Falls, Vermont, to play Fred Eaglesmith’s Roots on the River Festival. Great show! Standing ovations. More good friends to visit with. Tommy and I collapsed in our hotel room at a very reasonable 11 PM.

We were up and out this morning by 11 AM, thankful for the nice long sleep. Headed out for Cape Cod.

We’ve arrived in Cape Cod now and we’re borrowing a house tonight. We’re chilling for a couple of hours before the show tonight at 9 PM at O’Shea’s. We’re up against the Celtics in the NBA Finals, so hopefully SOMEBODY will come listen to us!

See you there. We’re flying home tomorrow…home!

Tomorrow’s DADDY at Music City Roots—see you there!

The What’s Cookin’ gig was really good; we’ve gotten used to playing London now. Where it used to be intimidating, now it is another place we play. We’re looser about the big city shows, less self-concious. Much better that way.

5/27

Drove to Leicester after London show. Got in about 3:30 AM. I skyped home. Exhausted, I still had to wind down for about an hour in the dark, just listening to my brain chatter on and on.

Woke around 11 AM, showered and got out the door for a noon pickup. Paul Needham and his assistant Leah took some photos of Tommy and me. They got some great shots.

And then we were off to Nottingham. We had a truly fabulous show at The Maze. I don’t know what else to say about it; we played a couple of hours and then were called back for three encores.

5/28

Back down and around London for our last UK gig: East Grinstead. In contrast to how it sounds when you say it, East Grinstead is an old market town, and now a London bedroom community. Pretty cozy town,. Jeff and I strolled down and took a look at a row of 13th Century daub and wattle buildings, still in use as businesses and residences, I even encountered a couple of piss-drunk young guys who I could imagine in medieval garb giving me the same looks and comments 700 years ago (one of them made farting sounds with his mouth as I walked by). Funny.

East Grinstead was good gig. Decent crowd. They really liked the music. There was one lady who seemed to have had one too many drinks. She got excited a few times and started stomping and clapping in a rough approximation of the tempo of the song that had her going. In the tiny venue, we had to hunker down and really concentrate to keep the groove. But the promoter, Steve, was a great guy and treated us well.

5/29

I was up at 4 AM to get it together for our London-Berlin flight. I mistakenly thought that Gatwick Airport would be less busy early in the morning. Dream on. It was a zoo. There were several hundred people lined up for Easy Jet. The good news for us was we were on the verge of missing our flight by the time we really got in the huge line, so they moved us up to the front of the line. Then they moved us up to the front of the line to pay our overweight baggage fees. Then they pretty much waved us through security. Turns out we had plenty of time to wait in another long line to board the flight. The flight was fine, though, and we landed in Berlin.

Ralf, the promoter from Lauchhammer, picked us up and drove us to his house. We got a taste of 100 mph Autobahn driving—zoom up to the back of a semi, slam on the brakes, pass, zoom up to 100 mph, brake, etc. Very exciting. Ralf’s wife, Iris, made us a real nice lunch, then Ralf took us to a B and B so we could take a nap. I got a good one in, and by sound check I was feeling ok.

The gig was great. Real Music Club is a cool room with pretty amazing sound. It’s a real home away from home for American musicians, many of whom (like us) have a hard time getting the big gig in Berlin proper. The house engineer, Marcus, brought his Strat and his amp and let me use the rig, so our show had some loud and proud electric guitar.

It was a very rocking show to a very appreciative audience. Hats off to Ralf, Iris and Marcus for treating us like kings.

5/30

Got in late; Ralf wanted us to hang with him at the club, so we did. It was fun, trying to learn some German and teach some English to the small and friendly staff who were hanging around drinking some post gig beers. Got up and caught a ride with the nice old guy who owns the B and B. Made it to the station at Lauchhammer. The former East Germany—we are right along the Polish border—is a trip. They are still rebuilding after the Communist era. It’s dreary looking and eerily quiet at times. But everyone has been so nice to us.

On the train now, two line changes—Lauchhammer to Ruhland, Ruhland to Cottbus, and now Cottbus to Berlin. My dear old friend and former roomate Clark is picking us up for our big day off in Berlin. Our only day off of this tour, until we get to Amsterdam on June 6. We are tired but feeling pretty good.

We arrived at Berlin Hautbahnhof and Clark came to pick us up with his two wonderful kids. Then he took us on an auto tour of Berlin. What a mind-boggling city, especially for history buffs like Tommy and me. We saw old Prussian history, WW1 history, Nazi and WW2 history, the Berlin Wall, the Soviet influence on East Berlin, the thriving modern city of today.

And then we went home, had a cocktail, played with the kids, ate dinner, sat around talking music and life. Off to bed.

Played Dragon Park Summer Music series with Daddy in Nashville. John Deaderick couldn’t make it, but we had a good show anyway. The bagpipers played, the parade went on despite the rain. At some point, we were playing under the awning and the crowd was just out there in the pouring rain. Bless ‘em!

5/17

Flew out of Nashville with Tommy. Layover in Charlotte. Flight to London Gatwick went fine.

5/18

Landed. Took train to Burgess Hill. Train did not stop there, though, so we went all the way to Brighton and then back. Cab to Travelodge. Promoter Mike picked us up for gig. Brighton gig sparse attendance but good for first jetlagged gig night. Paul and Jo Needham there, as well as the other Two Pauls. Driver Jess met us at gig with merch.

5/19

Surprising good Little Chef roadside breakfast. Jeff drove us to Swansea. Great gig at The Chattery. Nigel and Alex, the father-daughter proprietors, treated us with the utmost hospitality. Great food, great sound, nice place to stay. We were so happy we stayed up way too late (mainly just laying in bed surfing the internet).

5/20

Long and beautiful drive from Swansea to Anglesea—up through the mountains, along the Welsh coastline. Wonderful Anglesea gig at Victoria Hotel.

5/21

Up for breakfast. Black pudding today. Hmmmm… Lazing around for a few minutes before trundling back into Jeff’s car for the slog to Leicester. Back at The Musician. Should be good: Friday night, Dawson and the Dissenters opening.

It was good; the crowd was smaller than we’d hoped, but they were very happy to be there. Their cheers were loud. We played for three hours, and it felt like about 90 minutes. Had to drag ourselves away from from happy, buzzed fans who wanted to buy us drinks.

5/22

Up at dawn for 500 mile drive up the the Highlands of Scotland. It was an epic slog, but well worth it. We arrived in Strathpeffer in the late afternoon and were welcomed by our hosts, Steve and Clancy, and Rob Ellen. The gig was really good, despite Tommy and I being bloody knackered.

Ross County Staggies defeated Celtic in the Scottish Cup recently and that was all the buzz. Go Staggies.

It was my first trip to the Highlands. Beautiful.

5/23

We slept in and took it easy. Clancy made us breakfast and kept the tea and coffee flowing. I sat around playing Steve’s lovely Avalon guitar for quite a while. Finally we just had to get going to Edinburgh.

Arrived Edinburgh just in time to load in, sound check, eat a quick bite, and play the show. It was a small crowd, and as Edinburgh audiences tend to be, rather quiet. But when we asked them to sing the call-and-response on “You Made Your Bed”, they notched up the volume and sang out loud and proud.

Jeff, Tommy and I spent about an hour with Willie and Claire, a young couple of fans from Edinburgh. Willie’s in the band Delta Mainline. Claire’s his girl. Lovely couple of young people. We found our Travelodge, checked email, skyped home, and got to sleep about 2:30.

5/24

Slept in again. Glorious to feel rested. Hit the road around 1:15. Stopped for roadside snack and headed on. We’ve reached Glasgow and bound for Largs, on the west coast of Scotland, just beyond Glasgow and Paisley.

Played upstairs at Victoria Hotel in Largs. Barely had any people there—Largs has a team in the Scottish Cup football, and the whole town had packed into buses over the weekend, gotten pissed and were not going to come out to hear folksingers on a Monday.f

After Tam and Sean showed us our rooms and we soundchecked (Tam offered three different whiskies at soundcheck), I took a walk along the beach. My first decent little stroll since Brighton. It’s a busy tour.

But there were two separate Allans who traveled in for the gig—one, Alan the younger, from Paisley—big music fan—the other, Allan the elder, in from Islay—yes, the island with a 500,000 pound yearly economy from single malt whisky—Allan the elder heard me on Bob Harris and was intrigued enough to take the ferry at 4:30 AM and get to the Victoria around 4:30 PM for the show. So at least there were folks passionate enough to go to some lengths to see us play. And we played well. There was some drama about our Edinburgh show, coming from booking agents and managers, but we shrugged it off and played it out. Got our rocks off, so to speak.

Pizza and whisky after the gig. A lot of pizza; not too much whisky. Tommy and I drifted off after a bit of ye olde Scottish internet surfing in the hotel room.

5/25

Up at 5:45 AM, in the car and rolling at 6:30. We are to be at BBC Western House in London by 4:30 this afternoon. But after we tape a Bob Harris segment, and we take the tube back out to our suburban hotel, we are off for the night. I hope there’s decent food out there. We are due for a good crash after 9 days of transcontinental flights, long drives and gigs every night. No one can say we aren’t working hard out here. Nor can anyone say we don’t love our work.

In Glasgow traffic. I’m thankful for Jeff’s driving. I’m in the backseat, pecking away at this keyboard. About to catch a little travel sleep.

We made it to BBC right on time, and taped a segment for Bob, who wasn’t there. He has an “Old Grey Whistle Test” CD just out and was appearing on Jools Holland Live in promotion of the album.

We ate Thai in Soho (Thai Cottage, just off Wardour St—excellent!), took the train back out to the hotel and crashed, utterly exhausted after the nonstop hubbub of the past 12 days.

5/26

Late checkout today; feel like I’m rested for the first time since two Sundays ago in Nashville. Drove down to Leytonstone, London, for our What’s Cookin’ gig here tonight. Sat around drinking tea (I admit I had one delicious Greene King Ale…) until we could get in the gig. Now we’re watching Steve the promoter set up the decorations for the gig (you should see how cool his set is!), and our friend Paul Needham just showed up. Tommy’s crashed. Steve and Paul are talking shop. The sun’s back out in London, and we have a show tonight.

We are bound for Leicester today, back home at The Musician! See you there.

DADDY in Brighton --- Nice Recording King guitar!

We played upstairs at the Prince Albert—a pub turned club smack in the middle of Brighton. It’s a lovely city. Very cool. Would love to spend some time there.

Met up with our driver and general tour mate for the next few shows, Jeff, last night. A welcome addition and a great guy. We’re already having fun and will continue to enjoy this trip.

The show last night was great. We played a lot of songs, had some fantastic guitar interplay, got to see some good friends and make some new ones.

See you in Swansea!

(thanks for the byline idea, Eric!)

Kimbroughs in Nashville were spared any damage.

I met my Gulf Coast kinfolk in New Orleans yesterday and we shared a fabulous meal at Mandina’s, all of us very aware that only a few years ago, the city and the restaurant were devastated by another storm, another flood, another agonizing wait for the government to fix things.

No water in Boston…bombs in New York and Pittsburgh, floods and tornados in the midsouth, oil spill on the coast. And yet I look out the window at the bluest sky and the greenest trees I have ever seen, thinking back on three great nights of making music among friends in Texas.

It’s all so good and bad. It’s all so much.