Cleveland's
answer to Tom Waits is Ray McNiece, slam poet turned musician. We
heard him years ago when he was a regular on the poetry slam circuit, an
entertaining artform that seems to have faded away of late. But Ray has
put together a tight band and puts his words to music these days.
A couple of other poets read their work before Ray & the band hit the stage for their set, with mixed results. The first was terrific, the second not-so-good, and the third OK. But really, we and most of the audience were there to hear Ray's last gig before leaving to teach in Singapore for five months.
Quite the entertained, he told jokes and kidded with the audience before and between performing a half dozen or so of his songs. I recorded a few to give you a sense of his work. Another one of those evenings that you'd enjoy somewhere else and thing "what a great place this is!" It's all around in Cleveland , but most folks don't appreciate it.
What's wrong with this picture?
Maybe that's too negative a way to put it, but this scene from West Wing showing Toby smoking a cigarette at a bar is history in many parts of the country, including Cleveland.
I've never been a smoker, am not crazy about being around smokers, and always hated coming home from a bar with clothes reeking of smoke, but...
...there's something about a smoky bar that seems more intimate, more mysterious, more conducive to sharing intimate thoughts. When I watched this scene from set in a dimly lit bar, Toby taking a drag from a cigarette, it immediately put me back into many similar scenes from my life. Part of me really hates to see this go.