Get On the Right Thing

The invitation promised wistful, haunting, hip, exotic and playful.

Aspiring to all those things, I invited a friend to meet me for dinner and the show. Perfect, she said.

Planning to park once and party twice, I chose Aziza's for dinner, knowing how fond she is of the pizza.

Come to think of it, who isn't?

We were the first people in and took the table in the front window, which lasted just as long as it took for the sun to make a greenhouse of the restaurant's glass.

Wine (procured after she was carded at 35) and menus in hand, we moved to a shadier table, and no longer limp from the heat, the music caught my ear - early McCartney, so early my friend didn't even recognize it.

But then it was "Beth" by Kiss and you better believe she loved that. I was all about the Spinners' "Rubberband Man." Then Fleetwood Mac's "Say You Love Me." The O'Jays' "For the Love of Money."

Boston. Earth, Wind and Fire. Elton John.

I'm embarrassed to say we couldn't imagine what the starting point had been for the station, so we had to ask.

Duh. It was as simple as, ta-da, the seventies! Hunger had clearly dulled our brains.

Pizza took care of that - hers a margherita and mine a white with pancetta - as we discussed discos, Dallas versus Chicago (no contest) and how much her Mom had liked Wham! in the '80s.

By the time we finished gabbing and munching (I had a pile of pizza bones stacked high on my plate), we needed to hurry down the block to Globehopper or risk not getting a seat.

We snuck in the back door so we could score wine and sweets,only to find a rapidly growing crowd filling the little coffee shop from the front and back.

I saw plenty of familiar faces, including the J-Ward neighbors who had been kind enough to save us seats at the front table, and after buying a Rice Krispie treat to put the sweet ending to our dinner, we joined them up front.

My neighbor told a funny story of offering to make any dessert for her daughter's date and his request surprised the heck out of her - Rice Krispies treats.

We all have our soft spots (or chewy spots, as the case may be)/

Playing first was Uc (which means 3 in Turkish, a reference to the number of members) doing traditional Turkish music with guitar, drums and lute.

Actually, I didn't know it was a lute but my dinner date took a picture and sent it to her husband who supplied the answer.

Technology, satisfying curiosity 24/7.

I found myself taken by the traditional dance songs they played from western Turkey and influenced by Bulgaria. Before long, a woman stood up and began dancing, her long, tiered skirt sailing around her legs as she twirled and shimmied.

My friend turned to me. "I would have to be so drunk to do that."

On the following song, another woman got up and danced fluidly, an incongruous sight when a pack of people on Segways breezed by the big windows behind the band.

Toward the end of her dance, she danced over to a man at the bar and kissed him, so we're assuming they knew each other.

Either that, or Turkey is a far friendlier country than I ever realized.

When the woman stopped dancing while the music was still being played, the band wound the song down immediately.

"Why play when they stop dancing?" the lute player asked rhetorically. He had already explained to us that most of the dance songs had no real names; they were just referred to as "dance song from XYZ."

For the last song, the lute player switched to drum and with two drums and guitar, finished their set with a percussive flourish.

During the break, two teachers (and members of the crew of the Lady Slipper batteau team) joined our table for a spirited discussion of public education and a new charter school in Chesterfield County for girls, where one of them will teach.

By then, Globehopper was so overflowing with humanity that I feel safe in saying the fire marshall would have shut it down.

After working on tech issues with the sound system, Yeni Nostalji, a band that plays vintage Turkish pop classics from the '60s and '70s, was ready.

Although I've seen them several times now, tonight was the first night as a quintet with the addition of Rei on drums and Marlysse on keys.

Announcing that they'd begin their set with a pop song from Istanbul, guitar player Evrim explained, "Everyone wants a piece of this song because it's so beautiful. Like our vocalist, Christina."

That would be corny except it's absolutely true and she looked perfectly lovely tonight in a green lace top and fitted black skirt, her long, dark hair framing her face.

"We are here for your listening pleasure," Evrim said as Marlysse put on sunglasses, upping her cool factor even more. Tim the bass player, ever the pro, just smiled widely.

The sound system was giving them feedback problems and Christina inched toward the front door, announcing she was taking her mic and moving as far from the band as possible.

"Because I forgot deodorant," Evrim joked. "Like most Turkish men."

Major laughter.

Giving us a hint at the lyrics, Christina said, "Turning, the whole world is turning, except you back to me," before singing it in Turkish, a song that had all the emotional drama of a Petula Clark classic like "Kiss Me Goodbye."

But so did all the songs, which Christina worked dramatically with hand gestures and such dynamics in her voice, so unlike her hushed, understated delivery in her other band, Low Branches.

For the three friends with me who'd never seen her in this band, it was a revelation to see her so animated and assertive in her singing.

Evrim joined her, trading vocals and dueting with her, while also providing the comic relief between songs.

"A man goes to get his palm read and the reader wants to see her line on his hand, but it's not there," he said explaining lyrics for the upcoming song and then paused. "Oh, no, I gave it away."

Christina dedicated a song to Evrim's baba (father), saying, "He played guitar on the recording of this song from the '60s. He's not here tonight, he's in Turkey."

"If he were here, he'd be weeping," Evrim said.

There was one song where Christina read the entire lyric in English before singing it, beginning with, "I wish I were drunk to forget you for a second," and then launching into the song.

Midway through, Evrim called out to the capacity crowd, "Raise your glass if you got 'em!" and practically all of us did.

The music was fabulous, the band's sound so much fuller with the two additional musicians and about the only thing I'd have changed about the evening would have been to dim the lights and put candles on all the tables, as if we were in some subterranean Turkish club circa 1966.

You know, some place haunting, hip and exotic. Everyone would want a piece of that, especially me.