Barely Legal Bona Fide Human Beings

Okay, Byrd Park Roundhouse, get your act together.

When I attended my first show there a few weeks ago, I showed up at 7 because that was the time on the Facebook event page. But upon arriving, a sandwich board announced that the doors actually opened at 7:30 and music wasn't until 8. The change was an excuse to walk around the lake on a beautiful evening, so no big deal.

But needless to say, when I made plans to go hear the Hot Seats at the Roundhouse tonight, I knew enough to arrive just before 8:00. Stopped at a  traffic light on the way over, I saw a plane fly directly under the bottom of the nearly full moon, leaving a vapor trail that looked like it provided a ledge for the moon to sit on.

I took it as a good omen for the evening.

Walking from where I parked toward the Roundhouse, I saw young families scattered around the lawn outside the Roundhouse's open door, kids scampering as parents listed to the music.

All of a sudden, I could hear that the band had started, a bit of a surprise since it wasn't yet 8.

Walking in, money in hand, the guy at the door looks apologetic. "I think they're about to finish up their set," he explained. "But maybe if you let them see you putting money in, they'll play a little longer."

Glancing over at bandleader Josh, whom I've known for years, I made an exaggerated motion with my arm, bringing it up and over my head to deposit the cash, which, incidentally, all goes to the band, and smiled broadly.

"You just got us a few more songs, I think," the door guy whispered with a grin before I found a seat in the back row. It wasn't a big crowd, but they were mighty and clearly fans of bluegrass and new grass and everything the talented Hot Seats - guitar, upright bass, fiddle, mandolin and occasionally banjo played by a woman otherwise seated in the front row - were serving up.

I'm sure if I'd been there when the show began, I'd know who she was.

The first full song I heard was "Compliance," an original song Josh said was about "someone having their foot on your throat and asking if you mind if they kick you." Who doesn't like fast-pickin' with major attitude in the lyrics?

"We're the Hot Seats, in case I didn't mention it and we've been around a while," Josh said to laughter. "It's our eighteenth birthday as a band, which makes us barely legal."

There was another original song, during which a Dad came in with his two young girls and headed toward the bathrooms, the kids never even turning to look at the four men vigorously making music as they passed by. It made me a little sad considering the volume and the energy and their complete indifference to both.

After a song about "being bona fide human beings," Josh promised, tongue firmly in cheek, that they would "keep the uplifting songs going." Then they launched into another of his songs, this one called "When You Were Young," which he says he wrote to remind himself not to be so crotchety.

When you were young
Things were fun
You used to like things
It was exciting

After reminding his bandmates they were moving into songs in the key of A, the did a nice little murder ballad called "Willow Garden." When you're listening to a good murder ballad, it's hard not to appreciate a setting as lovely as tonight's: windows open to the park, the sunset sliding behind the trees, humidity so low as to be imperceptible (which means I had to wear leggings so I wouldn't be cold).

Practically perfect except for the absence of company.

Even Josh couldn't help but commenting on our surroundings, announcing that he'd been married in the Roundhouse, "Thirteen years ago? Fourteen? I should know, shouldn't I?" All I'm saying about that is, I'd bet his wife knows how many years it's been.

Part of the beauty of the Hot Seats is hearing multiple voices harmonizing, but also hearing an occasional plaintive lead vocal by the fiddle player.

They were doing a song about a rattletrap van not known for starting with certainty or frequency when two women arrived and sat down in the row in front of me. I wondered if they'd gotten the same warning that I had, that the show was about to wind down.

When that song ended, that was it and people began heading out after a reminder from Josh about future Roundhouse shows. Curious about why the show had started so early, I stopped to ask the table guy and he explained that all the shows there are supposed to start at 7 sharp. Since I'd only been to one previously and it had started at 8, I'd made an erroneous assumption, I told him

Standing nearby was a couple who joined our conversation to say that they'd done the same thing after the Luray show. "We'd have been much earlier if we'd known it was really starting at 7," she said. Finally, witnesses to back up my story.

Finally fully armed with the correct information about future shows, I headed out, only to run into Josh, who gestured at the moon and observed that it was nearly full. When I told him about seeing the plane appearing to shave off the bottom of it earlier, he joked, "Oh, that's why it's missing that little part at the bottom." Who doesn't appreciate a clever musician?

Making my way to my car, I heard the distinctive strains of "Downtown," a song I love, so I stood by my car to finish listening to it. I couldn't tell where it was coming from because it was starting to get dark and the trees obliterated the source of the sound. Probably just somebody's boombox.

If I'd had any sense, I would have followed the music because as soon as I got home, I saw that a friend was at opening night of Dogwood Dell and the English Beat - purveyors of Brit pop, rock and prog from the '60s and '70s - were playing the night away.

I'd been within spitting distance of the amphitheater and not had a clue. So if they played my Petula Clark favorite, "Don't Sleep in the Subway, Darling," I'd rather not know about it.

I don't want to sound crotchety, but I hate missing out on double fun.