Danny's 2010 Grandsons US Virgin Island Tour

Back in St. Thomas

2010-02-19T05:47:00.000-08:00

Tuesday we had our last day on St. Croix. We woke late, after a night playing out at Chicken Charlie's, and I was pleased to be waking to the smell of potatoes being sautéed as John began to make breakfast. Then we leisurely made our way to Rainbow beach for the afternoon. After I drank a small bucket of a drink called a Cruzan Confusion, we went back to our room at the Jasmine Manor and I promptly passed out. I woke a hour later and we only had a short while before we we slated to perform in the courtyard of the Jasmine Manor for a Fat Tuesday celebration. Chicken Charlie made Jambalaya and cornbread and on John Young's suggestion the drink for the evening was Sazarac, the official drink of the state of Louisiana. The libation is made of bourbon, bitters, and absinthe with a lemon twist. The party was a hit and we were joined by a locally born bongo player named Juni Baba. During our break I let the recorder on my phone roll and sat interviewing Juni about his life growing up on the island.

The party ended and we helped clean up and to commemorate our last night at the Manor, our host Vicki Pederson invited us to all have a cocktail. We ended up hanging in Vicki's kitchen telling stories of the rock and roll lifestyle till about two in the morning. She had quite a few of them about Buddy Guy, Junior Wells, and others most of which ended with her shooting them down. We finally packed and found our beds around three only to wake again at 5:45 am to head for the airport.

We fly out of St. Croix at eight am on a small ten passenger plane and I fell asleep again despite the fact the ride was all of twenty minutes. We arrived back at the St. Thomas airport and we dismayed by not surprised to find that although we had a reservation with Avis for a car, the reservation had been made for five pm instead of nine am. We ended up walking the length of the run way toward town, waited a good while for the local bus, and in the end had to bargain with a local cabbie to get us to our first gig about five hours early.

The day became very long quickly as we ramped up for not one but to gigs and the set up and transportation of all the gear. The gigs went smoothly and we were very pleased to have the company of our friend Morgan Rael the island's king of the steel pan (also, a very good guitarist and harp player). We made it through and played two very good gigs. The night was topped by a nice couple who had seen us at Cariga's in Red Hook last year, offering to pick us up on Tortola Sunday morning and dropping us right at our last gig back on St. Thomas. Very sweet couple and we look forward to hanging with them. As I understand it the wife, Karen I think, is a very talented chef who used to work in NYC.

On Thursday, we woke back at Edythe and Paul's beautiful house on the North Shore of the island at seven thirty and was dropped by the cruise ship dock to board the Doubloon. This sailing vessel is where cruise ship passengers can go to get an authentic island experience of snorkeling to see sea turtles and then getting extremely drunk on the way back so that they will by Doubloon t-shirts. It was very fun and we we treated special having been by the owner and not cruise ship passengers. I got to see a few very large sea turtles and one surfaced for air right in front of me. Pretty sweet.

Last night we played our gig and then I went out with a girl I met in a coffee shop the day before who is originally from Syria. We hung till around two and as she drove me up the hill toward Edythe's house, I noticed that her engine has started steaming. The car overheated on a hill and as soon as I had stepped out of the car to look under the hood, the skies opened up and it poured for the first time since we arrived. I got drenched and there was little to do for her car. Luckily, the first person to drive by stopped and happened to be a mechanic. He drove us bak here, where I ended up having to wake Alan up at three in the morning to drive this girl home. Quite an island adventure. I have to run to make the ferry to Tortola and our two night stint at The Jolly Roger with owner Lou Schwartz. Hope all you Schwartz's back home are doing alright. Miss you.

Days Five & Six - St. Croix

2010-02-15T07:12:00.000-08:00

So it took a hot second to get internet and cell phone reception on this side of the island this year. So let me catch you up with my adventures. We arrived in St. Croix on Friday, we played a gig that night at Cheeseburgers. Then the next morning we woke around nine to get to a beach on the other side of the island by around ten to set up for the Mardi Croix Parade. The parade is held at Cane Bay which is known for the ocean shelf less then a hundred feet from shore. It's a drop from 40 ft. to nearly 3000 ft. less then a hundred feet from shore. It's a premium diving destination, but on this day all that was going on was a bit of surfing and a lot of drinking. We were set up and started to play around eleven and though we took a few breaks we ended up playing music pretty much straight through till five thirty. It was brutal and my voice felt like it had been ripped to shreds. We got back to the inn around 7:30 and I was about ready for bed then, I stuck it out for a while trying to make phone contact with my BandHouse Gigs partners before the beginning of the show that night at the Barns back in Virginia.

Yesterday morning I awoke to find that about a dozen people were having a big communial breakfast in our courtyard, I dragged myself out of bed and enjoyed it with them and the meal was capped off by the passing of a small blue smoking accoutrement to help aid digestion. It was a lovely morning and we relaxed most of the day while I called players who had been on the show the night before to get recaps. Then last night we played at Rhythms at Rainbow beach for Valentine's Day and we played straight through sunset (though this year I didn't see a green flash). The Grandsons have played that gig all four years they have toured the VI, and this year was a great one. The crowd was good, we had a new york actor named Tim Walther, whom I swear I recognized, we had some return guest from last year, and we won over some new fans who took home a few CDs. Last night we also sold the last of our Calypso Ponzi Schemers demos. Alan had brought about thirteen and we successful fulfilled our ponzi scheme by selling them all off for $5 a pop. We have even talked about making more when we return to St. Thomas on Wednesday.

After the gig we retreated back to our room again with two whole BBQ chickens with red beans and rice, which had been prepared by our booking agent, Chicken Charlie right on the beach. I invited our bartender Sarah from Rainbows to come hang with us at the inn and she obliged. She has been our bartender for a few years here and has been in the islands for eight years, so she was able to give us some interesting insight. She also was full of great stories, my favorite of which by far, was her story of being in Seattle, Washington in a park and being approached by an old man with white hair on a scooter. The old man asked her if she would like to get high with him and she said she would. They sat in the park smoking and shooting the shit for a little while after which the old man scooted away. At this point a woman came up to Sarah and asked, "do you know who you just smoked with?". She didn't and as luck would have it, it turned out to have been Jeff Smith the host of the Frugal Gourmet. This killed me. She was a ton of fun and I find myself with the clear understanding that only strong female personalities can survive on the islands.

This morning we again work early so that we could drive up into the rain forest to The Domino Club. This is a small open air bar in the woods, owned by a sweet lady named Norma. Though we had been up there at night last year, this year we were in time to catch her renowned breakfast of homemade biscuits and gravy. Her home fries were made with oil and rosemary and her homemade hot sauce was a force to be reckoned with. It was delicious. Though we have never seen it Norma does have a stable of beer drinking pigs up there that are a tourist destination on cruise ship tours. We finished and headed out to return to the inn for some R&R before our gig tonight. It has been a great stay on St. Croix so far, two days left to go then back to St. Thomas and on to Tortola. See you there.

Day Four - Arrival in St. Croix

2010-02-12T10:29:00.000-08:00

I am sitting in a courtyard in the Jasmine Manor B&B in Frederikstad on St. Croix. It's 85 degrees out and beautiful. The family across the street is pumping Reggae music since we got here, which is actually nice. Tonight, we play at the restaurant, Cheeseburger in America's Paradise. It's a open air restaurant outside of Christenstad. The first few gigs have been very good and I'm even more excited for this weekend. Tomorrow we play the Mardi Croix parade. We play on a stage on the beach outside of the the Sprat Net beach bar. It's always a big crowd and big party. Then we are playing Rhythms on Rainbow beach for Valentine's Day. The gig is on a beach facing west and we start in the afternoon for that people can watch the sun set as we play. Plus, our host Chicken Charlie Campbell will be cooking rotisserie chickens on the beach. Then for Fat Tuesday we are playing right here in this courtyard with people and booze, and Charlie's famed jumbalaya. Can't wait, Mardi Gras is New Orleans must be great, but there's snow on the ground there, so we'll settle for Mardi Croix. More to come, thanks to my sis and her beaux for signing on.

Day three

2010-02-11T23:02:00.001-08:00

Day three on St. Thomas. We were pretty lazy today. We had breakfast then, hung around our host Edythe's house rehearsing some new tunes (including a Hepcat song that I sing and have always wanted to perform live). Yesterday we played two gigs, one of which was the most amazing villa up on the hill. Then today we played at Tickles dockside bar. It was fun, but the bartender must have been in her seventies and was going deaf and found our softest jazz tunes to be piercingly loud. Forget the rock tunes. I also recognized our waitress Heather from last year when she waited on us at a completely different restaurant. She loved that I remembered and thus took me out to a locals bar to meet her friends. It was a good time and I got home fries and eggs at two in the morning (late night food is hard to come by here). Now it's three am and we are heading to St Croix tomorrow. I'll continue this entry in our ride over. Goodnight friends (specifically my mother who is the only one reading this). Love.

End of day one.

2010-02-09T21:53:00.001-08:00

So I have had a wonderful first ten hours in the USVI. I am laying in my bed which tonight, by choice, is some blankets and a pad under the stars. I can see so many stars. Alan MacEwen and I made it out of DC this morning only a day late. I couldn't breath easy until our planes wheels were up, but once they were, we were on our way. Tonight, we went to the North Shore Bistro to watch our host Paul Dirks play guitar. We had a very nice meal complemented by good orange mojitos and great music. Tomorrow we have two gigs, one in the afternoon at The Fat Turtle and a private house party at night. The place tomorrow night is amazing (there's a link with pictures two posts back). I can't wait to play! Just wish some of my friends from last year were here. But I'll just have to make some more. Till next time, honorary Grandson Danny, signing off.

Airborne, finally

2010-02-09T09:07:00.001-08:00

I've just boarded the plane in Ft. Lauderdale to fly to St. Thomas. They are pulling away so I'm finally on my way!

Snowed In

2010-02-05T22:05:00.000-08:00

So it's 1:00 am saturday morning. There is currently almost two feet of accumulated snow outside and still falling. Alan and I are supposed to fly out Monday. Sunday I am supposed to go to rehearsal for the BandHouse Gigs' Tribute to Crowded House. Who knows if we'll have it, so I may not get to see much of the music rehearsed before I leave, but on the bright side it's still an amazing show with an unprecedented line up of talented folks. Also, we just received copies of the highlights cd from our Tribute to Allen Toussaint last April. It's a wonderful collection of Toussaint's music featuring Jon Carroll, Lea, Eric Scott, The Nighthawks, and of course, The Grandsons! Check out everything at www.bandhousegigs.com

If everything goes as planned we'll be in St. Thomas by 4:00pm monday afternoon. Then wednesday evening we have just scheduled a last minute private house party at a villa on St. Thomas. You have to check out the pictures of this place. I may never leave. Check out the pictures here.

I am enjoying this leisurely weekend, snowed in at the folks house here in Bethesda with my family's dog and cat and my cat. One big happy family for the first time in three months or so and then monday I escape! hehe.

Sir Alan and the Calypso Ponzi Schemers at The State Theatre in Falls Church

2010-01-21T08:59:00.000-08:00

Just a few days before I leave for the islands, Sir Alan and the Calypso Ponzi Schemers will open for Chopteeth and The Iguanas at The State Theatre in Falls Church, VA. The show is Friday Feb 5th 2010. Should be a great one. Please come out and say hi! oh and check out our myspace at www.myspace.com/ponzischemersband

First Tour Diary Post

2010-01-07T12:46:00.001-08:00

Very excited. Just over a month till departure for the islands. To get "warmed up" for it check out the video of my and Alan's Calypso band at the Kennedy Center last night. Search for Sir Alan & the Calypso Ponzi Schemers at www.Kennedy-Center.org. We had a few very special guests and it was a very special show. Hope you dig it.