Christmas in July

July 5th in New York is a little like Christmas day except instead of everyone being at home with their families, they are in bed nursing their hangovers. Christmas cold keeps everyone home to snuggle and yesterdays glaring, beating sunshine kept headaches and fear of sudden death behind shady, air-conditioned curtains. Alas, not Tin Pan.

We finally decided to take Barry up on his offer to have us play in front of the FSC Barber Shop on Horatio Street in the West Village. He saw us performing at Café Moto and immediately proposed the idea. I got there early to case the joint again and was dismayed to find so much bright, bright sunshine and no shelter. Also, very few people on the street. My expectations were quite low. Inside the shop, however, everyone was so friendly, cool, dapper and encouraging that it made it really hard to just show up and then put the kibosh on the whole affair. By 1:45pm we had begun to play.

From our first song we were stopping traffic. Literally: a cabbie had stopped at the red light directly in front of us and was so transfixed that he needed a honking car behind him to nudge him into drive. A crowd gathered across the street within 60 seconds. For our perspective, it was very surreal. We were squinting, lazy, hot, and instantly weary and the music was sloppy, silly, loopy, and loose. But I forget the simple power of performing as much as we do. As soon as we begin, something magnetic is happening regardless of our mood.

In a word, it was a scene.

We hammered through the sun for about two or three hours and then needed much re-hydration. But again, the folks at FSC were so wonderful, encouraging and generous that we will go out of our way to make it back there at some point. I asked Barry what he had hoped for from our appearance and he had a great answer. He said that the barber shop didn’t need the business, they were doing just fine. So it wasn’t a promotional thing for him. It was just that the vibe of the band and the vibe of the barber shop seemed to be a good fit and he thought it would be fun! And there you have it. Mission Accomplished! See you soon, Barry.