author's note: Okay, this is the last installment for that part of my Karaoke Summer Tour last year. Sorry I've been so delinquent on posting. Things have been pretty busy lately. Anyway, this last installment introduces you to the cast of characters at The Windjammer in Misquamicut, Connecticut. And it's pretty long (six pages, double spaced), so you might want to take it in small doses.
“What a fascinating experiment is man. So far advanced from our tree-dwelling ancestors, yet in so many ways, still living in those very branches. I wonder if Darwin would have changed some of his theories if he could see us now. After all, you can take the monkey out of the jungle…”
bh duk
I believe we met Scott and Arizona first. Scott and Arizona were a couple in their late thirties (maybe early forties) still holding true to the favorite times in their lives and who drove up from Connecticut every weekend in their VW bus with their two dogs for karaoke and camping.
Scott had been a rocker, his heyday probably in the Eighties. Sporting a semi-mullet thinning on the top, a goatee and a belly that confirmed that beer in middle age didn’t burn off as quickly, Scott had been in a handful of bands over the years, but now owned his own mobile karaoke set-up. He traveled with his own collection of karaoke CD’s. I’m pretty sure the first song he did was “Workin’ for the Weekend.” Maybe “Takin’ Care of Business,” but you get the idea.
Arizona was from, well… you guessed it, and we guessed that with her own performance past, it probably wasn’t her real name. If I were to venture another guess, from her age and obvious influences, Arizona had an older sister who was probably a hippy, and whom she held in high esteem, but Arizona grew up a little later. Accompanying the braids and thin dreds were streaks of various bright colored hair. Dressed (and appearing) younger than her years, Arizona was fun to watch, and a pleasure to listen to. She had the same performer’s intensity of Scott (again, Man Without a Band rings so true), but she had the skills to back it up. Scott was a little rougher around the edges.
In his defense, Arizona might have said that he’d had a cold, but she had quite a few good things to say about Scott. If there was one thing obvious, these two loved each other and enjoyed being together.
“Scott can be sick as a dog,” Arizona said at one point, “but show him a microphone and he’s all better.”
Another couple who seemed to enjoy each other, but in a more traditional male/female relationship were Paul and Tina. With appearances more clean cut than Scott and Arizona (even if in a more Eighties style), Paul and Tina spoke with that great Rhode Island/New England accent that I could listen to all day. I don’t remember how they earned a living, although I believe Paul was attempting painting or some similar artistic endeavor on the side. He gave me a card consisting solely of a picture of one of his prints. I think it was a horse… with strong tones of blue, I believe, but I’ve misplaced it.
What I do remember is that Tina loved karaoke, and that, out of support (or often a feeling that he needed to protect her), Paul came along.
“I don’t sing,” he said. And not like how some people will tell you they don’t sing because they’re shy, or that they don’t sing because they’re being modest. The feeling I got was that, while some people can be goaded into it with a few drinks, Paul had never even considered getting up on the stage.
But Tina sure did. With a voice capable of hitting the lower ranges, I especially remember her unexpectedly sultry rendition of Patsy Cline’s “Crazy.” I believe it was actually this performance that prompted Brenna and me to take an interest in the couple. Otherwise, as opposed to the standout appearances of Scott and Arizona, Paul and Tina would have blurred into the periphery with the rest of the Windjammer patrons. And that would’ve been a shame, because Tina knew her karaoke. She rambled off a list of the best places in the area, telling us why the Windjammer was “just okay” with their limited selection, which was better than many I’d seen, and their “decent” sound system. She lowered her voice when she told us about a bar in a neighboring town that had the best set up, “but it’s all blacks. And there’s not a single one of them that can’t sing. Paul doesn’t like me to go there, but if you get a chance, you two should go.”
I laughed, trying to picture this little white girl who looked like a cross between Laverne
and Shirley holding her own in a bar full of soul, and I wondered why she lowered her voice. There wasn’t a black person in sight. Maybe it was a sore point between her and Paul.
Conversation bounced back and forth between the six of us as the evening progressed, the focus changing as one or another would get up to perform. I spent a little time with Scott, perusing his personal collection of CD’s while Brenna talked with Arizona. At some point I got up and did a roughed-up version of Bob Seger’s “Night Moves” (I always forget about the higher parts in that one), then conversation resumed. Paul told me about his art while Tina performed a song. Couple more drinks. Groups rearranged again. Arizona asked me if Brenna and I were a couple while Scott sang another hard rock ballad. Brenna and I would regroup and share the information we’d learned about our new friends. It was great. This exemplified exactly the purpose of this trip (or at least as far as my accountant was concerned), and the timing couldn’t have been much better when my name was called to perform the song that got this whole crazy thing started in the first place. Did I tell you about the night at the Blue Kat in Cedar City, the guy with lip cancer who still came out every week to sing and play his harmonicas? I’ll have to check back and see.
“Pablo, you’re up next!” the DJ in black called over the microphone. I always use “Pablo.” It’s like a stage name for me. I dunno’ why, exactly. Maybe it gives me that extra bit of courage to get up on stage, get outside of myself, if only for a few minutes.
Arizona asked me which song I was doing as I took another drink from my Seven and Seven and stood up.
“Neil Diamond,” I said. “Holly Holy.”
“Oooh, I love that one,” she said. Tina chimed in to the same effect, and next thing you know, I had backup singers. And if you want to talk about feeling like a superstar, here is the moment, having the two best female singers in the house getting your back.
We stumbled at first (hey, we didn’t get to practice), getting about 30 seconds into the song before asking the DJ to start over. We were gonna’ do this one right. And do it right, we did. The girls were great, and I belted it out. This may have been the first time I had performed the song since that night in Utah, but I knew it was a new favorite and I let it all out. As a big Neil Diamond fan, I considered it a tribute to Neil to make it my own, my personal rendition coming out sounding like a little of the man himself mixed with Eddie Vedder, and maybe a more serious, soulful Jack Black (circa “High Fidelity”).
We finished up to much acclaim (or at least that’s how I remember it) as Jenna was called up to the stage.
Jenna and Matt. They were in love, too, but they expressed it in an entirely different manner. More of that “young lust” kind of love. From what I gathered, Jenna and Matt were still newlyweds, and this particular evening Matt had chosen to celebrate his birthday at the Windjammer with his new wife and his parents. In their mid-twenties at best, we had already seen some of Jenna and Matt this evening. For Matt it was a forgettable monotone performance with a few flashes of energy when he would hit the chorus and actually hit a note (am I a karaoke snob? It’s okay, you can tell me.). For Jenna, it was a strange display that she chose to put on for her new husband.
The deejay had announced that Jenna had something special for Matt. Or maybe I’m getting ahead of myself. Maybe it just started with a solo performance on the dance floor loosely dedicated to Matt, but in a way, for the benefit of all. A mix between a college dance squad routine and a, well… you know (“do they have any, umm,
clubs around here?” I asked Brenna.), it was an interesting few minutes of thumping bass/techno/something while she slid, snapped, whirled and grinded over the dance floor. Okay, a little strange, especially considering the fact that Matt’s relatively conservative parents were mixed up in the festivities, as well, but this was just the tit (oops, tip) of Jenna’s iceberg.
Cake entered the scene at some point in the evening. Matt center stage, holding it in his lap, while Jenna danced around him with a faux fur black stole. At some point the cake ended up on the floor, maybe she moved it for easier access to his lap. Next thing you know there’s a foot in it by mistake, then somebody belly flops on top of it, and as good natured chaos ensues, I’m reminded of the table slide from the first karaoke night of this whole crazy trip almost a month earlier.
[Footnote: the swamper who came out to mop up the mess was a young kid, also probably in his early twenties. Wearing a spotted white tee-shirt and jeans damp from the tasks of keeping a bar clean and apparently known around these parts as the “K Master,” he appeared on stage a couple times later in the evening with his dish rag slung over one shoulder as he rapped some of the latest hits, including an impressive Eminem.]
By the time Jenna performs the Divinyl’s “I Touch Myself,” complete with a soft-porn-esque physical interpretation of the lyrics, no one is especially surprised… okay, I was still a little surprised she was putting on this show with Matt’s parents in attendance, but even they seemed completely at home, stepping into the entryway between the pool tables and the main bar to watch for a moment before returning to their game (although Dad lingered a moment longer), and I wonder what conversations are going on behind closed doors. I dated an exotic dancer a few years back, but, while my parents wouldn’t have necessarily been surprised to hear this fact, I never told them what she did for a living. Not to say that Jenna was a stripper. Maybe she just took one of those classes for women that I’ve been hearing about. It’s empowering, I guess.
Anyway (in other words-“To skip past the minutia which I probably wouldn’t remember correctly anyway,”), it was a helluva’ evening overall. While I had more songs turned in, I don’t think I performed again. Probably for the best. Leave ‘em with a high note. Definitely a good thing they didn’t call me up for “Purple Rain.” I’ve tried it since my performance in the Chinese karaoke bar in Honolulu without nearly the quality I believed I possessed in Hawaii.
As things wound down, Arizona tried to convince us that we should come back the next day for karaoke on the beach, but, much as it sounded like a good time, I didn’t anticipate seeing them again. Farewells were made, last drinks finished, and Brenna and I exited the Windjammer. We spotted Scott and Arizona in their bus, sitting in the parking lot with two dogs obviously excited to see them (for some reason, I want to say that they were Bassett Hounds. Funny image, eh?), probably rolling up a little nightcap. I wondered where their paths would trail off to on this particular evening and was tempted to suggest to Brenna that we ask, but instead (and possibly wisely) I raised a hand to them and wished them well as we continued across the asphalt to Brenna’s Honda, and back to the beach house.
So while I'm at it, this picture from Colonial Williamsburg (the hottest day of our trip to the East Coast Last July) makes me laugh. 
