Oh Mercy, its Beatle Bob

I mentioned to you previously that I saw Beatle Bob for the first time (and then the second time) during the Americana Music Festival Showcases back in Nashville back in September. And you may have thought “Who is Beatle Bob?”, unless you have also encountered Beatle Bob, then you knew exactly what I was talking about.

My experience was precisely as the guy at the beginning of the clip describes “sitting in a club, watching a band, when suddenly this guy, in this crazy suit... jacket… whatever, walks up to the stage, completely barren dance floor, sets his drink down, and then starts doing this really wild, bad dance.”

In my case, the club was the Mercy Lounge on the Wednesday night of the festival. The band was Kane Welch Kaplin. (KWK was the second act of four that night, followed by Marcia Ball, and Will Kimbrough playing with a couple of other people.) When Bob walked up to the front of the stage the first thing I noticed (this was before he started dancing) was that perhaps his hair style and clothes were a bit dated, but thought, hey, he’s prolly some big shot Music Row guy. He sat his drink down on the speaker, so as to free his hands. That was when he started dancing in a way that I would later describe to my wife as “Remember that bad dance Elaine did on Seinfeld? Well, like that, but with a lot more hand motions.”

I lived in New Orleans for a long time, so I’ve seen my share of people who don’t conform to the generally accepted mold. Also, in the northeast Louisiana town where I grew up there was this really creepy guy who always dressed up like an old-style bluegrass musician, with loudly colored suits and boots and a cowboy hat and a big belt buckle, and he went by the name of “Tex”. When I first saw Beatle Bob, I thought I was watching the reincarnation of Tex, or simply presumed he was just some guy whose keeper was probably standing at the bar watching to make sure he didn’t cause too much trouble.

Then, in the space between one song and another, Kevin Welch said, “It’s always good to look out into the crowd and see Beatle Bob.” Of the people sitting around me, some were like me and just thought Bob was some unknown odd fellow off the street. The enlightened people explained that, no, Bob is a well known odd fellow who you will see at almost any music festival—Austin City Limits, South by Southwest, New Orleans Jazz Festival, etc. Wow. And I just thought he was off his meds.

Bob danced all night and like the proverbial automobile accident scene that you don’t want to look at, it was hard not to notice him, standing at the front and dancing wide. Even after the area in front of the stage became crowded, Bob held his spot, plus two or three more, never moving too far away from his drink; although he was agreeable to stepping aside briefly when pho-togs came up with professional looking cameras to take pictures of the bands. I also observed several people taking pictures or video of Bob, without regard to the bands. Ah celebrity.

Bob must have been at another venue Friday night, because I didn’t see him at Bruce Robison's show at the Station Inn. Bruce put on a delightful show, and we didn’t really miss Bob not being there.



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Music I’m Listening to Now: Bruce Robison, The New World on Rhapsody.com
What I’m Reading Now: David Wroblewski, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle.