We all arrived at the same time, and I was surprised to see harmonica-wiz Cliff Ashmon pulling up in his blue Ford Explorer. Jeff had hired him to fill some vocal duties so Jeff could concentrate on guitarslinging. Bassist, Mickey Will, a tall, rotund man with a ebulliant manner and DJ voice, was refreshing and enthusiastic.

Everyone took a turn at the vocal duties, with Cliff soulfully handling the blues end of things. His wireless harmonica mike is his trademark and he used it to good effect as he strolled around the room visiting tables close up. It was a good crowd, too, with a better than usual 11 p.m. rush. I was pleased to see a couple of groups of 20-somethings stumble in, and stick around--hopefully the word will spread into that sector.

Jeff was tasty and dynamic, and coaxed a great tone out of his Matchless amp. We covered the standard blues band fare, but touched on the rock end of things a bit. I had told Jeff that we didn't have to stick with just the blues, like we did during the Gemini Pub days with Curtis Salgado and Paul deLay (we backed them as the house band for several weeks). So...how about the Tommy Tutone hit "867-5309" (?), or the Greg Kihn biggy, you know...well, I can't think of the title. We did 'em, and they rocked, actually, getting the best response of the evening out of the crowd, second only to Jeff's touching version of SRV's "Lenny."

One of the speaker cables for my ancient Sunn/Peavey PA failed toward the end of the second set, and although I had a good replacement for the offending cord, I managed to plug in the new cord and unplug the working one, thinking I was replacing the bad one. It was a Homer Simpson DUH moment... We finally got it straightened out in the third set with minimal damage to our attempted professionalism.

As the end of the night rolled around, we rocked it up with a Hendrix number and Chuck Berry. One audience table was particularly appreciative and led the noisy demand for an encore, which we obliged. Jeff is great fun to work with, and has a nicely bizarre sense of humour. He's been working with Drawback Slim doing some recording lately, and keeps himself available for freelance jump-in gigs.

Hope to see you down at Hopper's next Tuesday night, with Garry Meziere and Ellen Whyte!

Boyd