Back to Mac

Despite a high of 94 degrees, it turned out to be a day for standing on the pavement.

When I set out on my walk, it was with the intention of beginning at the dedication of the Maggie Walker statue right here in Jackson Ward. When I saw the size of the crowd standing in the middle of Broad Street, I adjusted the plan.

After a walk to the river, I returned via Broad Street so I could witness the new sculpture after all the speechifying was over, snagging a fan from my favorite R & B record store, Barky's Spiritual Store, en route.

There were still plenty of folks milling around on the new plaza, but at least I could get a good look for the first time at Miss Maggie in her new Arts District digs. I'll tell you what, it certainly is refreshing to see a statue of a woman of note for a change, and even better, a woman of color.

Welcome to the 21st century, Richmond.

The second highlight of the day was being reunited with Mac after 4 long weeks of not seeing her smiling face. Life - good and bad - had intervened for both of us and I couldn't wait to spend the evening with her.

She'd chosen Dinamo (and gotten no argument from me) for dinner but we arrived half an hour before they opened, so we took advantage of 821 Cafe's empty patio to sit down on mod-looking furniture and pour out our stories from the past 28 days.

Talking to her again just reminded me how much I'd missed her company and our ongoing conversation.

Promptly at 5:30, we followed another couple into Dinamo's cool environs and chose seats at the bar behind the espresso machine. Life was good. If not for the table that came in next with 3 caterwauling children, it might have been great.

But of course the food made up for it all, from my special of crab, shrimp and corn chowder to a platter-sized flatbread with artichoke hearts and chick peas to double desserts - fresh sliced peaches and a mound of freshly whipped cream the size of a grapefruit and a Nutella cookie with sea salt that I dipped in the whipped cream.

We rolled out of there full as ticks so that we could go stand in a parking lot under the still brutal sun, something we'd only consider if the Purple One was involved.

As it happened, he was because the Trunk Show Band was presenting the tenth and latest installment of the Cover to Cover series and tonight's album was "Purple Rain."

And unlike the last nine in the series, all of which I've attended and loved, tonight's was being presented not in the hop-scented tasting room that makes me gag, but on an outdoor stage, the better to sweat to the funk.

Host Matt kicked things off onstage by announcing, "Some of you gave my outfit some looks as I was walking through the crowd like you didn't know you were going to a Prince show. I'm just going to go ahead and tell you I look fabulous." He wasn't lying.

After some applause and hollering, he went on, "I thought we got over that gender normative dressing in the '70s!"

We did. I was there. But tonight's crowd was enormous and unfortunately, some people didn't get the memo. On the plus side, just like at the two Prince shows I'd attended in the '90s, the crowd was satisfyingly diverse, a nice change for Hardywood.

Major props go to the band who began with a mixtape selection of one song from each of the nine albums they've already covered - songs like Green Day's "Basket Case,"  Amy Winehouse's "Back to Black," Paul Simon's"Graceland" and Maggie doing a terrific version of Alanis Morissette's "Hand in Pocket" - a lovely memory for those of us who'd been there and undoubtedly a cruel tease for those who'd missed those stellar shows.

Oh, well, keep up or miss out, kids.

During the break, I turned to see Foto Boy coming at me with open arms and we took a hot minute to catch up since it had been ages since our last lunch. A favorite theater lover stopped by for a hug and to get a recommendation (I sent him directly to "The Toxic Avenger") of what I'd seen that qualified as fabulous lately.

Where the crowd appropriately lost it was when the band, complete with two drummers and two guitarists, began "Let's Go Crazy." I mean, it was practically a directive. Also, it was the start of a two-hour dance party that barely left room to breathe.

"I don't know if it's the reverb or what, but y'all are making us feel like rock stars!" Matt enthused after that song ended. After "The Beautiful Ones," he called out, "Y'all should be dancing if you're not."

Please. Mac and I had started moving with the first notes. After all, this wasn't our first trunk show rodeo.

Apparently it was for the drunk guy who blocked my view of guitarist Grant (not to mention his superb guitar playing and great haircut) by  planting himself smack in front of me (a slight jab to the back moved him closer to his date and out of my way), at least until he began bobbing and weaving leaving his date to begin supporting him.

After sending him off to the bathroom, she leaned over and asked if I would recommend a restaurant nearby where he could soak up the copious amounts of beer he'd ingested. I suggested Supper and an Uber (he was from North Carolina and her car was back at his hotel) and wished her good luck.

"Do they have burgers?" she asked, sounding desperate. Yes, now go, please, so Mac and I can grind to Todd singing "Darling Nikki."

An extended version of "I Would Die for You" with Anthony singing lead became a crowd singalong and midway through, a breeze arrived to take it into sublime territory.

"Purple Rain" got the royal treatment with three vocalists and Maggie and Ali using wands to blow bubbles over the sweaty crowd, many of whom used their cell phones as flashlights subbing for Bic lighters to wave overhead.

It was over too soon.

Anticipating just that, the Trunk Show Band had rehearsed a few hits for a final set: "Kiss," "Raspberry Beret," my favorite, the masterfully metaphoric "Little Red Corvette" and then the inevitable crowd-pleaser, "1999," coincidentally the year the baby-faced bass player Pete was born.

But because the crowd was now at fever pitch, they couldn't end it there and, as Cover to Cover tradition dictates (and I've come to count on since that very first show), they did a reprise of "Purple Rain," complete with more bubbles as Mac and I basked in the purple glow.

I don't know if it was the reverb but, hot summer day or not, some shows are worth dancing on the pavement for.

Especially now that Mac is back in town.

Love Is Careless in its Choosing

It's a swell life I have.

As I'm sitting on Hermitage Road en route to Hardywood, the evening sun inching toward setting on my left, a ridiculously long freight train crossing in front of me and Chakha Khan belting out "Through the Fire" at all-windows-open top volume, I am reminded of that fact yet again.

At the last minute I'd found out that tonight was Cover to Cover and that the Trunk Show band was doing "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars" and decided it would be just disrespectful not to give the Thin White Duke my attention.

In no time, I made the acquaintance of a young women originally from Michigan after complimenting her gorgeous blond curly hair. "Yea, it's the best part of genetics," she said, both of us glowing from the warmth of the tap room.

Currently on a four-year post as a political scheduler in Richmond, she admitted to still getting to know the city, which made it all the more surprising that she'd found out about C2C.

"I was in Halcyon this afternoon and overheard someone talking about it and decided I definitely needed to come," she said. Turns out she'd done theater back in Michigan, leading to a comparison of which shows we'd both seen.

When Trunk Show took the stage, I pointed at guitarist Grant in a white short and vest and asked her if he was cute. "Well, he's got a guitar in front of him," she said rhetorically. "But, yes, he's definitely cute."

Then it was showtime. Matt, clad in synthetics with a blazer on top, yelled, "I'm really hot...in more ways than one!" and the show was off and running. When he got to the "I'm a space invader" lyric during "Moonage Daydream," the blazer was thrown off to reveal a symphony in Spandex: a backless, deep-cut purple top and silver skin-tight pants.

A few notes into "Starman," my young Michigan friend turns and grins, saying, "This is one of my very favorite Bowie songs!" Nearby, practically every middle-aged guy was singing along to every word.

Matt, on the other hand, only once forgot the lyrics all evening.

"This backless thing is great in a building that's 90,000 degrees, but the fabric just doesn't breathe!" Matt lamented from stage before going on to explain to the room (and especially newbies like Michigan) that the whole idea of Cover to Cover is to "bring back the idea of the album as a story meant to be heard start to finish, as opposed to his generation's habit of hearing one song out of context and never exploring the rest of the album at all.

Hey, he said it, I'm just seconding that notion.

But it wasn't just the Matt show and stellar vocalists Ali and Maggie (she's the brilliant one who came up with the C2C idea - it's always a woman, isn't it, with the best ideas?) were welcomed to the stage to sing lead in their appropriately glammy ensembles while the rest of us danced in the sweaty tap room to every song.

In the spirit of Matt's admonition, I followed Bowie with an evening of record-listening at Holmes' man cave, drinking "good swill," as he puts it (Graham Beck Brut Rose and French champagne Beloved had planned to save for her birthday) while grooving to "Ricky Nelson Live at the Troubadour," Joni Mitchell's "For the Roses" (after the third time Beloved and I replaced the needle on the start of "You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio," Holmes cut off our needle privileges) and "Court and Spark" and "The Best of Spirit," which reeked of the late 1960s.

But it was Holmes' extensive Neil Young collection that yielded the new-to-me "This Note's for You," a 1988 record by Neil Young and the Bluenotes (which couldn't have pleased Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes) that not only had a horn section, but pulled from the same influences as Stray Cats.

Who knew Neil ever went in this direction? Certainly not me.

Throughout the night, Holmes would spontaneously announce, "Everybody dance!" and everybody did. We were having such a great time that the only reason I left at 1 a.m. was because I knew I had to be up early.

When I got home, my downstairs neighbor was on his porch, contemplating the thunderstorm rolling in, smoking a cigarette and curious about where I'd been. When I told him I'd gone to a show followed by a friend's house to listen to records and talk, he sat up in attention.

"That's so cool that you do that kind of stuff!" he enthused. Do what, have a life? "No, that's more than a life. That you intentionally listen to music with friends and talk about it. I feel like the people I know never do that. No one I know actively listens to music."

To be clear, he graduated from VCU two weeks ago and is a practicing musician and this is his reality, that people can't be bothered to really listen to music, much less discuss it.

Being a millennial must suck in so many ways.

After five minutes of shared storm watching and lifestyle discussion, I bid him goodnight, intent on getting to bed so I'd be up early enough to catch the first hour of Broad Appetit. And, unlike Holmes who cracked me up earlier by deadpanning, "I like to have secure premises when I retire," I closed not a single window before sliding between the sheets

I was not only up, I met my date on the street, so eager was I to eat and escape quickly.

Even at 11:02, Broad Street was alive with people pushing strollers, walking dogs and making the loop in search of the best small plates. Unfortunately, this year's event had a far greater amount of fair-type vendors shoulder to shoulder with local restaurants, but really just taking up valuable space, in my opinion.

In one hour, we ate the equivalent of brunch: Lucy's meatloaf over cornbread and bacon-wrapped chicken with ranch dressing, Amour's duck crepes, potato pancake with applesauce and chocolate crepes with fleur de sel, Maple and Pine's short rib shortcake with mushroom ragout and quinoa salad with avocado mousse over an heirloom tomato, Castanea's paella and Lehja's butter chicken over rice and my favorite, an edamame and avocado chaat.

Just as good as the food I ate was the weather, which maintained a mostly comfortable cloudy overhang the whole hour we strolled the circuit. Only once we headed away from the increasing crowds did the sun make a concerted effort to come out.

It's only 12:03 and the whole day and evening is still ahead of me. Yep, my life is truly swell.

Under African Skies

I'm always thrilled with the cosmos when real life dovetails with what I'm reading.

For the past week or so, it's been Ralph Abernathy's autobiography, "And the Walls Came Tumbling Down," an absorbing memoir of the Civil Rights struggle told by one of the major players. Even his godliness (he was, after all, a man of the cloth), such a stark contrast to my raving heathenism, comes across as just part of who he had to be to accomplish what they did.

So imagine how thrilled I was when I saw that the Southern Film Festival's final offering of the weekend was the documentary, "We Shall Overcome" about the song that was the de facto anthem of the movement.

What I didn't know until I got to the Grace Street theater was that a Civil Rights activist would speak beforehand. Man, I get lucky sometimes.

Although I'd never heard of Joan Trumpauer Mullholland, I only had to hear that she'd been a frequent participant in sit-ins and a Freedom Rider to be completely intrigued by everything she had to say. In a testament to the time, because she had been white and southern, her sanity had been called into question for her activism.

Today she showed off her t-shirt commemorating the 50th anniversary of SNCC, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and spoke about her years working for the movement. Despite that I'd been reading about people just like her, I'd never expected to hear from one.

Narrated by Harry Belafonte, the 1989 documentary told the story of the iconic song and its place in the movement through interviews with everyone who mattered: Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, Peter, Paul and Mary, to name a few, plus singer Guy Carawan, apparently a major figure whom I'd never even heard of.

While I'd known the song had originally been a black spiritual, I'd had no clue it had been adopted by the labor movement in the '40s, long before the Civil Rights movement picked it up and carried it forward. Since then, it's been used for movements all over the world, including the woman's movement, and in Ireland, Korea and South Africa. Desmond Tutu spoke in the film of its power in the anti-apartheid movement.

Someone said it was the glue that held movements together, a way for disparate groups to recognize their connectedness.

Best of all were the myriad versions we got to hear: Peter, Paul and Mary's, Pete Seeger's, the Freedom Singers performing it in the '80s, the finale of the 1963 Newport Folk Festival with an all-star cast, Taj Mahal, who said he'd learned the song from his mother as "I'll Be Alright Someday" and, as is only fitting, Joan Baez - the woman who'd sung it at the March on Washington.

Needless to say, this was all pretty wonderful and hugely compelling to me because of the book I'm reading. But, wait, it gets better.

After the film, we were treated to a performance by the VCU Black Awakening Choir, a group that probably numbered 60 or 70 black-clad college students plus a three-piece band.

They sang "O, Happy Day" and I'm not exaggerating to say that when they all lifted their voices to the rafters, I felt goosebumps. The sound produced by that many talented voices was soul-stirring even for a non-believer.

I don't think the Southern Film Festival could have ended on a higher note.

So where do I go from there? Straight to Hardywood, of course, for the sixth installment of the Cover to Cover series. In what I choose to see as yet another tenuously connected thread, they were covering Paul Simon's "Graceland," the album that exposed American pop culture to African music.

Such an ambitious album had not only been the original inspiration for the C2C series but necessarily required a bigger band than usual. Tonight's group of musicians included horns, accordion and an extra guitar player. They even had a gospel choir, albeit of 7 rather than the 70 I'd just heard.

"Who's a Paul Simon fan?" organizer and lead singer Matt asked the beer-drinking crowd and a roar went up in affirmation. "We are, too. Wish us luck!" Then they were off, and by they, I mean that crack band and choir with Matt and Maggie on vocals.

"These are the days..." Matt began singing and the room exploded with the energy of "The Boy in the Bubble." Around me, people sang along and those who didn't were dancing.

"Graceland" got the choir onstage for the first time, causing Matt to note, "The stage just got a lot more good-looking." They left when Maggie got singing (rapping?) rights for "Gumboots," saying afterwards, "I love Paul Simon. He just had to tell that story."

Behind the music, Cover to Cover version.

The choir was back for "Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes" and Maggie used the opportunity to sit down in front of the choir and give her soles a rest while they belted it out.

Directly in front of me, a girl sang every word, usually directly in her boyfriend's face and danced non-stop. During a pause between songs, she looked at him and sighed, "I'm gonna cry! This is so great!"

Cover to Cover tends to inspire fanaticism, I'm telling you.

During "You Can Call Me Al," I saw lots of people singing the familiar chorus to each other but everyone was amazed when choir member Anthony Smith pulled out a penny whistle for the distinctive solo. The audience went nuts for it; ditto the brief but muscular bass solo.

When the song finished, Matt gave three big snaps up and down. "Y'all weren't expecting a whistle were you? You thought, there won't be a whistle, but there was!"

He was right, it was pretty spectacular.

They pulled out the tambourine and accordion for, as Matt put it, a trip to New Orleans and "That Was Your Mother," taking me back to the Big Easy of this morning's "King Creole," except not in black and white.

By then, it was so hot in the brewery that if your arm or leg touched someone else's while dancing, you were likely to stick together. Matt and Maggie looked just this side of soaked in sweat by the time they finished the album.

After a ten-minute break, the band returned for some Paul Simon favorites such as "Cecelia" and "Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard," with Matt noting, "I'm really more of a Garfunckle based on my look," no doubt referring to the blond curly locks falling in his eyes as he danced and sang all night.

Saying they were going to slow things down and do Matt's favorite Paul Simon song, we got "The Only Living Boy in New York," which was enough to get the millennials motivated to pull out their cell phones in place of Bic lighters to hold up and sway. So post-modern.

Then because it's become an unwritten rule that they always repeat one song from the evening's album during the encore, we heard "You Can Call Me Al" again and the night was complete. And completely wonderful.

"For those of you who've never been to a Cover to Cover before, that's what it is," Matt said to close out the night. Say goodnight, Maggie.

I've been to all six and they continue to be as fabulously impressive as (geek alert) having the pages of the book you're reading cross over to real life. Oh, happy day...and night.

Covers and Cocktails

If you were from Atlanta, you'd be mighty impressed with my evening.

It started at Hardywood for Cover to Cover: Back to Black, a performance of Amy Winehouse's music. What you have to understand is that I was never a big Amy fan, more of an appreciator of her talent. Unlike the performers involved, I certainly didn't know most of her material.

But that's why you go.

Host Matt Shofner began by high-fiving the band, an appropriate move given how talented these guys are, before calling up Carolyn Meade - nailing it in a sleeveless yellow dress, red belt an shoes and red head scarf over long beehive brunette hair.

If possible, her voice was even more spot-on that her ensemble.

Within two songs, she'd turned that brewery into a jazz club by singing the first two songs off Amy's Frank album (the one that references Frank Sinatra), nailing the singer and the song.

Midway through the first set, the heavens opened up and rain came down, causing Matt to say, "Hopefully, this rain will cool things off or at least not steam things up," before  removing his loafers and donning a pair of very high-heeled red pumps ("Any chance to get into pumps, I take it. I'm short, that's the only reason) to sing "F*ck Me Pumps."

Fabulous as Matt's version of the song was, it was rocking the world of the two hatted bros in front of me, who proceeded to look dumbfounded at each other, snap pictures and try to prove that they weren't staring, but staring repeatedly.

As the troupe of actors moved through the album, the trumpet player joined them late. "That's how you do it, you just walk onstage and a do a trumpet solo," Carolyn said of the less than punctual horn player.

The absolute funniest moment of the entire show was when Matt got up there to explain what was going on. "These Cover to Cover shows are a chance to introduce you people to the people who are actors in this town doing live theater like this in actual live theaters. It's a way to let you know that Richmond has an amazing theater scene."

It was like those disturbing "human zoos" that the British had in past centuries where they "exhibited" Africans as some rare species. What he was telling the beer-soaked crowd was that this was an "actors' zoo." Look, but don't stick your hand in.

And, by all means, learn something here.

After Frank, there was an intermission before getting back to black for the second act.

During that time, I gleaned from a woman her first concert (John Denver at 14 with her parents and Boston in 1977 on her own), but the best story was about the time she saw George Thoroughgood and the Destroyers. An Innocent at the time, she'd been surprised when a guy in the row in front of her turned and offered her a joint.

Flash forward to VCU, they re-meet, date and then go off and each marry someone else for 20 years. They reconnected post-divorces and have now been married for 11 years. "We're having a ball," she beamed. We were fine until she shared that she'd driven alone to Merriweather Post Pavilion to see the Eagles before they broke up and then she was dead to me.

I can forgive many things, but not the Eagles.

Back to Black began with Matt singing "Rehab" and a girl walking by me with her phone and hard box of Marlboros tucked into her cleavage. Then Maggie, looking out-of-this world gorgeous in a leopard print dress and gray pumps, positively purred "You Know I'm No Good."

I think it was as Durron was knocking it out of the park with "Me and Mr. Jones" that I overheard the people next to me marveling about the music. "I'm used to bar cover bands!" one guy lamented. Another girl arrived in front of me, pointed to the stage and told her friend, "It's so weird! He's like my neighbor!"

Seems she'd never suspected her neighbor had musical/theatrical talent, so she'd come to the actor zoo to see for herself. It wasn't long before another clutch of females began discussing what a great cover band they were, necessitating a friend explaining that these were not musicians but people who worked in theaters. The girl talking made them sound very exotic.

Saying that they were going to do an obscure song, Maggie noted, "We're giving you an education." It was absolutely true. I'd known nothing from Frank but by the third song knew I needed to own it. The things you can learn at Cover to Cover are enough to make it worth hanging out in a beer joint.

And then Matt announced the last song "to play you guys out into the night" and the three-set Amy Winehouse extravaganza wound down with the crowd singing and dancing along.

They played me right out into the night and over to Balliceaux for the final night before they close for three months. After countless nights spent there, I knew enough to arrive sufficiently early to nab a stool and enjoy the view and close service.

When my favorite bartender there asked if I wanted tequila, I surprised the hell out of him by requesting a cocktail. I watched him make it while chatting with a wine shop owner sipping Mezcal, which turned out to be part of my drink, along with Aperol, Yellow Chartruese, habanero shrub and grapefruit juice, a complex and blushingly pink sipper he claimed was a riff on the classic Corpse Reviver.

I only hope it wasn't a comment on how I looked.

Before long, a guy came up to get a drink and immediately complimented my hair and introduced himself. He was visiting from Atlanta and wanted to hear more about Richmond. When he pulled his friend over to introduce, I recognized a J-Ward neighbor.

Soon we were a trio at the bar, discussing all they'd been doing in RVA and DC over the past four days. Their itinerary had included four shows- Phantagram (neighbor's fave of the four), Billy Idol ("Vegas-ready"), St, Vincent and Hot Chip ("A sausage fest!") and countless meals and cocktails.

When the Atlanta guest kept looking at his phone, I called him on it and he explained succinctly, "I'm Tinder-ing the hell out of this town while I'm here." Swipe away.

In between tangents, I spotted or spoke to the chef, the organizer, the trombone player, the comedienne, the non-drinker and probably others I've already forgotten due to having my first two cocktails tonight.

I heard about all the things they'd done here and what was still on their agenda for tonight. When invited to join them at Strange Matter, I declined. One instructed the other to finish up so they could pay their tab and get on to next party.

"Drink that last sip! There are sober children in Africa!" Mr. J-Ward cracked, Now that's some quick thinking.

Balliceaux had become a fire hazard by then with people continuing to arrive and need drinks while only a trickle left. Visiting the back room, the Atlantan summed up the scene back there like this, "Music's funk and hip hop. It's a bunch of hipsters steeped in nostalgia." Some would call that tragic.

When I went back there myself, I saw that DJ Michael Murphy and a drummer had the crowd dancing the way he does every time he DJs. No way to know if the crowd was especially worked up about it being the final night (at least for a while) or just enjoying the usual Saturday night dance party.

I was doing both. Here's hoping Balliceaux returns.

It Was Worth All the While

Kerplunk, just like that it was 1994 again, except thankfully without Celine Dion and "The Lion King."

For the second night in a row, I was at Hardywood, this time for the Cover to Cover series where they play an entire album live start to finish. Somehow when I wasn't looking, 21 years have passed since Green Day's "Dookie" was released, so that was to be the featured album tonight.

Like every teen-aged boy in the country, I'd bought "Dookie" when it came out in '94 because even with estrogen, I couldn't resist their pop punk hooks and whiny, stoner lyrics. But even then I understood who that album belonged to.

Walking in, I ran into Brian, tonight's bass player, whom I'd just seen play bass last night with Snowy Owls. Even better, he's playing tomorrow at Hardywood with yet another band, that one a jazz group. Versatile guy doing shoegaze, punk and jazz in a matter of 48 hours.

Hardywood had a big crowd for the show tonight, whether for beer or a trip down middle school memory lane, I couldn't say. A couple of (male) friends joined me near the front, no doubt there because they were 12 and 14 years old when it came out.

Although the show was supposed to start at 7:30, it didn't, so the crowd kept growing until finally ringleader Matt Shofner (in a short-sleeved black shirt and bow tie) took the stage with the crack Cover to Cover band, saying, "Punctuality isn't punk." You know, he had a point.

Matt wasn't the only one looking the part. When I'd seen bassist Brian earlier, his long hair had been up, but now he'd released his waist-length locks, looking ready to rock.

Explaining that "Dookie" had been released on February 1, 1994, he reminded us that it had arrived in an era of chain wallets (the chain on his pants could have secured a bank vault) and burgeoning eye liner usage. As they launched into "Burnout," the crowd began "clinking" beer cups together as the familiar strains washed over them.

Matt and his fellow vocalists - Maggie (who did triple duty also dancing and playing tambourine), Evan (black shirt, skinny tie) and occasionally the other Maggie (hilariously insisting on applause to make it worth her while)- even had the rowdy crowd sing "Happy Birthday" to the album in Green Day style ("not dirge-like").

The night really got rolling when they did "Basket Case." As Matt sang, "I am one of those melodramatic fools," a melodramatic bearded fool in the crowd exploded in front of the stage, singing along, pumping his fist, briefly jumping on stage and generally unleashing his inner 14-year old. It was a beautiful thing to see.

One thing the crowd picked up on quickly was how well the band - Brian, Bentley and Grant - were executing the songs, nailing every lick and drum fill. A girl in front of me kept yelling, "You're amazing!" at them.

Of course everyone went berserk singling along and jumping around to "When I Come Around," causing Evan to observe, "It's great to see so many of you singing along. It means you listened to this music when you were kids."

I wheeled around to raise an eyebrow at my friend, the former 12-year old Green Day lover, and he looked sheepish. "Kids!" he repeated.

Someone shouted out a toast to Tres Cool, Green Day's drummer, only appropriate.

After the last song, "F.O.D.," Matt held up his phone set to a timer and told us to be patient. He reminded the crowd that it was last call. Only when a minute and 17 seconds had passed did they launch into the hidden track, "All by Myself" accompanied only by acoustic guitar.

It's now standard procedure at the end of every Cover to Cover show for the band to encore with a few greatest hits and they did. My friends didn't bother waiting around so I told them good-night and stayed put.

"American Idiot" made everyone go crazy, even more so when Matt sang the line, "Well, maybe I'm the faggot America," pointing at himself and the crowd roared. After all, who wants to be part of  the redneck agenda?

"Brain Stew" only fed the fire and after that, he announced, "Okay, get out your lighters," which for this age group means cell phones with the flashlight feature on and sang "Time of Your Life." The room sang along at the top of our voices.

So take the photographs and still frames in your mind
Hang it on a shelf in good health and good time

After one last full-throttle rocking, the band was introduced and we were thanked by Matt, but the band had other ideas. They began playing "Welcome to Paradise" for the second time tonight and the space in front of the stage, sloppy with spilled beer, finally turned into a mosh pit with bodies flying as they sang along.

It was very 1994. Like then, I stayed out of the fray but enjoyed watching every minute of it. Green Day calls that "Having a Blast." Me, too.