Songs For Your Day

In New York City on a sweaty July evening, a young man ascended the basement stage of the knitting factory. The room was abuzz, no one noticed him setting up his drums or fastening his kazoo. People’s voices echoed stories of another band’s van being broken into, all of their equipment lifted. A reporter was conducting an interview directly in front of the stage. The bar was flooded with hipsters. The man on stage payed it no mind, he set upon his guitar in a fury and was off to another place.  The audience grew quiet, suddenly transfixed by his furious stomping and aggressive strumming. (What a wonder that his guitar didn’t crack into pieces under such pressure!). He was a one-man-band from Brooklyn named the Bones of Davey Jones, and he looked like he crept out of a Louisiana bayou bearing dark secrets, and his music was swiftly taking everyone back with him.

After three or four songs his pace slowed. Melancholy took over the room. A simple melody stumbled out from between his fingers and his voice trembled through the microphone:

“It seems like I’ve been waitin’ for this moment my whole life. You gave me something to dream about at night, I could die happy tonight. So don’t, no don’t give me your pity…don’t pretend to care about me, I know I’m just a remedy. And if you ever need a friend to get you through the night again, oh you know I am yours, all you have to do is say the words. And you , you move on to find the little boy who’ll sing you songs, but in the end will make you cry, and I’ll be standing there by your side…because we’re, we’re best friends, and I hope we are until the end. I don’t need to be your man I’m happy just holding your hand. Please don’t be upset when I stop by late at night, I’m weaker than you, I need to be sure that you’re alright. Because it’s raining outside, I brought you this umbrella to keep you dry. I can be your house, lock me up…I’ll keep the riff-raff out…”

Of all of the shows that my band played that summer on tour, his performance is the only one I remember vividly. To this day I’ve never seen anything like it. But more importantly, “I,Remedy” takes me instantly back to that basement, sitting in a wobbly chair next to my best friend and his beard,  both of us half-drunk and depressed under the circumstances, but temporarily transfixed by a single man’s honesty on stage.