Tondeleo: Hello, This is Tondeleo...
Doc: Look, Tondy, I still got a burr in my saddle thinkin' about bein' throwed outta that Blue Grass Vestibule over the weekend. An' I wasn't drunk or fixin to be cause I cut all that mess out when my brother died an' told me to take care of Marilyn his daughter. He told me afore he died to take good care of her and stay sober an' I mostly done it. Over the weekend I got throwed out 'cause they said if I used 'lectricity when I played my guitar then it wasn't truly country roots bluegrass American music.
Now if I live in the count
ry, which I DO, an' I play music which I DO, an' I use a amp so you can hear my guitar over my singin' which I DO, an I am an American WHICH I AM, an the songs I sing is the ones my Daddy an my 'Grandaddy afore him sang, which they ARE, then how is that not real country roots American music?
Tondeleo: Ummm...
Doc: But that ain't all. They use 'lectricity theyself. They got CD's out an' they has radios an they is all 'lectric. They was SELLIN' CD's there, which you gotta have 'lectric or you cain't hear them.
But I ain't allowed to use 'lectric on my guitar which I have been usin' for more than 30 years an' I have played it in the mountains, in the valleys an' wherever I felt like it til this past weekend, when someone invited ME, I din't invite them, to come an' play.
Now here is what got me madder than a striped ape in a prison camp. They, the good little boys who WAS allowed to sing, was all singing through mikes, which IS 'lectric an' plug into AMPS which is 'lectric. I know a mike ain't really' lectric, but my guitar ain't really 'lectric neither. It ain't no more 'lectric than a mike is. A mike which I DON'T need cause I got a fair set of pipes on me. My guitar is what needs to be made loud an' Marilyn's harps gots to be made loud. But I don't need no mike for my voice.
They had some of them boys up there singin' into mikes an' blastin' the sound all over the place an' holdin' theys guitars in front of mkes an' that is ok, but I ain't allowed to play my guitar or use my stompbox cause it gots a mike in it too.
Tondeleo: Well, Doc, it IS their festival, and you were only invited at the last minute... and you don't even know if the bloke that invited you was authorised to... or did he just invite you to attend...
Doc: That guy what worked there who told me I couldn't play my guitar through my battery powered amp, he couldn't play nothin anyway an' he didn't have enough shoulders to hold up a guitar strap. I was gonna wup his hindparts an' rake the grass with it an' then wup him again for leavin' a greasy stain, but the way he was howlin' an' carryin' on cause I wanted to play my guitar was so pitiful I was too disgusted to wup him.
An like I said yesterday, Marilyn had commenced to cryin' an' said they would put me in jail if I got up on stage an' played anyway, which I was goin' to do. I had a Hank Williams set of songs an' some Webb Pierce and Merle Travis which is 'bout all I know, but I know 'em real good.
We rode more than two hours to be there an' then got throwed out cause don’t you know that country people don't have no 'lectricity. That's what city people thinks, an I was gonna show him some real country 'lectricity if Marilyn hadn't tugged on my arm so much an' ast me to leave an' if Oliver hadn't been there to help me get over it.
So here is where it stands. I AIN'T goin to no more Blue Grass vestibules or any country ones lessen they tells me up first I aint gonna be able to use my guitar, ceptin' my one what ain't electric an' if they try to stop me then, they is gonna have one situation on their hands, period. Bye.
Tondeleo: Bye, Doc. Have a good evening.
