The Bum Raps and the Dirty Water Choir at Sombrero Bohemia 8-13-26 and the Unwieldies at Salt Road Brewery 8-16-26 (Fort Collins)

 

I was in serious need of a break so we picked a weekend that we didn't have anything pressing, contacted our friends Rob'n'Dani and they were good enough to put us up in Ft Collins for a long weekend despite the fact that they already had two gigs planned! Good friends are hard to come by!

Since moving to Ft Collins, this productive couple has been hosting monthly shows (outside of the winter months) in their spacious backyard, dubbing it Sombrero Bohemia. These are always well attended and while their own projects will play, they also host local and touring combos. We miss this energy in Las Vegas!

We got to their place just in time to watch Rob set up the scene, grab a quick bite and watch one of the first shows for his new band with guitarist Eric Straumanis, the Bum Raps. In this configuration they are (mostly? I didn't take notes, so don't remember everything) playing obscure songs from the Psyatics, interpreted in a new, fun way. Eric is a terrific guitarist who adds his own sound'n'licks to the tunes, giving them a fresh feel. I'm a big fan of pretty much everything that Rob has done, but even so, this was extremely cool! They are looking for a percussionist so it will be interesting to see where this leads, but it was a great beginning!

Also on the bill was the Dirty Water Choir, a New Orleans-styled combo with floating membership, led by on DW (hence the "dirty water", I assume) on guitar and vocals, backed by a lead guitarist, banjo, standup bassist and two gents playing various horns. A bit reminiscent of Soda and his Million Piece Band, along with the NO influences and, of course, their own touches. Even with a bit of rain that turned torrential for a while (apparently every show here has at least a chance of rain), most of the audience hung in for the sounds and continued to dance the night away. Super fun night despite the weather! At least it was still nicely warm!

On the Sunday, the Unwieldies (featuring both Rob'n'Dani, natch) were scheduled to play Salt Road Brewing (one of many local breweries in the area) and their new-ish violinist couldn't make it so they asked the Bum Raps' Eric along with myself to sit in on a few songs, while they did the rest on their own. They pulled out songs that they hadn't played for a while from their various albums, along with a number of cover tunes. 

I got to sit in on acoustic slide guitar on a couple of songs that Rob'n'I played together in the Gentlemen of Four Outs, as well as a couple of covers ("Everybody Knows" and "More Than This") along with two of my favorite Un's numbers, "Grim Hymns" and "Strange New Weakness". Eric did an incredible job with literally no rehearsals on several originals, a country-fied "Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" and "Dance Me Til the End of Time" and we both jammed on their unique version of "The Thrill is Gone".

It was a super relaxed atmosphere with plenty of jokes'n'banter'n'stories, some great originals and other covers from "Billie Jean" to a super powerful "Which Side Are You On" - though, of course, Ft Collins is pretty darn liberal, so I'm sure most everyone there were on the correct side!

No joke, I was honored to get to play with my talented friends and meet some more of their pals and it was terrific to get a feel for FoCo! If you are ever in the area, look up these combos for some great music!