I'm into Something Good

It's not every Sunday night you get a living, breathing satellite of love.

Or a harp. Or vibes. Or a hot toddy-drinking chanteuse.

Tonight's show at Helen's followed a very late last night, outdoor brunch with an unlikely quintet and no chance to catch up on sleep before going out again.

You'd have thought the extra hour would have helped but it only gave me more time to be busy.

Things were just getting set up when I arrived to find a friend in his Halloween costume which included a gold sequined top and satellite panels for his arms.

I found it funny that he'd gone into Forever 21 looking for a shiny shirt and when they had none, a salesgirl had offered him one of her own if he'd come to her car to get it.

In a timely effort to memorialize Lou Reed, completing his Halloween costume was important enough to him to take clothing from a stranger.

Hence the satellite of love who greeted me.

First up was Fredericksburg's Nature Boy Explorer, a trio of guitar player, harpist and an accordion player in shorts despite the weather, all of whom sang.

Their songs covered quite the range - having a baby ("I didn't actually have a baby, but I helped make one"), formaldehyde and the Buena Vista concrete jesuses (jesi?) which can be seen, we were told, on Route 29 south

Favorite lyric: I just wanna say you have totally opened up my eyes.

During the interminable break while Philly's School Dance set up, a friend and I discussed the need for roving nacho servers once it get toward midnight (which felt like 1 a.m. tonight) and with another about going to other countries to dance with foreign men to assuage heartbreak.

School Dance was a duo; he played modified vibes (practically a xylophone, I was told) and drums while she played flower-bedecked keyboards and wore a crown of flowers.

As if that wasn't groovy enough, she began by telling us we needed to do the hand symbols along with the first song she was singing.

Immediately, a friend at the table announced, "I'm not doing those gestures," but she looked right at our table, so we were soon making hearts with our hand and sunshine gestures with our fingers.

After explaining that they had a sponsor and were required to sing that little ditty, they moved on to some electronic dream pop, heavy on interesting percussion.

I know I was moving in my seat and before long a couple got up from the bar and began dancing in the aisles. Another guy danced outside on the sidewalk while looking in through the window as the band played. It was hypnotically rhythmic.

When they finished, she thanked us because it was the first night of a very long tour and we'd been an attentive audience.

Hey, if you're lucky enough to have bands come through on a Sunday night, why would you not want to give them a listen?

That's a rhetorical question directed at the guys who kept chatting while they played.

During the break, I chatted with the father of a friend/half of the next duo, Transitones.

He was handsome (a friend said he looked like a classic Irishman with thick white hair and intent eyes) and chatty, so I used possibly my only chance to get some childhood dirt on my friend.

Dad was only too happy to share that, despite two other children, it wasn't until my friend started school that he got to know the school principal.

No surprise there. I'd have guessed he'd been defying authority since he was old enough to try.

Tonight he was on his best behavior, all dressed up in a shirt, tie and slacks, notable because in the four plus years I've known him, I've yet to see him in anything but jeans.

The Transitones took the candlelit stage with Christina from the Low Branches on vocals and Paul from countless bands on guitar to play a well-selected choice of covers from the past 70 years or so.

Given Christina's usual hushed vocals with the Low Branches, it was a pleasure to hear her coming on strong with songs like "I'm into Something Good," "Spanish Harlem" and "Stand By Me."

"We started this duo back in August," Christina explained in between songs, "to get in touch with better days past."

"And better days future," her bandmate piped up appropriately.

Paul had chosen some interesting people to cover - Roxy Music, Dusty Springfield- and his guitar playing was a worthy adversary for Christina's husky lyrics ("I won't let this cold get the best of me," she promised).

Dusty's "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me" segued beautifully into "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay," with some wisecracking during the whistling solo ("Help us out").

With the orange neon Helen's sign glowing in the background, they finished out their too-brief set with Ray Charles' "You Don't Know Me," sung so emotionally that Christina may as well have been pouring out her personal loneliness and heartbreak to the room.

For I never knew the art of making love
Though my heart aches with love for you
Afraid and shy, I let my chance go by
A chance that you might love me, too

The shiny satellite of love told me it was one of his top five songs.

I'd call that better days present, right here tonight, my friend. Only thing that could have made it better was roving nachos.