It's not unusual for the Music Fog crew to be chasing an unknown entity. Luke Doucet is no exception. We go where Jessie tells us to go. Either she knows something of the artist, or she has a hunch. I'm not sure which one it was when we got the marching orders to chase down Luke. But it's always a good bet.
Luke Doucet was scheduled to perform in my back yard back in November, 2009, at a venue that I didn't know existed. It was the Gordon Theatre For The Performing Arts in Reisterstown, MD. I looked it up online and discovered that it was a complex located in the woods. It had a day care center and a Jewish Community Center attached to it. The place was decked out! Aaron made the usual call to the theatre looking for the "house guy." All that came back down the phone line was the word "no." No, you can't bring a film crew in here. No, you can't record Luke Doucet anywhere in the complex. No, no, no. It wasn't the usual level of cooperation that Music Fog is used to.
I waited until the day before Luke's appearance to scout out another location to tape. Somewhere in the neighborhood. But first I thought I would drop by the theatre to find out what time his sound check was scheduled for, sort of a courtesy call. We didn't want him to be late for the all important sound check. The complex was enormous. And tucked in the woods amongst 200 year old horse farms with rich histories of champion racing legends. I was met at the door by a person that looked a lot like Dame Edna.
You know, that Australian guy who likes to dress up like a woman and some how manages to fraternize with British royalty. She was not happy to see me. Before I could get one word out she gave we a good verbal flogging and told me the crew was not welcome. She must of thought that I was rolling in a hollywood movie set, complete with porta potties and Winnebago trailers. I was chased of the property by security in a Rav 4 with amber lights on the roof.
Off I went to scout out a new location. Aaron had the bright idea of looking for a farm in the neighborhood---to record in a barn. There were plenty of them. One of them was the famed Sagamore Farms. Once owned by the Vanderbilts, this sprawling complex is now under the watchful eye of Kevin Plank, CEO of Under Armour sports apparel. It was my first stop. Everybody there was helpful enough, but the guy I needed to talk to was out of the country and wasn't going to be available for a couple of days. Then one of the farm help spilled a 16oz soft drink on my pants. It looked bad. Like I didn't have any bladder control. He wanted to dry me off, but it was my personal area and I thought it best to handle it myself.
Off I drove to another horse farm called Caves Farm. Bingo, this was the mother load. The owner took me under his wing and drove me around the property in his truck. There were dogs everywhere. Two of them were in the back seat of the truck licking me. They wanted to lick my pants. That was off limits. He showed me the "Party Barn." It was an old barn build in Pennsylvania back in the 1800's. He bought it, had it disassembled and moved to his property. It was perfect. He told me of some venture he had done years ago with Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac. So he was totaly in the Music Fog game and left the door open for us to do what we needed to do. Everything was set to record Luke Doucet.
Then came the call. Luke had the "the virus." He was down for the count and couldn't make the gig. The dream barn recording was never going to happen. And my pants needed a good wash. But now we have a really cool barn to record in. And all of us can thank Luke Doucet for being the catalyst that helped us find it.
Check out Luke's Wiki. It's pretty impressive. And a fine addition to the wealth of Americana artists coming out of Canada. We finally ran into Luke, with Melissa McClelland, at SXSW this year. I was impressed.
-Beans
