Hey friends, 

It's a rare Hobo Travelogue that's got no travel in it, but this here's just that sort of strange beast. I've been to the grocery store a couple times, bought a few odds and ends out the back door of local specialty stores, and ridden my bike around a fair bit now that the snow's melted, but that's about the size of my world these days. Thankfully, I'm still feeling grateful for the free time, the roof over my head, and the blessed company I'm lucky to be stuck with. 

Pamela, Elliot, Foxy and I had so much fun doing last month's concert from our kitchen that we decided to do another, hopefully with just as much joy and way less technical difficulties ;) We also moved it an hour earlier than last month by request for friends on the east coast. It's happening this coming Saturday evening, May 9th at 7pm Mountain Daylight Time, which makes 6pm in Eugene, 9pm in New York, 9am Sunday morning in Taiwan, 11am Sunday in Melbourne, and 1pm Sunday in Wellington (if you're struggling with time zones, the internet's got an answer for that too). 

We've got a whole hour of new stuff worked out, including last month's requests, an update on the plant babies on our kitchen shelf, and a couple surprises. If you want in on this live transmission of love from our house to yours, tune in on my Facebook fan page and refresh the page if we don't appear right on time. You can also watch on my Instagram, but we'll only be following the comments on Facebook, 'cause it's just too much to watch two feeds. It'll be saved afterward so friends in Europe and South Africa can tune in later, but we're also planning to do another concert that's better timed for you folks. Oh yeah, and if you're game to help us spread the word, there's an event page here. 

To those of you who've preordered the new album––and wow, there sure are a lot of you!––you don't have much longer to wait. The mixing and mastering are done, I'm on the home stretch of the editing and formatting of the book with Cecilia Sharpley's gorgeous leaf prints, and I honestly can't wait to get it into your hands. I've gathered a team to work the publicity, and we've set an official worldwide release date of July 31st, but it'll be going out to YOU good people as soon as it's in my hands, likely in about two weeks' time. 

The first single from the album, "Leave a Light On", will be released Friday, May 22nd, on streaming services and through my website. There's already a Backlink, where you can go to pre-save the single for the day it drops, right here:

"Leave a Light On"

If you want to get in on the ground floor for this whole thing, there's still time to sign up for the first delivery, and even to sponsor the project, here. 

Oh, and I forgot to mention it last time, but I finally made a video explaining partial capoing and double capos, something I'd promised to do when I released One More Time Around back in 2013.

Oh yeah, and we're contributing a song to an online benefit that our friends Tom Richardson and Kimberly Erin Yoga are organizing for their hard-hit friends in Bali and Fiji, here: Outside Ourselves: Just a Little Help for Our Friends

Pamela and I have been taking online lessons from some musicians we really admire, including Nadine Landry, who's given Pamela some invaluable help with bass, and Dana Wylie, who's been coaching us on harmonies. If there's something you want to learn, I'd encourage you to seek out teachers. A lot of talented people have time on their hands these days :) 

To anyone working in essential services during this pandemic, my gratitude goes out to you, as does my heart to anyone suffering. Check in with your people. And keep shining your light however you can. Big love, be kind,

s

Hello darlings, 

I'm writing you from home sweet home in Riverdale, Edmonton, Alberta.  That's right, longtime readers, I live in a house now!  It's pretty wonderful, I must say. And with this whole shelter-in-place scene happening, well, the timing really couldn't be better. 

It was a four-day drive home from Texas, but I made it back to Canada to reunite with Pamela in Naramata, BC where she was house-sitting, hanging out with her daughter, and making friends with the local peacock. 

We had two kinda surreal weeks of self-isolation there in vacationland before heading back to Alberta and gradually settling into the idea of an indefinite stay at home and the weird times ahead.  This is gonna be incredibly hard on some folks.  I'm thinking especially of people in the developing world, and friends and family in the States, which despite being the richest country in human history, really hasn't got the social safety nets in place to weather something like this.  I'm feeling for everyone living paycheque to paycheque, and even more for folks who are homeless or stuck in a home with an abuser.  And I'm feeling for everyone whose job has been deemed essential––health care workers, caregivers, grocery clerks, delivery drivers, all the heroes keeping things running while we're holed up––who's contending with work overload on top of the stress of all this.  But I'm also counting myself among the lucky ones, to have a place to live and food to eat, and I'm seeing the silver lining in having the first chance in years at actually catching up with myself. 

My life's left a lot of loose ends dangling over the past decade or so.  It's such a struggle to keep up with emails and cobble together the next tours, while riding whatever tour I'm on, that I rarely find any time to file taxes, organize contacts, submit set lists for royalties, or do a proper job of getting my new releases out into the world.  So many planks of my ship have rotted through but gone unreplaced.  Well, I'm pleased to report that as of last week, at least one of those shoddy planks is sturdy and new: I've finally got a modern website.  Head on over to www.scottcook.net and have a look.  If you liked the old one better, I'm not surprised––you're a folk music fan, after all.  Ever heard how many folksingers it takes to change a lightbulb?  (Just one to change the bulb, and another ninety-nine to write songs about how much better the old bulb was.) 

I've been using that snazzy new website to take orders for the new album, and there are three options available: 1) book and CD, 2) book and VINYL, and 3) book with YOUR NAME in it as a sponsor, along with the vinyl or up to 3 CDs of your choice as thanks.  That last tier's only available for a limited time, since I'm almost finished the book. 

I'm already honoured and humbled by how many kind folks have stepped up to support this project.  When I ask myself what the heck I'm even doing manufacturing thousands of copies of a whopping big book in these uncertain times (and believe me, I ask myself that at least once a day), I remind myself that hundreds of people have already put their money down to show they believe in it.  If you're so inclined, and in a position to help, you can join them here: 

https://scottcook.net/support-scott-s-new-album 

Since the bulk of the album was recorded in Australia, I decided to work with a local artist friend to give the book a suitably Aussie aesthetic.  Cecilia Sharpley lives in Healesville, Victoria, and is one half of the team behind Duckpond House Concerts, just one of the amazing house concert series (not to mention the amazing folk festival!) running in that surprising little music mecca.  She uses local eucalypts and other leaves to make eco-friendly prints, drawing the colour out of the leaves themselves, and using the designs for books, lampshades, and clothes, as well as standard prints.  You can find her work on her website, and all through the pages of Tangle of Souls. 

It's gonna be a thing of beauty, and I really can't wait to get it into your hands!  To my Aussie friends who pre-ordered back in October and November, your patience will be rewarded.  And for anyone else who wants to get in on this thing before the rest of the world, you can climb on board right here. 

A lot of musician friends have been doing online concerts during the quarantine, and Pamela and I did make a couple little virtual appearances while we were in Naramata, for a Poss Music Works fundraiser and for a group of folks from Eugene who've taken their weekly song-sharing circle onto the Zoom Meeting platform for now.  We really enjoyed the experience, so we've decided to do another little concert, from our home to yours.  If you want to join us, come by my personal Facebook page on Saturday April 11th, 8pm Mountain Standard Time.  That'll make it 7pm in Eugene, 10pm in Toronto, noon on Sunday in Melbourne, and 2pm Sunday in Auckland.  All hands of our quaran-team will be on deck, including our housemate Elliot Thomas and corginator Foxy. 

Just a tip for this and any other online concerts you're tuning in to: if you're having trouble watching on your computer, try your phone. 

Wherever you are, I trust you're rising to the unique opportunity and challenge that this time presents us with.  Just a reminder, sunshine and birdsong are good for your mental health.  So are good old-fashioned phone calls with friends.  Same goes for diving into whatever you've been putting off.  Online guitar and singing lessons have been giving me lots of joy lately.  And so have strangers' smiles from a distance, and all the little kindnesses that mean even more in a time like this. 

So much love from our bunker to yours, 

s

Hey friends, 

I know you just heard from me, but I'm writing to break the news that I won't be finishing this tour.  I was supposed to be out for eight more weeks, but last night I read a bunch online, consulted the folk barometer, and decided that it would be irresponsible for me to continue with this contagion running around.  There's a real risk that I might unknowingly help it along, considering what an ideal vector a troubadour would make––going from house to crowded house, and communing with diverse groups of often older folks across vast distances.  I'd gone through a few days of denial, like the country did, not wanting to overreact, wanting to wait and see how this thing plays out.  But we don't need to wait and see how it plays out.  We've already got Italy's experience to learn from, and the scientists say we're about a week behind them. 

A few of the venues made the decision easier for me last night by letting me know that their concerts are on hold for the time being.  Some of the venues even generously offered to send a cheque to help with the sudden loss of two months of work.  We invest a lot of time and money into these tours up front, on the assumption that it'll come back to us.  I've never had the rug pulled out from under me like this.  Thankfully, I'm doing alright these days, not perilously close to the line like I used to be, and many of my musicians friends still are.  Everybody in the gig economy (which has grown to over 35% of the US workforce) and the service sector's gonna be hurting.  Venues are going to be hit especially hard.  I count myself among the lucky not to worry about going hungry or homeless, and to live in Canada, a country with socialized health care for everybody.  It's been incredibly disappointing, even as this outbreak widens the cracks in America's system, to see Democrats voting en masse for a candidate who stands against Medicare for all.  Maybe he'll have a change of heart when he goes head to head with Bernie on Sunday. 

I've already started driving homeward, from Austin toward Albequerque, and from there, on through New Mexico, a corner of Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Oregon and Washington, to Naramata, BC, where Pamela's hanging out with her daughter.  It'll probably take four days.  Then I'm told I'll need to self-quarantine for two weeks after I arrive in the country.  It's easy for me to see the silver lining in that, seeing as I've still got an unbelievable amount of work to do to get this album and book out into the world, and to solidify the upcoming release tours in Canada, the States, and across the pond, assuming they're still happening.  I'm got plenty of use for time off.  But I'm painfully aware of what a struggle it's going to be for so many folks. 

Lots of feelings come up when your livelihood and way of life are threatened.  I can empathize with Albertans who've lost jobs in oil and gas after the global drop in prices, even though they misplaced the blame on a government that was simply trying to diversify the economy so we wouldn't be so dependent on global oil prices.  It's tempting to try and find someone to blame, just like the President did in his televised address, emphasizing that the virus was foreign––it came from Asians, and then Europeans (though not the British necessarily, but you know, swarthier sorts of Europeans)––it wasn't our problem.  Well, now it's everybody's problem.  And as always, as long as we're children of this Earth, we belong to each other. 

I keep thinking about climate change, as I burn these dinosaur bones to get home––about how the scientists can tell us over and over that it's time to act, but we'll keep stalling until it's glaringly obvious, maybe until it's already too late and we find ourselves fighting among the empty shelves.  But crises can also bring out the good in people.  As one of the presenters I just heard from, Beverly in Saratoga Springs, wrote, "Do you think we could come together to heal one another with the Coronavirus and then move on to healing other things?" 

I'm still hoping, friends.  Because I know how much beauty and mercy and magic we're capable of, and because I'm invested in the future: in small things, like continuing to plan shows and create art, and in more important things, like all the young people I love who'll inherit this world from us. 

There's a lot about all that in the book I just wrote.  If you want to help me bring it into the world, tenuous an endeavour as it is, there are three options in the link below.   One of those options, by popular demand, is vinyl.  If you've already ordered a CD and want to change your order, just drop me a line and we'll work it out.  I'm incredibly humbled by how generous and supportive you've already been. 

Pre-order Tangle of Souls! 

After sending out the last Travelogue I realized that the video in the link was password-protected, sorry about that!  It's unlocked now so you can see it in all its cinematic glory through the link above.  My sincere thanks to the folks who've already been sharing the video online.  It was filmed by our pal Joshua Collings of Pegleg Productions, with help from Tristan Pierce and Victoria Vigenser on cameras, and Lindsay Martin capturing the sound, with the support of Cobargo Folk Festival.  Since we shot the video, bushfires tore through the town of Cobargo, leading to the cancellation of this year's festival, and Josh's hometown of Cudgewa, where his family lost their house.  It's a high wire we're dancing on, always.  I feel incredibly grateful, heading home from a tour in tatters, to be among the lucky ones. 

There's a slight chance I'll finish some of the late-April dates on this tour, but it's looking extremely unlikely.  I'm still planning a trio tour of BC in May and Alberta in June, though that's up in air too.  Most exciting are a few shared dates with Corin Raymond, who's also releasing a new album and even bigger book, called Dirty Mansions.  The Edmonton show's booked for Sunday June 7 at Varscona Theatre.  All the dates and details, as always, are on www.scottcook.net, which will very soon be shape-shifting to the new site you're seeing on www.scottcook3.bandzoogle.com. 

I suppose that's all for now, friends.  I've got miles to go before I sleep.  I trust you're all washing your hands and abstaining from handshakes and following public health officials' advice.  But I sincerely hope we can all keep our hearts open even as our doors are shut.  Create something beautiful.  Call a friend if you're feeling alone.  Give the money you'd be spending on coffees to people who need it more than you do.  Read those books you've been meaning to read.  Me and Pamela might even do a little streaming concert if we get around to it.  Whatever you do, do it with love. 

Stay safe, and stay kind, 

s

Hello dear ones, 

I hope this finds you smiling. This here's the first test of a new email system, and I sure hope it works! 

I really meant to write you a couple weeks back, during my happy month as an inside dog in snowy Edmonton. But despite putting in long days on the computer and barely showing my face around town, all too soon it was time to be a road dog again. So it is that this Hobo Travelogue comes to you from Tulsa, Oklahoma, four gigs and 4000-and-some kilometres down the road. 

Tulsa's one of the best music towns in the world, but tragically I haven't even gone out to see any shows, just been trying my best to catch up on things before I climb back into the saddle tomorrow. At least I've been out for a bike ride in the sun every day. And I'm making progress on tour bookings, long-neglected emails, last tweaks on mixes for the new album, and biggest of all, the book that's going to accompany it out into the world. 

It's turned out to be the most ambitious thing I've ever done. Tangle of Souls is not only my seventh album, it's also my first proper book. I knew I was going big this time around––hardcover, cloth-bound, debossed and foiled, with a little silk bookmark, even––but I had no idea just how big. It's over 40,000 words. I finished most of the writing while I was in Taiwan, found a few stretches of time to edit it during the New Zealand tour with Pamela, and now it's out getting feedback from a few trusted friends. I hope to finish the editing and layout over the next two weeks, when I've got some more precious downtime in Austin and on my way over to North Carolina. Back home, my longtime engineer Brad Smith's almost done the mixing, and I plan to let the first single drop in a few weeks' time. 

I'll be mailing them to the Australian friends who pre-ordered them as soon as I get them delivered, and will of course be selling them at shows, but the official release won't be until June. There's no point in rushing something this big. 

If you want to get in on this labour of love BEFORE it's turned loose into the world, all you've gotta do is pre-order, through the link below. And if you feel like contributing in a more substantial way, you can sponsor this thing to the tune of $100. In return, you get 3 CDs of your choice (could be three of the new one if you want, or any combination, signed to whomever you specify) and your name in the album credits. This option's ONLY available for the next couple weeks, while I'm finishing up the book. If you want on board, here's the link: 

https://scottcook3.bandzoogle.com/support-scott-s-new-album 

I'm also taking pre-orders at shows, for anyone trusting enough to fill out an envelope and put their money inside. I've got a bunch coming up on this side of the border. If you've got friends down this way who you think would enjoy the songs, please send 'em my way! Here's the run-down: 

Fri Mar 6 • Oklahoma City, OK • The Blue Door 
Sat Mar 7 • Austin, TX • Joe's Basement Concerts 
Sun Mar 8 • New Braunfels, TX • New Braunfels House Concerts 
Tue Mar 10 • Austin, TX • Wild Gins house concert 
Fri Mar 13 • Farmers Branch, TX • house concert 
Sat Mar 14 • Arlington, TX • Open Door Coffee House 
Sun Mar 15 • Shreveport, LA • afternoon house concert 
Fri Mar 20 • Asheville, NC • house concert 
Wed Mar 25 • Chapel Hill, NC • The Kraken with Jonathan Byrd and the Pickup Cowboys 
Sat Mar 28 • Sterling, VA • Focus Music 
Sun Mar 29 • Baltimore, MD • afternoon house concert 
Thu Apr 2 • Philadelphia, PA • The Living Room with Crys Matthews, Ethan Pierce, Ami Yares, and Aaron Nathans 
Fri Apr 3 • Marblehead, MA • Me&thee Coffeehouse, opening for Tim Gearan Trio 
Sat Apr 4 • Ripton, VT • Ripton Community Coffee House 
Sun Apr 5 • Bridgton, ME • Hayloft at Dragonfly Barn 
Fri Apr 10 • Earlville, NY • Earlville Opera House Arts Cafe, with Joseph Mettler opening 
Sat Apr 11 • Leverett, MA • Mt. Toby Concerts for Social Change 
Fri Apr 17 • Hartford, CT • Meeting House Presents 
Sat Apr 18 • Brooklyn, NY • Voices in the Heights with Shawna Caspi and Katie Dahl 
Sun Apr 19 • Lincroft, NJ • Earth Room Concerts with Meghan Cary 
Thu Apr 23 • Saratoga Springs, NY • Youth Helping Youth fundraiser at Spring Street Gallery 
Mon Apr 27 • Wellsboro, PA • house concert 
Wed Apr 29 • Pleasant Plain, OH • Plain Folk Cafe 
Sat May 2 • Central Ohio Folk Festival 
Mon May 4 • Decorah, IA • house concert 

All the details are on www.scottcook.net/news.php, and if there's a listening room or living room you think I should squeeze in a stop at along the way, I'd love to hear from you at scottcooksongs@gmail.com. 

I'll barely be home before heading out again on a tour of BC and Alberta with Bram and Shari that's WOEFULLY under-booked––if you've got any ideas for stops we should make, please do let us know! Here's what's confirmed so far: 

Sat May 9 • Fort St. John, BC • Whole Wheat and Honey 
Sun May 10 • Prince George, BC • TBA 
Wed May 20 • Vancouver, BC • double album release with Corin Raymond at the WISE Hall 
Thu May 21 • Steveston, BC • Steveston Folk Guild 
Sun May 31 • Victoria, BC • Victoria Folk Music Society 
Thu Jun 4 • Calgary, AB • double album release with Corin Raymond at Ironwood Stage! 
Fri Jun 5 • Black Diamond, AB • double album release with Corin Raymond at Jolene's barn 
Sun Jun 7 • Edmonton, AB • double album release with Corin Raymond, details TBA 

Let me emphasize again, if you've got any ideas of places we can play, please drop a line to scottcooksongs@gmail.com. I've been way too busy the last while and have unfortunately outrun myself on bookings. But we're gonna have a hot trio and a brand new album on the road, and we won't be back in BC for a good long while, so we really oughtta get the songs to the people while we're out! Let me know where and when, we'll bring 'em. :) 

Last I wrote you faithful readers I was holed up in Fulong, on the northeast coast of Taiwan, writing the book and waiting for Pamela to arrive. She'd never been to Asia before, and I was hoping for some sunny days so I could show her around a bit. As it happened, we had a few rainy days to ease her into the other side of the world, gradually exploring further afield as the weather allowed. We played shows in Taipei, Taichung, and a groovy farm in Hsinchu County with more guinea pigs than I've ever seen in my life (venue for the Farm Jams of years gone by), caught up with a bunch of old pals, and even got in some exploring around the Northeast, with trips to Jiufen, Houtung Cat Village, and Caoling Old Trail. Just like every time I've visited Taiwan, I feel even deeper in love with that island. I'm already contemplating a longer visit sometime in the next couple years. 

The day after Pamela's first green Christmas, we hopped a flight to Christchurch via Guangzhou. I'd been really excited to explore the city a bit in our 7.5 hour layover, as I'd done once before, but as it turned out, they only let you out if your layover's 8 hours or longer. Thankfully they've at least updated the airport since the last time I was there. On arrival in Christchurch, we walked into the centre of town, marvelled at the earthquake-ruined Cathedral, ate tapas, and cruised back to our hotel on Lime scooters, laughing at the surreality of it all. 

We rented a Mazda Bongo from a great company called Rental Car Village the next day, and headed out to the Banks Peninsula for a day of exploring and a night of free camping on the foreshore in our newly-named Bongo-low. The vistas were staggering, as they were every day of our ramble around that glorious green country. 

The first gig was the Whare Flat Folk Festival, a little gem of a fest put on by the Dunedin Folk Club. The forest is really unique there, with some rare native species that make a dense canopy unlike anything I've seen before. It's also there that we first heard the ruru (a native owl) and the tui, a native passerine with an incredible vocabulary that sounds more like R2D2 than a bird. 

Whare Flat was a beautiful example of everything that makes antipodean folk fests special. They had unaccompanied singing sessions every day, with folks leading sea shanties, old ballads, or modern songs by the likes of their own recently-departed Marcus Turner, and everyone joining in on the choruses. They had a blackboard stage every afternoon, where folks could sign up to play a couple songs in an open mic format. They had instructional workshops, and variety concerts in the evenings with short sets from the headlining artists. We got to see a haka, a traditional Maori dance of greeting that must've scared the shit out of the English when they came. And we welcomed the new year with Maori waiata, a big ceilidh and a square dance. 

We couldn't have imagined a warmer welcome to that beautiful land. We kept running into friends we made at that first festival throughout the rest of the tour. And the whole way, we felt carried along on a flood of generosity. Kiwis might actually be even nicer than Canadians. A community radio DJ I'd never met reached out to offer us the use of her apartment while she was away. Two different gals tried to give Pamela items of clothing after she complimented them. Folks invited us for a meal or a cuppa pretty much everywhere we went. 

In Wellington, I got to sing and chat on national radio for half an hour (an honour I've never had anywhere else), and at every show after that, a big chunk of the crowd put up their hands when I asked who was there because they heard me on the radio. People texted in to the radio station while I was on air to offer me gigs in their woolsheds. 

We got to play some really unique venues along the way, including the amazing Grainstore Gallery, in Oamaru's historic Victorian precinct; the charming Old Lodge Theatre in Hokitika; Barrytown Settlers' Hall, a spot in the middle of nowhere on the rugged west coast, where the audience miraculously appears right before showtime; the Mussel Inn on Golden Bay, a wonderful restaurant and brewery built around permaculture principles; Te Rangi, an informal hang at my pals Danny and Kate's family's house; and as always, a living room show that ended up being the biggest earner of the tour. 

We wrapped up the ramble at the Auckland Folk Festival, and it already felt like a big ol' reunion, with so many friends we'd met along the way. Again, they had unaccompanied singing, this time in a legendary session that goes late into Saturday night, where the homebrewers offer up black beer to anyone with a receptacle, and everybody stands in a circle and joins in on the choruses. Again, they had plenty of blackboard concerts, so that everybody who wants to sing can have a crack at it. They had separate venues for the late-night jams, with celtic tunes going in one spot, bluegrass in another, drums and dancing in another. And on Saturday, they gave all the folks clubs the opportunity to curate a half-hour of their own programming in one of the venues. It was such a wonderful example of what folk music's all about––not just a bunch of ticket buyers watching professionals do their thing, but FOLKS making music. 

On the Monday after the Auckland fest, we attended the traditional "survivors' session" at the Bunker, an actual Cold War-era bunker set atop an extinct volcano overlooking Auckland, where folks have been singing unamplified on Monday nights for forty or fifty years. We'd heard plenty of talk about the club's president Roger Giles, a legend who didn't make it to the fest as his health's in decline. When we squeezed in and sat down, we spied an old fella with a big beard and suspenders drinking whiskey and wondered if it was him. Of course it was. A gal named Deb Gillanders loaned me her guitar, passed on to her from a friend who died, so we could sing "Pass It Along", and it was a fitting close to the whole ramble. 

I'm deeply grateful to Finn of Second Hand Touring for booking the tour, giving me the rare pleasure of just going where I'm told and singing for the people. We're also deeply grateful to his family for giving us the run of their beach house in the Northland for the last few days of our stay. We're already talking about another visit in April of 2021, now that we've got a whole family of friends and a new country's burrowed its way deep into our hearts. 

We returned to Edmonton at the beginning of February, and I sure enjoyed the month of domesticity to follow, playing house with Pamela in Edmonton's Riverdale neighbourhood. I was the happiest person shovelling snow on the whole block. Who knew there could be such joy in walking the dog, doing the dishes, and fixing things around the house? My only gripe is how little time there was for visiting pals, occupied as I was with my admin and the work on the book. But I'll be living there on and off through the summer, and come late fall, I'll be hunkering down there for a good long while. Phew. 

It was cold when I left, but I had warm welcomes in Michigan and Chicago, and I've finally made it to where the climate suits my clothes. I hope you're feeling inspired, wherever you are, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for making all this possible. Look out for new songs and a nice long read coming soon. Love from here, your fan, 

s

Hey beauties, 

I'm writing you from Fulong, a fishing village on the northeast coast on Taiwan, a place my heart sails to sometimes when I sleep. I've been holed up here for a week and a half, writing the book to go with the new album, and god, is it ever good to be back on the island. I spent a month in this little town back in 2012, when I took a break from the sauce and the stage to stay put for a change. I answered all my unread email and wrote three songs that month, including one called "Pass It Along" that seems like it'll outlive me. 

It's been another fruitful stay so far. The book's already passed the 30,000-word mark, and I'm digging deeper than I've ever dared, both politically and personally. There's a through line for me here. 

My old pal Crees picked me up from the airport in the early morning last Tuesday, and my spirit soared to see the mountains in the hazy distance. I missed this island so much. The smells here––the ocean, the bamboo groves, the temple, the market, even the motorbike mechanic's shop––give me such a swell of feeling that it's hard to know what to do with it. The first day I rode a pedal-bike around and thrilled at the sight of everything. Thankfully, it's been raining a lot of the time I've been here, so I've actually gotten some writing done. But I did take a couple epic bike rides on the sunny days, and when Pamela arrives on Tuesday I'll surely be showing her around some. 

I played Tiger Mountain Ramble last weekend in Taipei, and it was so sweet, if a little overwhelming, to reconnect with some old pals. I've got four more shows left while I'm here, starting tomorrow: 

Sat Dec 14 • Hualien, TW • house concert w/ Peace Dave and Matt Van Stone opening 
Fri Dec 20 • Taipei, TW • Bobwundaye! with David Chen and Conor Prunty 
Sat Dec 21 • Taichung, TW • Lei Gallery afternoon house concert 
Sun Dec 22 • Xinpu, TW • The Farm w/ Mike Mudd, Megan Ridley, and Soul Flies 

After that, Pamela and I will be flying to New Zealand for the first time, to spend five weeks traveling that gorgeous country. If you've got friends there, PLEASE, send 'em my way! 

Mon-Fri Dec 30-Jan 3 • North Taieri, NZ • Whare Flat Folk Festival 
Sat Jan 4 • Oamaru, NZ • Grainstore Gallery 
Sun Jan 5 • Wanaka, NZ • Bar Number 8 
Wed Jan 8 • Hokitika, NZ • Old Lodge Theatre 
Thu Jan 9 • Barrytown, NZ • The Barrytown Hall 
Fri Jan 10 • Nelson, NZ • The Boathouse 
Sun Jan 12 • Onekaka, NZ • The Mussel Inn 
Wed Jan 15 • Wellington, NZ • The Third Eye 
Thu Jan 16 • Palmerston North, NZ • Globe Theatre 
Fri Jan 17 • New Plymouth, NZ • TSB Festival of Lights 
Sat Jan 18 • Carterton, NZ • house concert 
Wed Jan 22 • Hastings, NZ • The Common Room w/ Danny Priestley 
Thu Jan 23 • Hamilton, NZ • Nivara Lounge w/ The Bollands 
Fri-Mon Jan 24-27 • Auckland, NZ • Auckland Folk Festival 

I'll be taking most of February off in Edmonton, but at the end of the month I'll be hitting the road again, to release the new album around the States. Dates, as they're added, are on my news page. If there's anywhere else you'd like me to play (even if it's your living room!), please drop me a line and hopefully we can make it happen! 

Before I sign off and get back to the writing, I just want to say another huge thanks to all the kind folks who took care of us in Australia. It was such a good visit, and such a joy to reconnect with friends there. We felt especially grateful to be invited to so many festivals, and we dug them all. Special shoutouts from the last month to By The Banks Music Festival (a perfect one-day thing in Albury put on by my favourite Australian band, the Northern Folk) and Healesville MUSIC Festival, an impeccably-organized beauty of a fest just outside Melbourne that WAY more people should know about. 


The biggest heart-full of all for me, though, was Majors Creek Festival, in the Southern Tablelands near Bungendore. The lineup was killer, the stages were close enough together and scheduled so that you could catch a bit of everything, and our poop got composted with sawdust rather than carted away in a chemical soup. They made time in the schedule for This Way North to host their Sass the Patriarchy panel, and I reckon they had about as many women as men on the festival lineup. They had a big circus tent in the middle for the kids. They gave us half-hour changeovers on the stages! Dancing to a salsa band on Saturday night with some rowdy local bros, and even talking sobriety with one, I was reminded of what folk festivals are FOR––bringing the world to some little town, spreading the gospel of music and fun and tolerance and looking after each other, opening minds in a way that speeches just can't. And on the Sunday, hanging and dancing with the locals on the lawn of the little gold-rush era pub, lapping up the evening light with my eyes, and then walking back up the hill under the big Southern sky for one of my last sleeps in Skippy, I had all the feels. 

Skip overheated on the way out of there but we managed to find a shop where they fixed the problem in an hour, and a lady I recognized from the festival sneakily bought our lunch. My friend Bronwyn offered up her house again, and me and Bram stayed there off and on for a couple weeks, and got to play a show in her living room toward the end of it all. Our friends Peter and Jane hosted us for a show in the 90-seat theatre they built specifically for their house concerts (I kid you not), and again provided us the biggest payday of the trip. A bunch of people came back to see us at multiple stops along the way, and about 200 of them pre-ordered the new album, trusting me with their money in exchange for writing their name and address on an envelope. You people are so kind. I won't be back for a while, but it's not for lack of love. Thank you. 

Oh, and Skippy! My friend Tom from Wingham, NSW flew into Melbourne around the time I flew out, got the key off the driver's side tire, and adventured all the way back home. I heard today that Skip just had a successful mission ferrying rabble-rousers to a climate action. So life goes on. I'll miss Skippy, and I'll miss you good people. Again, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. 

Love from the South China Sea-shore, 

s

Howdy friends, 

This here's just a quick g'day from Melbourne, where Bram and I have been enjoying a couple days off before jumping back in the saddle and off to another festival! It's been a good run so far, reconnecting with old friends and making lots of new ones, including two excellent fiddlers named Jeri Foreman and Kat Mear, who've played with us at a couple festivals and will be joining us for a couple more. We also got to join in a Pete Seeger tribute with Pete's pals Mike + Ruthy (who'll be in Canberra tonight, then Beechworth and Sydney) at Kangaroo Valley and Dorrigo Folk and Bluegrass fests, two of the lesser-known jewels in Australia's festival crown. There's always potent magic in the air when you bring that many inspiring, living-out-loud people together in one place. 

I won't be back here for a year and a half, and I'll be riding on the Festival of Small Halls tour bus then, so I'm gonna sell my trusty van Skippy to my friends Trish and Tom at the end of this ride. He hasn't got all the punch he used to have, but it looks like we'll be finishing out the tour together. We've also managed to fill in our last few open dates (including two with great young Tasmanian songwriter Teri Young!), so here's how the rest of month's looking: 

Thu Nov 7 • Violet Town, VIC • Babblers Cafe 
Fri-Sun Nov 8-10 • Majors Creek, NSW • Majors Creek Festival (w/ Jeri Foreman) 
Wed Nov 13 • Lauriston, VIC • house concert w/ Teri Young opening! 
Fri Nov 15 • Seymour, VIC • house concert w/ Teri Young opening! 
Sat Nov 16 • Healesville, VIC • Healesville MUSIC Festival (w/ Kat Mear) 
Sun Nov 17 • Glenlyon, VIC • afternoon house concert (w/ Kat Mear) 
Fri Nov 22 • Eaglemont, VIC • house concert 
Sat Nov 23 • Mildura, VIC • Live at the Club 
Sun Nov 24 • McLaren Vale-ish, SA • secret show w/ a SURPRISE act! 
Thu Nov 28 • Melbourne, VIC • Yarra Hotel (w/ Kat Mear) 
Fri Nov 29 • Melbourne, VIC • St. George's Hall with Men In Suits (w/ Kat Mear) 
Sat Nov 30 • Albury, NSW • By The Banks Music Festival (w/ Kat Mear) 
Sun Dec 1 • Yackandandah, VIC • Arts Yackandandah show at Yack Station (w/ Kat Mear) 

I wish I could tell you who we're sharing that South Australia show with, but I can't! All I can tell you is they're a pretty big deal, and it's gonna be a night to remember. It's also gonna be my last show in SA until at least 2021 and likely 2022. If you want in on it, drop a line to scottcooksongs@gmail.com and I'll put you in touch with the organizer. All the details for all these shows, as always, are on my news page. 

The morning after our Yackandandah show, Skippy'll be going to his new owners, Bram'll be getting on a plane back home, and I'll be flying to Taiwan via Singapore. My main mission on my old stomping grounds is writing the book that'll accompany my upcoming album out into the world, but I'll also be playing a handful of shows while I'm there: 

Sat Dec 7 • Taipei, TW • Tiger Mountain Ramble Outdoor Music Festival 
Sat Dec 14 • Hualien, TW • house concert 
Fri Dec 20 • Taipei, TW • Bobwundaye with David Chen and Conor Prunty 
Sat Dec 21 • Taichung, TW • Lei Gallery afternoon house concert 

Pamela will be joining me halfway through the Taiwan stay for a brief taste of my second home (and her first green Christmas!), then we'll be flying to Christchurch together via a stopover in Guangzhou. I'm over the moon to be taking this trip together, and doubly so after talking with our Kiwi songwriter pal Kerryn Fields about her beautiful country! The dates are as follows: 

Mon-Fri Dec 30-Jan 3 • North Taieri, NZ • Whare Flat Folk Festival 
Sat Jan 4 • Oamaru, NZ • Grainstore Gallery 
Sun Jan 5 • Wanaka, NZ • Bar Number 8 
Wed Jan 8 • Hokitika, NZ • Old Lodge Theatre 
Thu Jan 9 • Barrytown, NZ • The Barrytown Hall 
Fri Jan 10 • Nelson, NZ • The Boathouse 
Sun Jan 12 • Onekaka, NZ • The Mussel Inn 
Wed Jan 15 • Wellington, NZ • The Third Eye 
Thu Jan 16 • Palmerston North, NZ • Globe Theatre 
Fri Jan 17 • New Plymouth, NZ • TSB Festival of Lights 
Sat Jan 18 • Carterton, NZ • house concert 
Wed Jan 22 • Hastings, NZ • The Common Room w/ Danny Priestley 
Thu Jan 23 • Hamilton, NZ • Nivara Lounge w/ The Bollands 
Fri-Mon Jan 24-27 • Auckland, NZ • Auckland Folk Festival 

I've got a month off at home in February, and then I'll be releasing the new album with a string of tour dates around the United States in in March and April, and a Canadian trio tour in May and June. All the confirmed dates so far are on my news page, but there's still plenty of room in my schedule, so please drop a line if you'd like to see your town on my route! 

I'm too busy organizing all the roads ahead to say much about the roads behind, but I would like to offer my sincerest thanks to the kind people down here who've been taking such good care of us this past month. It's been a great visit, and we've sung for open hearts at every stop. Bless all the volunteer energy that makes these things happen, the good people still willing to gather with friends they haven't met yet, and the tangled grapevine that brings 'em together. 

Stay kind, y'all. And we'll see you down the road. 

Big love, 

s

Hey beauties, 

This Travelogue's coming to you from Oodies Cafe in Bundaberg, Queensland, where I played the first show of this Australian ramble last night alongside dear friend, fine songteller, and beautiful soul Michael Waugh. I couldn't ask for a better guy to start the tour with. He sings straight from the heart, in the vernacular ("Aussie as, 'til I dinkum die"), about growing up in rural East Gippsland and all the complicated stuff that makes us human. They're touching, funny songs, nostalgic but unflinching, unafraid to address the hard stuff––toxic masculinity, homophobia, Australia's racist history, cancer, and dying––with big-hearted compassion. They're songs ordinary Aussies can relate to. They're songs white Australia needs to hear. And most importantly, they're love songs, from a man who loves his family, his people, and humankind. Michael Waugh makes me want to keep singing. 

I landed in this country Tuesday morning, and was surprised to see snowcaps on the tallest mountains, never having been here so early in the season before. My retired mechanic buddy Tom picked me up at the Melbourne airport in my trusty Toyota van Skippy, who is amazingly still ready to ramble after a bunch of tinkering by Tom. Legends, the both of 'em! 

Tom and I missioned out to Liz Frencham's place in Trentham where we loaded Skip up with boxes of CDs and all the requisite luxuries of van life before pointing him northeastward, to drop Tom off in Corowa and carry on alone. It felt pretty surreal, having just escaped the jaws of a record-breaking early snowstorm in Alberta four days ago, to be barreling through the sunny Australian countryside. I made it to Jugiong the first night, camped by the Murrumbidgee River, then onward to Woy Woy for a stop at my vacationing friends Michael and Ina's lovely oasis, where I finished "Fellas, Get Out the Way" a few years back. After another long day behind the wheel, I made my younger self proud by van-camping in a rest area, and climbed back into the driver's seat at sunrise for the last stretch of the nearly 30-hour journey up the country. Last night, though, Michael was kind enough to get me a hotel room, and while I probably wouldn't have forked over for it myself, I was mighty grateful for it. And after three days listening to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Democracy Now! podcasts, Pimsleur Spanish and Chinese lessons, and a straight binge of the Heaven's Gate podcast (about the cult who committed mass suicide to get on a spaceship following Comet Hale-Bopp), I was mighty grateful to have some real live company for a change too. 

We've got one more show together tonight, then I've got two on my own, and by next weekend it'll be back to a trio, with Bram flying into Brisbane and Liz driving up to join us. We've got a pretty nice schedule together, including a bunch of festivals we haven't played before, but there are still a few choice dates hanging open in VIC and SA, so if you're keen to host, or know someone who might be, please do get in touch! I won't be back down under 'til March of 2021, and I'll be playing solo then, with the Festival of Small Halls, so I won't be able to add any dates of my own around that tour. 

Long story short, if you want to catch the She'll Be Rights in action, or bring us to your town, this'll be your last chance for a good long time. Here's the schedule so far: 

Sat Oct 5 • Hervey Bay, QLD • house concert with Michael Waugh 
Sun Oct 6 • Maryborough, QLD • Brolga Theatre Riverside Stage (solo) 
Tue Oct 8 • Brisbane, QLD • Brisbane Unplugged (solo) with Christine Venner-Westaway 
Fri Oct 11 • Nambour, QLD • Blackbox Theatre with the She'll Be Rights! 
Sat Oct 12 • Nanango, QLD • The Shed 
Sun Oct 13 • Tintenbar, NSW • Tintenbar UpFront 
Wed Oct 16 • Shoal Bay, NSW • house concert 
Thu Oct 17 • Wingham, NSW • Wingham Akoostik pre-party 
Fri-Sun Oct 18-20 • Kangaroo Valley, NSW • Kangaroo Valley Folk Fest 
Tue Oct 22 • Candelo, NSW • Candelo Cafe 
Wed Oct 23 • Moruya, NSW • St. John's Parish Hall 
Thu Oct 24 • Newcastle, NSW • Whitebridge house concert 
Fri-Sun Oct 25-27 • Dorrigo, NSW • Dorrigo Folk and Bluegrass Festival 
Tue Oct 29 • Sydney, NSW • Leichhardt Bowlo 
Wed Oct 30 • Stanwell Park, NSW • SOL fundraiser at CWA Hall 
Thu Oct 31 • ???, VIC • OPEN DATE, anyone want to host? 
Fri-Mon Nov 1-4 • Maldon, VIC • Maldon Folk Fest 
Thu Nov 7 • Violet Town, VIC • Babblers Cafe 
Fri-Sun Nov 8-10 • Majors Creek, NSW • Majors Creek Folk Fest 
Wed Nov 13 • ???, VIC • OPEN DATE 
Thu Nov 14 • ???, VIC • OPEN DATE 
Fri Nov 15 • ???, VIC • OPEN DATE 
Sat Nov 16 • Healesville, VIC • Healesville Music Fest 
Sun Nov 17 • Glenlyon, VIC • afternoon house concert 
Fri Nov 22 • Eaglemont, VIC • house concert 
Sat Nov 23 • Mildura, VIC • The Club 
Sun Nov 24 • ???, SA • secret show!!! 
Tue Nov 26 • ???, SA • OPEN DATE 
Wed Nov 27 • ???, SA • OPEN DATE 
Thu Nov 28 • ???, VIC • OPEN DATE 
Fri Nov 29 • Melbourne, VIC • St. George's Hall with Men In Suits 
Sat Nov 30 • Albury, NSW • By The Banks Music Festival 
Sun Dec 1 • Yackandandah, VIC • Arts Yack show at Yack Station 

After this tour wraps up I'm headed to Taiwan for a month of mostly downtime, to work on the book for the upcoming album. It's proving to be a bigger undertaking than I thought, both getting the recording finished, and delving into some deep personal stuff with the writing, but I'm committing to a March release, and I'll be taking pre-orders during this Australian tour. In January I'm happy to announce that I'll be visiting New Zealand for the first time, and it looks like I'll be spending February back on Taiwan. More on all that in next month's Hobo Travelogue, but for now there's lots in the rearview to tell you about. 

The last stretch of my northern summer was full-on, but full of good things, so I really can't complain. Justin Farren, his wonderful partner Kerry, and their hella precocious three-year-old Amelia drove up from California for a run around, and it was an unmitigated joy to spend a couple weeks in their company, to revel in Justin's songcraft every night, and to show them some of my favourite parts of the world. We played to small but enthusiastic audiences in Vernon, Keremeos, and Castlegar, and took the ferry across Kootenay Lake to sing for a bunch of kind folks in the lovely lodge at Timbuktu. There were open hearts everywhere we went. 

Canmore Folk Fest kindly co-produced a show for us in the theatre at artsPlace that Pamela came down to join us for, and we sat together in the top row and laughed and cried through Justin's whole set. Like a lot of people discovering his music for the first time, me saying that he's as good as it gets had still left her somewhat unprepared for how deeply moving it was. I've heard him over a dozen times now, and he still made me cry every night. 

Last time I opted not to post any Youtube videos, but I've just gotta share this one, my favourite from the tour, and truly, my current favourite song in the whole world, "A Little Less Time". 

His daughter Amelia knows pretty much all the words to all of his songs, and would sing and dance along throughout the shows, then stay up for as long as the party went on every night. Regardless of how late we got to bed, she was still always up and back into it by 8am. Touring with a three-year old's a far cry from my debauched old days ;) 

Along the tour I kept hearing from people who were at Salmon Arm Roots and Blues, where my pal Irish Mythen closed out the festival with a singalong of "Pass It Along," with Valdy and a whole bunch of other performers onstage, and the words up on the screen for the crowd to sing. It gave me no end of songwritery joy to know that the song was out in the world doing its thing in such good hands. 

Pamela set the Farrens up at her place for a four-day stay in Edmonton, and we had a couple lovely local shows: for a few hundred folks on the lawn at Festival Place's Patio Series, and for a cozy crowd in Riverdale House, just a couple blocks from Pamela's place. On the Friday we drove down to Medicine Hat to play Ye Olde Jar Bar, a gig in a memorabilia-stuffed garage that happens to be one of the best venues in Western Canada. Our hosts Piet and Ina offered to host at the last minute, seeing as we had a Friday gaping open, and it ended up being the show that put the whole tour in the black. God bless the Jar Bar. 

We rounded out the weekend at Waynestock in Wayne, Alberta, a tiny town reached by eleven bridges crossing the Rosebud River as it winds through the coulees of Alberta's badlands. Justin played a low-key set in the Saloon, with no stage, a dodgy PA, and a flow of chatty patrons ordering drinks, but we did our best to spread the word to our pals, who crowded in close and sat on the floor, and he managed to pull off something supernatural. I don't think there was a dry eye in the place by the time he was done. 

That night we hung out at Swear By the Moon's campsite with a bunch of nears and dears, catching up and swapping songs around a bunch of candles that made a nice stand-in for a campfire, and I felt ever so grateful for my family of friends. 

I had a couple more days around Edmonton, and even managed to take in a couple Fringe plays with Pamela, but before I'd even settled back in I had to fly out to New York for a run that I'd started planning almost a year before. The first stop was Turtle Hill Folk Festival outside Rochester, New York: a lovely thing built around a weekly group sing, with a bunch of instructional workshops during the days and three acts on the main stage each night. It was a real honour to sing for (and with) that audience, and they kindly relieved me of 101 CDs on the first stop of the trip! 

From there I headed to New York City to play my first-ever gig there, for John Platt's On Your Radar series, a show I'd attended back in 2008 and thought I might like to play some day. A bunch of folks from Falcon Ridge showed up, and I was pretty tickled to know people in New York. Over the next five days I played a house concert in Baltimore, MD; a Unitarian church in the countryside of Wyoming, PA; another house concert in an old Philadelphia mansion that now houses circus performers; a concert series in a Unitarian church on Long Island, and a packed house concert in Dover, NH for some folks (also Unitarians!) who'd found me at Falcon Ridge. 

I was contending with some familiar, but newly invigorated, doubts along the trip, some of which I'm writing about in the book that'll accompany the new album. But I sure was grateful for the people's belief in the power of song. Even if they didn't realize it, we were holding each other up. 

Gigging six nights in a row can be tiring, especially when you're meeting a ton of people and having heartfelt conversations every night, but my new friend Eliza (who I'd also met at Falcon Ridge) managed to find me a spot for four days in solitude, in one of her students' dads' incredibly luxurious guest suite. The kindness of strangers never ceases to amaze me. 

I played for Eliza's students one of those days, and though I get way more nervous about getting up in front of a bunch of schoolkids than a barroom full of grownups, I had a good time. I had the honour of opening for Garnet Rogers in a Unitarian church in Morristown, NJ the next night, and the following night I went back to NYC for a show at People's Voice Cafe, a social justice-themed concert series in a Unitarian Church in Midtown Manhattan. God (or Goddess, or gods, or no god) bless the Unitarians! 

I took the bus into NYC around lunchtime that day to have a look around Manhattan, and walked for a while on the High Wire, a bit of disused overhead train track that's been converted into a public park, with gardens and trees (both deliberately planted and self-seeded), green spaces, and public art. I marvelled at the parking garages where they stack the cars in a grid five high, dug the old buildings, marvelled at the rusting infrastructure and the ports and piers on the Hudson, and feasted my eyes on the people, the panoply of styles, the cacophony of noise, and the vast heap of human dreams and yearnings turning in a city that size. After walking for quite a while, realizing just how big Manhattan Island is, and being passed by plenty of people on blue Citi Bikes, I took a quick look on the app store, and found out I could rent one for free on my first day! Within five minutes I was zipping along with the throng, gulping eyefuls of the city like a dog with its head out the car window and its tongue hanging out. I rode to Battery Park and saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time. I rode to Wall Street, and to Ground Zero, where the footprints of 1 and 2 World Trade Center have been turned into fountains with the names of the dead inscribed around the railings. I rode through Chinatown, dug the Empire State Building, and weaved through traffic up Broadway. It was scary and awesome. 

After the show I had a brisk walk to the bus station and a couple rooftop beers with fellow folksingers Jean Rohe and Ben Grosscup, and then got back on a bus out of the big town. I look forward to returning April 18 for Voices In the Heights in Brooklyn, and I might even stay a bit longer, we'll see! 

The next day I drove to Ithaca to play America's longest-running live folk radio show, Bound For Glory, where I sang my version of "Walk That Lonesome Valley," with the verse about Daniel Berrigan, only to find out that he'd spoken multiple times on that very stage! I drove out after the show, crossing the border around 3am and making it to Toronto, albeit exhaustedly, in time for my flight home. 

The rush was on account of tight scheduling on the other end; I had just four days at home before I had to leave for two last shows with the Second Chances (a great return visit to Olde Smokey's in Rocky Mountain House, and my long-dreamed-of first appearance at the Beneath the Arch concert series in Turner Valley) before my flight to Oz the next day. That's how my news has been sounding for a while now, I know. Plenty of people ask me (and have been asking me for a long time) how I do it. The short answer's that I love it. But the longer answer's more complicated, and it involves the difficulty of learning to slow down. It's a personal struggle of mine, and a broader problem in our culture. It's part of what I'm writing about for this book. But it'll have to wait for the book, 'cause I've gotta wrap this thing up! 

One more bit of news I wanna share with you before I go: my dear friend and longtime inspiration Corin Raymond's putting out a new album called Dirty Mansions (https://corinraymond.com/dirty-mansions), with a package that stretches the very concept of liner notes, even by our standards––a 264-page book! In a time when people are saying the CD (and maybe even the whole idea of an album) is dead, he's doubling down. He and I truly believe that we lost something when we got all the music in the world at our fingertips for next-to-free: we lost some of the joy of discovery; the foreplay, as Corin calls it; and in some sense, the value that an album used to have, back when we used to buy them, put them on, and listen to the whole thing. All that old joy's still available to us, it just means unplugging from what they tell us must be "the new model of music distribution"––a system that pays artists fractions of pennies, and cheapens everything it touches. 

Our mutual friend Emma Jane's also leading a deliberate revolt against the streaming platforms with another deliciously anachronistic idea: a CD Club! Remember Columbia House? It's pretty much the same idea, but better curated. For $25/month, you’ll receive a brand new CD in the mail each month, chosen by the ever-tasteful Emma Jane, in beautiful CD CLUB branding, the first of which will be Dirty Mansions. If you're up for a new (old) kinda of musical journey, you can sign up here. 

Alright, I've got a tour to get back to! If you've got friends in Oz who'd like the songs, I'd love to meet 'em! All the dates and deets, as they're confirmed, are on my news page. 

Keep shining, friends! The world needs your light. 

Troubadouringly yours, 

s

Hey beauties, 

I hope the season's treating you sweetly. I'm home, after six weeks and some 13,700 kms in Lucky, and I'm feeling pretty lucky about it all. Lucky to have completed, just yesterday, 43 laps around the sun! And lucky to think that the best ones may still be ahead. 

The most exciting news on the horizon is that my buddy Justin Farren and his family are already on their way up from California for a little run of shows, and we're heading out tomorrow morning to meet them in Vernon! If you're anywhere near us, you REALLY oughtta experience the man and his surprising songs while they're in this corner of the world! Justin is as good as it gets. I don't say that lightly, or often, for that matter. And have I ever steered you wrong? 

We did a run together in Oregon and Northern California last September, and Justin wowed me every night. I saw him again at Falcon Ridge two weekends back, and he absolutely destroyed me with his new songs. It's gonna be his first visit to this part of the world, and he's bringing his wonderful wife and kiddo along too. Seriously, make a road trip to see this show! It'll be worth it. 

I thought about posting a bunch of videos of my favourites, but that just led me down another Justin Farren Youtube rabbit hole. On popping back out, I thought better of it, both because it's so hard to pick favourites, but more importantly, 'cause I don't wanna spoil the endings! Come hear 'em in person, living and breathing, like we still can, and you'll see what I mean. I'll bring the Second Chances, you bring your friends, and Justin'll bring his incredible, intricate and undeniable songs to these few choice stops: 

Wed Aug 21 • Vernon, BC • Gallery Vertigo 
Thu Aug 22 • Keremeos, BC • The Old Grist Mill 
Fri Aug 23 • Castlegar, BC • Castlegar Public Library Amphitheatre 
Sat Aug 24 • Gray Creek, BC • The Lodge at Timbuktu 
Sun Aug 25 • Canmore, AB • artsPlace 
Wed Aug 28 • Sherwood Park, AB • Festival Place Patio Series with Colleen Rae 
Thu Aug 29 • Edmonton, AB • Riverdale House 
Fri Aug 30 • Medicine Hat, AB • Ye Olde Jar Bar 
Sat-Sun Aug 31-Sep 1 • Wayne, AB • Waynestock 

All the details, as always, are on my news page. After the tour with the Farren family I'll be dropping the band off at home and flying out on my own for a run of solo gigs in the Northeast: 

Sat-Sun Sep 7-8 • Rush, NY • Turtle Hill Folk Fest 
Sun Sep 8 • Schuyler Lake, NY • private event 
Tue Sep 10 • New York, NY • On Your Radar at Rockwood Music Hall with Grace Morrison and Crowes Pasture 
Wed Sep 11 • Baltimore, MD • Awkward Pause House Concerts 
Thu Sep 12 • Wyoming, PA • Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Wyoming Valley 
Fri Sep 13 • Philadelphia, PA • Philadelphia Folksong Society house concert 
Sat Sep 14 • Bayshore, NY • Eclectic Cafe 
Sun Sep 15 • Dover, NH • house concert 
Fri Sep 20 • Morristown, NJ • opening for Garnet Rogers at the Troubadour Acoustic Concert Series 
Sat Sep 21 • New York, NY • People's Voice Cafe with Mike Glick 
Sun Sep 22 • Ithaca, NY • Bound For Glory 

I'll be back in Alberta for two more gigs with the Second Chances, including a long-awaited first visit to the wonderful Beneath The Arch concert series in Turner Valley, where we're hoping to record a live album! 

Fri Sep 27 • Rocky Mountain House, AB • Olde Smokey's BBQ Shack with Allen Christie 
Sat Sep 28 • Turner Valley, AB • Beneath The Arch concert and live recording 

Bram and I are off to Australia for two months after that, and we've got a pretty full festival calendar, including Kangaroo Valley, Dorrigo, Maldon, Majors Creek, Healesville, and By The Banks, along with other stops in QLD, NSW, VIC and possibly TAS––dates are on my news page, with a few more to come! I'd been hoping that these shows would serve as release dates for the new album we recorded while we were down there last time, but unfortunately, it's not gonna be done by then. 

We aimed higher this time. The material's really challenging, instrumentally and vocally. The songs were mostly new, with some still being worked out while we were in the studio, and one (a hopeful anthem for America called "Say Can You See") not even written yet. I've covered WAY too much ground since then to find the time for finishing the recording, let alone writing THE BIG-ASS BOOK that's gonna accompany this thing out into the world. 

Talking with Pamela along our trip, I was repeatedly reminded that great stuff can't be rushed, and art's more important than timelines. So rather than boxes of CDs, we'll be bringing a box of envelopes along on the Australian tour. If you want in on this record, you can fill one out with your mailing address, and thirty bucks inside, and you'll get your copy before it hits the streets. 

It looks like I'll be spending December holed up in Fulong, Taiwan––the little beach town where I wrote "Pass It Along" years ago––finishing the writing for the book and laying the groundwork for the release. In January I'll be touring in New Zealand for the first time (including stops at Whare Flat Folk Fest and Auckland Folk Fest), in February I'll be off the clock in Latin America somewhere, and in March I'll release the album with a four-month tour through the States and Canada. Dates, as they're added, are on www.scottcook.net/news.php, and you can always drop a line if you want me to make a stop in your neighbourhood. 

So yeah, that's a quick look at the road ahead, but there sure is a lot to tell from the road that's just passed, mostly just because, as you travellers know, so much happens in day on the road! Last I wrote, Pamela Mae and I were getting geared up for a cross-country road-trip. We kicked off the summer with another joyful family reunion at the North Country Fair, on through to the Afterbender at the Empress Ale House, and the next morning we loaded out from Pamela's place in Riverdale, put the bikes on the back, reset the trip odometer, and headed east! We stopped in to visit and sing a couple songs for her mom and family in Lloydminster, and then stopped in North Battleford to visit her Grandma Mae Johnson, about whom Pamela wrote the eponymous song, a song that went on to coax a lot of tears and stories out of people over the course of our trip. Grandma Mae didn't cry when we played it for her, but she was evidently tickled, even though she argued that her name was an awful name for a song :) 

Our first gig was that night in Saskatoon, a bar show with a small guarantee and a tip jar, the kind I used to play all the time when I was getting started. One of my favourites in those early years was actually in Saskatoon, at a place called the Spadina Freehouse. The crowd there would mostly be talking and eating, but some of them would pay attention as the night wore on, the bar would give me dinner and drinks and a decent guarantee, and their sound guy Jamie Peever was an early believer in me, back when those were fewer and farther between. When my buddy John Antoniuk offered me this gig at the Capitol Music Club, I asked Pamela what she thought of doing a gig like that. It all sounded like fun to her, since it was her first tour, so I took it, along with another similar bar show in Halifax, as bookends for the whole thing. I was tickled when we walked in that night to see our sound tech was none other than Jamie Peever. There wasn't much dinner crowd at all, but a few folks came out to see me, and a whole bunch more came out to see Pamela, and our first gig together went pretty sweetly. Afterward we hung with our friends Jille and Ryan from bluegrass and oldtime duo Rugged Little Thing, who rounded up some pals for a sweet jam at their place. With voices and fiddles and banjos and guitars and laughter ringing through that little house, doors wide open to the warm prairie night, and stars glittering overhead, it was as good as tour gets. Remember this, I said, when it gets awful, but it never really did :) 

Jille told us a great story that night, about her social studies teacher in high school, an eccentric fella who threw their textbook in the garbage the morning of 9/11. He made them watch the CBC evening news for homework, and he'd check that they had done so by some random questions, quite often including what colour of tie Peter Mansbridge was wearing. Jille remembered the class putting together a package for Mr. Mansbridge, with a letter and a pink tie, and her delight when he appeared on the evening news wearing their tie! It was the first of many stories we'd hear along the trip about great teachers, and what a difference one person can make, by example, in people's lives. 

Our next stop was a family reunion of a whole bunch of distant relatives, organized by my Uncle Bruce Farrer, who's actually my second cousin, I think, but who I've known since I was a kid, when he united our families through his genealogical searches. He was one such exceptional teacher, teaching grade 9 for 40 years in rural Saskatchewan. Every year, he'd get his students to write a letter to themselves twenty years in the future, asking questions about what their lives had turned out to be. Now retired, he's still tracking down his former students every year and mailing out the letters on schedule. "The last box [of letters] is dated 2026, I'll be in my 80's. Hopefully still with it mentally and I'll be able to find the last few students," he said in one of the stories the CBC ran about it. Westjet even made a video tribute, which is really worth watching, here. 

Bruce organized a ton of activities, including lining us all up in front of our places on a family tree that covered three walls. There were about sixty people there, most of whom I'd never met, but he'd booked me well in advance to sing for the gathering, which Pamela and I did, on Friday night and Saturday afternoon. It was really wonderful getting to know them, and finding kindred souls among these relatives that I barely knew. 

Pamela and I were among the few folks in the RV camping, and once we got talking to our neighbours, it turned out they knew her family; their hobby shop even sponsored her dad's stock car! Coincidences like that just kept coming along the trip. That evening we went to play a backyard concert in Regina for a lady named Tracy who I'd never met, but is the mom of my friend Morgan, a pal from my early days in Taiwan whom I last visited in South Africa. Pamela wrote her aunt, who lives in Regina, to let her know about the house concert, and her aunt replied that she was already booked in––her and Tracy are best friends! 

While we were all hanging out in the backyard, I explained the reunion we'd just been at, and one of the fellas said "Bruce Farrer?!? He was my teacher!" Turned out he'd been one of the kids that got the letter from his younger self. 

The next day we drove to Winnipeg for a house concert at "Tell the Band to Go Home" radio host Jeff Robson's place, and went out afterward to the Times Change(d) High and Lonesome Club, a place I figured Pamela shouldn't pass by without visiting on her first trip across Canada. It was a Sunday night, which is blues jam, hosted by Big Dave McLean. It turned out that Dave had just been awarded the Order Of Canada, so they were celebrating the news. I hugged a bunch of Winnipals, we had a dance, and it was everything I could ask for on a night out in Winnipeg. The next day was Canada Day, and we rode our bikes to the Forks, where the Red and Assiniboine rivers meet, a meeting place for native folks since time immemorial, now the site of the Canadian Museum of Human Rights (which we had a brief but moving look around), and the location for the day's festivities. 

That afternoon we drove out to Rushing River campground near Kenora, and actually stopped and took a picture at the "Welcome to Ontario" sign, something that I'd never done, but seemed fitting on Pamela's first visit. The next day of that interminably-long trip around the North side of Lake Superior, we stopped in Thunder Bay to visit my friend Lara, and Pamela saw fireflies for her first time on Lara's brother's farm. The next day we had breakfast at the Hoito, a restaurant run by Thunder Bay's Finlandia association, a relic of another time, and another iconic stop along the mythical cross-Canada road-trip. 

We also stopped by the big goose in Wawa to shoot a video for "Pass It Along", which will appear (along with an earlier clip from the Dog River grain elevator in Saskatchewan, and a later clip from a lighthouse on Cape Breton Island) in the Canadian Folk Music Awards / Prix de musique folk canadienne' 2019 "National Strum" video. I'll let you know when it drops, dear readers. 

In Sault Ste. Marie we played a house concert for some folks who'd reached out to me a couple years back. His family happened to be over from Ireland for a visit, and after the show (and the Fourth of July fireworks from across the river in Sault Ste. Marie Michigan) we stayed up around the fire, tasting some fine scotches from their neighbour, the self-styled "Wandering Whisky Whisperer," and singing songs in the flickering light. One fella sang an Irish song a cappella, in the traditional style, a moving ballad about a father who was dying, and his family joined in singing as it went. One of the folks there remarked afterward that he'd never heard anyone sing unaccompanied like that. Some of our traditions may have faded in the glow of our screens, but they're still there, little fires rekindled every time we return to feed them. 

The next day we pulled into Orillia to play the grande dame of Canadian folk festivals, Mariposa. It was at Mariposa that Estelle Klein broadened the notion of "folk" programming in Canada, and introduced the "workshop" format, which in Canada means not someone giving an instructional presentation, but rather a bunch of musicians who've never played together before taking turns leading songs and collaborating. It's where the most magical moments happen at Canadian folk festivals, and as time goes on it's spreading to other fests around the world. 

It was an honour to finally play that fest, a blast to do it with Bramwell (who was out visiting his family in Ontario) and Brian Kobayakawa, a joy to swim in Lake Couchiching and Lake Simcoe right next to the stages, and another bit of classic Canadiana to hear Gordon Lightfoot sing "If You Could Read My Mind" just before Jason Isbell took the stage on Sunday night. Oh, and there were fireflies again, in the tall grass along the roadside as we rode our bikes back to the hotel. 

After the fest and all that driving we took three days off in Algonquin Park, swimming in Canisbay Lake, picking tunes around the fire, and just being. Pamela reckons that was her favourite part of the trip. 

From there we made our way to Toronto for another, to my mind, quintessential bit of Canadiana: Corin Raymond and the Sundowners' Thursday residency at the Cameron House. Bram came out for his first time as well, the room was packed with hearty singers, and the love was thick in the air. After the show we biked down Queen Street to watch Freddy & Francine, friends of ours from California via Nashville, who slayed at Mariposa and completely blew the minds of the thirty or so people lucky enough to be there that night. 

Early the next morning we left Lucky in the Toronto airport parking and flew to Oklahoma for the Woody Guthrie Folk Festival, making a stop along the way at the Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa, where they still had on display the pieces Woody wrote about his ruthless, racist landlord, Fred Trump. Those days aren't so different from these. 

We'd been reading an article from Pamela's friend Charlie along the trip, about the Dust Bowl days and the New Deal; how a man-made environmental crisis got so bad that it gave rise to serious public action on an unprecedented scale, drawing the obvious parallel to climate change and the sweeping vision of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez' Green New Deal. It's a long read, but it's well worth reading, both to be reminded of the weight of resistance from entrenched interests that a big change like that needs to overcome, and of the power to accomplish the unthinkable that lives in a historic moment like the one we're facing now. Have a read, here. 

Oklahoma is deeply conservative, but the celebration of Woody's legacy brought a beautiful and diverse group of folks together. Besides the concerts, there were talks on a variety of subjects, including a profound presentation on West Virginia's coal mining and labor history by Tom Breiding, who works with the United Mine Workers, recounting some of the open warfare between strikers and company thugs covered in the movie Matewan, history that's incredibly relevant today. After the stages shut down, the artists jammed til the wee hours out in front of the Days Inn, and to me that was the beating heart of the festival, a bunch of ramblers swapping songs in a parking lot. 

We flew back from Oklahoma and out to Ottawa for a Monday night house concert that some folks had driven over an hour to attend, and felt incredibly grateful and humbled by that. We spent the next two days exploring the gorgeous old streets of Montreal and Quebec, and finally made it to cute little Fredericton, a town Pamela reckoned she could actually live in. 

Our next stop was Prince Edward Island, for Rollo Bay Fiddle Festival, a 43 year-old beauty of a gathering that I'd heard about years ago in Australia from the East Pointers, who have taken over the running of the festival from their older relatives. We played for a lovely audience in the barn that first night, and on the outdoor stage the next day, learned to dance the local square dance ("the Souris set"), and reunited with friends from Edmonton including our dear friend Laurel-Lee, who was born there. Late on the last night of the fest, I went by the Tuning Room (a building next to the stage), and saw what I reckoned was the real heart of that festival: fiddlers of all ages, some little kids falling asleep in their chairs, a piano pounding out the chords, whistles, guitars, all kinds of instruments, and tune after tune rolling out, one into the next, nobody even calling the names of them but everyone picking them up and joining in, and occasionally getting up to dance. That right there was the fire. Old folks lit it, and thankfully there are young folks tending it today. 

PEI's bigger than I knew, with all its corners and valleys and coves and villages, but in a way it's just one big small town. It seemed like half the people I met at the fest introduced themselves as a cousin, uncle, or aunt of the East Pointers. And we saw it again and again over the next couple days, at a big family gathering at Laurel-Lee's family's place, and at a lovely sold-out show at the Trailside Music Inn with my Aussie pal Liz Stringer: the close connections, the way everybody's known each other forever, the importance of family reputation and place in the community. "Who's your father?", Laurel-Lee's dad would ask, and soon enough he'd established a connection to everyone. 

We left PEI for Cape Breton, where my shows hadn't materialized but we decided to spend a couple days exploring anyway, and wow, what a beautiful corner of the world that is! We were sorry not to make it to Newfoundland (I've still never been), but again I was astounded at the breadth of our country. A month isn't nearly long enough to drive across it. 

After our bookend bar gig in Halifax and a last night on the Fundy shore, Pamela flew home to play Blueberry Bluegrass festival with her band The Strawflowers, and I made my way homeward via the venerable Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in upstate New York. My friends Jake and Ethan from Pesky J. Nixon told me about it seven years ago; they program an unpaid, unofficial stage on Thursday night, and there's an "Emerging Artists Showcase" on Friday afternoon where some two dozen artists sing two songs each on main stage. I'd always figured I couldn't make the trip without actually getting hired, but seeing as I'd be in the neighbourhood this year, I figured I may as well go, and I'm glad I did. It was a really warm welcome into that community, and I was surprised at how many friends I already had there. 

The main stage had American Sign Language interpreters all weekend, and they were all captivating performers, dancing, signifying, and emoting the lyrics with such grace and skill. During "Fellas, Get Out the Way" in the Emerging Artists Showcase, I asked her to show the sign for "malarkey" again, 'cause I'd missed it while I was singing. And then "matriarchy," which to my delight turned out to be the signs for "women" and "in charge". 

There had been a lot of Trump-denouncing on stage throughout the weekend, which I have mixed feelings about, mostly because I don't know what we hope to accomplish by it, especially in a liberal bubble like that. On Sunday, though, the outside world intruded into that bubble, with the news about the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton. And for the next couple days, driving homeward alone, all the flags at half-staff and the voices on the radio asking why kept it close to my mind. It felt like something of a relief to pull back into Canada, my adopted country, a country where an idea like public health care isn't seen as a communist plot, and where angry young white men are way less likely to mow down a bunch of strangers. But we sink or swim together here on Turtle Island, and the same hatred and division that's being sown down South can take root up North too. I only hope that music can help to bring people together rather than drive them apart, that we can open a tent wide enough to welcome everybody in, and let the gathering do the teaching. 

My last stop was Trout Forest Music Festival in Ear Falls, Ontario, a supremely low-key gathering of mostly Winnipeg music scenesters and country folks from the area. It was great. It was everything a folk fest should be. The last act on main stage was a true Canadian-style workshop, bringing together a Winnipeg fiddle group, a trio of Métis Red River Jig dancers, and an amazing flamenco group that the artistic directors met on their travels in Cuba. The stage was on fire. The audience was all on their feet at the end, dancing along, and I cried for the first time that weekend, seeing the wide world come together in the middle of nowhere, and both sides being changed for it. 

I said my goodbyes and drove out the gates to the strains of the last song, "On The Road Again," and I felt pretty lucky about it all. 

That's it for now, friends! If you're anywhere nearby, I sure hope to see you when I roll through with Justin, and if you're further afield, I look forward to our paths crossing when they do. Stay kind, keep shining, 

s

Hey friends, 

This Hobo Travelogue's coming to you from my friend Lisi's cabin on Lac St. Anne, Alberta, the place I holed up back in February when I was writing songs for the new album. It's perfect to be back here now, as I'm recording the remaining lead vocals and a few leftover bits of guitar, settling on the wording for the last few songs, and tracking a brand new one that I wrote during my run in the Pacific Northwest last month. It's doubly wonderful to see summer arriving on the lake, with gulls and geese and bugs and boats where last I saw only frost-gleam and ice-fishing shacks. 

Next week I'll be back in Edmonton, recording Bram's last parts for the album, and working up some songs with Pamela Mae for our trip across the country this summer. Before we leave, though, I'm headed up to the biggest reunion of my year, back among the throng at my home festival, the North Country Fair. My big band The Long Weekends are playing Thursday at 9pm on Main Stage, and I'm closing out the festival with the Second Chances on Sunday at 4:30pm on Main Stage. If you've never been, maybe it's your year to discover that crazy magic. The following Wednesday I'll be hosting the twelfth(!) annual North Country Fair Afterbender at the Empress, and then hitting the road across Canada with a wide-eyed Pamela Mae, who'll not only be on her first journey across Canada, but also on her first ever tour! All my dates and deets, as always, are on my news page, but here's the long story made short: 

Thu-Sun June 20-23 • Driftpile, AB • North Country Fair with the Long Weekends 
Wed June 26 • Edmonton, AB • North Country Afterbender with the Long Weekends and guests 
Thu June 27 • Saskatoon, SK • Capitol Music Club 
Sun June 30 • Winnipeg, MB • Sunset Saloon house concert 
Tue July 2 • Thunder Bay, ON • Corbett Creek Farm barn concert 
Thu July 4 • Sault Ste. Marie, ON • house concert 
Fri-Sun July 5-7 • Orillia, ON • Mariposa Folk Festival!!! 
Wed July 10 • WHERE SHOULD I PLAY in SOUTHERN ONTARIO??? 
Thu July 11 • Toronto, ON • singing a few as a guest of Corin Raymond at the Cameron House 
Fri-Sun July 12-14 • Okemah, OK • Woody Guthrie Folk Festival 
Mon July 15 • Ottawa, ON • house concert 
Thu July 18 • Fredericton, NB • Tipsy Muse Cafe 
Fri-Sun July 19-21 • Rollo Bay, PE • Rollo Bay Fiddle Fest 
Tue Jul 23 • Mount Stewart, PE • Trailside Music Cafe with Liz Stringer 
Fri July 26 • Halifax, NS • The Carleton 
Sun July 28 • Crousetown, NS • Petite Riviere Winery w/ Morgan MacDonald 

Pamela's flying homeward after that, to play Blueberry Bluegrass Festival with her band the Strawflowers, and I'll be making my way southward into the States to play the Lounge Stage and the Emerging Artist Showcase at Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in New York, then homeward via Michigan and Trout Forest Folk Festival in Northern Ontario. If there's anywhere along the way you think I should really make a stop, please drop a line to scottcooksongs@gmail.com and hopefully we can make it happen! 

My run around the Pacific Northwest in May sure was lovely, thanks to the open-hearted people who came out to hear the songs and all the kind folks who took such good care of me. Seriously, I think this last tour set a new high-water-mark for healthy feeding and luxurious sleeps. Not one couch or air mattress on the whole run, and no fast food! What is this life?!? 

I arrived at my house concert hostess' place in Eugene to see a Bernie Sanders 2016 sign in her front yard, and knew I was in good company. As the folks were arriving (some who knew me from Sisters Folk Fest, others through the hostess Sadie's admirable work in spreading my music around), I complimented one lady on her Bernie 2016 t-shirt, and wondered aloud if there were 2020 ones out yet, only to have a lady named Donna show me hers, in purple. I got pretty excited about it, I admit. Five minutes later she came back wearing a different shirt, borrowed from a friend, and GAVE ME THE SHIRT OFF HER FREAKIN' BACK! People are so kind. 

In Olympia I was happily reunited with my Taiwanese friend Kimmy, who used to own our family bar, The River, in Zhongli. My old bands The Anglers and The Smoking Cones jammed there on Thursdays for years, and I was a sorry kindergarten teacher on many a Friday as a result. I was expecting a small crowd, but the venue (Traditions Fair Trade and Cafe) has a strong following, and again, as at most of the shows, Sisters Folk Festival-goers brought their smiling faces too. 

In Salem I played for a younger crowd, which rarely happens to me these days, and saw what everyone else has been saying about CD sales ;) The crowd was lovely, though; mostly friends of my new friends Nick and Raquel, who organized the show, and who I'd also met at Sisters. The bar actually printed up menus with a couple cocktails they invented for the occasion: the "Pass It Along" (vodka, blackberry fig, eucalyptus, and black pepper) and the "Fellas, Get Out the Way" (gin, lavender, violette, lemon, and champagne). 

On a free night in Portland, I found out that the great BC poet Shane Koyczan was playing at the Alberta Rose Theatre, so I went to see him. As I mentioned in the last Travelogue, playing alone on this tour took some getting used to, feeling somewhat vulnerable without a band to blow people's hair back. But here was a guy alone on a big stage, taking us on a journey with just his words. I laughed hard, I cried, I laughed and I cried again. At the end of the show I was such a weepy, emotional mess that I split rather than wait to say hi to Shane. But I was incredibly grateful for the gift he gave all of us in that room, by opening his heart for us, and giving us permission to open ours. He let fly with eloquent words of resistance, at the end of a week when some of the most regressive abortion laws in history had been passed in the Southern states and the White House blatantly defied lawful subpoenas from Congress. He gave voice to our rage. And he talked a lot about his Grandma, who raised him and was his favourite person, and reminded us of all the unsung good and heroism in the world. 

If you don't know Shane's work, or even if you do, here's just one of many bursts of brilliance from his pen: "How To Be A Person" 

Also in Portland, I met up with fellow Taiwan-alumni singer-songwriters Dawid Vorster and Nathan Javens, and was amused by the ever-evolving Portlandian delicacies like rhubarb & bone marrow ice cream, IPA ice cream, and a CBD-infused kettle sour. At the Alberta Street Pub, I got to share the stage with Beth Wood (who's much of the brains and heart behind Sisters' Song Camp) and Ara Lee, who perform as a huge-voiced duo called Stand and Sway, and got a pound of great coffee out of the back of a minivan from our doorman for the night, a singer of infectious pop songs named Phil Ajjarapu. 

There was a fair bit of zigging and zagging in my routing, but I enjoyed all the roads, especially the 101 along the coast. Even the I-5 isn't bad, winding through greenery most of the way, and as always in America, I pause whenever I can at the roadside rest stops. I've loved them since I was a kid, from our family's big road trips across the States, but I love them even more now, for the temporary respite of treeshade and birdsong beside the freeway, and the reminder of the old socialist dream of an America for everyone that still lingers there. 

My last weekend was spent on the San Juan Islands, thanks to Sisters Song Campers JoAn Mann, Phil Paige, and Mandy Troxel, who also opened three of the shows. We got a lift to the show on Shaw Island on some locals' fishing boat, a first for me. After the show we went to an afterparty at a local's place, and I'm pretty sure all twenty or so people who were at the show were also there. We hung out for half an hour before it was time to load us all up in cars and head off to catch the ferry back. 

On Lopez I had the pleasure of watching goats out the window while I sang at the local Grange hall, and on Orcas I sang on the same Grange stage that's on the cover of Emmylou Harris' Blue Kentucky Girl album. Every night on the islands there were cookies! And at every show there were open-hearted folks who wanted to talk. Lots of people are worried about their country, it seems now more than ever. But lots of people are also working on making it better in whatever way they can. And I'm resting my hopes on people like that. 

Happy summertime, northerners! Pals down under, I'll come see you in the spring. Wherever you are, keep working on making it better in whatever way you can. Love and luck, 

s

Hello brave souls, 

Just a quick one this month, coming to you from gorgeous Vashon Island, Washington. My plane landed late in Seattle yesterday afternoon, and I just barely had time to pick up my rental and drive to my house concert hosts' place, arriving about five minutes before the first guests. Things have felt like that for a while now. But Stan and Linda were kind (like so many gracious hosts I've barely met who've invited me to sing songs in their living room), and the good folks kept arriving with food and howdy-dos and reminiscences of my previous visits to the Northwest, and it gradually became clear to me that the magic was gonna happen, whether I felt like it or not. It was their steadiness that carried me through feeling naked without the power of a band, just a guy with a guitar singing songs and wondering if they're enough, whether they can really do anything, and whether any of us can really do anything in this hell-bent world. Because, I remembered, they'd all felt naked and powerless sometimes too. We were together in that. 

Today I slept in, for the first time in a long time, and then rode the ferry across to Vashon, where I've been soaking up the greens and blues, and feeling my whole nervous system settling down as a result. I'll be singing songs here tonight, at a funky little spot called Snapdragon, and heading further south tomorrow. Almost all these shows came out of Sisters Folk Festival, and I'm already grateful to be back among some of those good people. If you also know good people in this part of the world, please send 'em along to one of the following stops: 

Thu May 9 • Vashon Island, WA 
Fri May 10 • Portland, OR with Kate Power & Steve Einhorn, Paul Chasman, and Glass Heart String Choir 
Sat May 11 • Eugene, OR 
Sun May 12 • Grants Pass, OR 
Thu May 16 • Olympia, WA 
Fri May 17 • Port Townsend, WA 
Sat May 18 • Salem, OR 
Wed May 22 • Portland, OR w/ Stand & Sway 
Thu May 23 • Conway, WA w/ Mandy Troxel 
Fri May 24 • Shaw Island, WA w/ Mandy Troxel 
Sat May 25 • Lopez Island, WA w/ Phil Paige 
Sun May 26 • Orcas Island, WA w/ Mandy Troxel 

As always, all the details are on my website, www.scottcook.net. Remember websites? They were a thing back before there was an app for everything, back when the internet held the promise of democracy rather than the erosion of same (see this TED Talk on Facebook's role in Brexit) in the name of selling us to ourselves. There's a bigger point here, but mostly I'm just saying this in the vain hope that no one will write me to ask, "where are you playing in Portland?" this time ;) 

As my first paragraph implies (and as I'm sure comes as no surprise to repeat readers of this Travelogue), I've been hella busy since I wrote you last. Two days after returning home from Australia, Bram and I shot down to Calgary for a weekend of wonderful gigs with Shari on bass. We opened for the amazing Dala at the Calgary Folk Club, and I set a new record for CD sales at a single gig, in case anyone thought the days of the CD are done. In High River we afterpartied and swapped songs with William Prince and a bunch more good folks til 3am or so, and I had two drinks rather than twenty, and woke up incredibly thankful for that. While we were there we heard a lot about the flood of several years back, in way more detail than I'd heard so far, and the way it brought out the best and worst in people. And of course it got me thinking, as I have been a lot lately (thanks in part to Naomi Klein's important book This Changes Everything) about the climate crises to come, and the inevitable struggle to stay human in the way we respond to them. 

Manny's brakes were squealing on that short trip, and sounding downright dangerous by the drive home, so I took him to the shop to find out what I'd already suspected: he needed more work than he was worth, and our days of rambling together were done. On Wednesday I got the news and started scouring Kijiji, on Thursday I bought a 2008 Kia Sedona and a new bike rack, and on Friday me, Bram and Shari piled into the newly-christened Lucky and hit the road to the West coast. 

Our shows in Dunster and Hope on the way out set a beautiful precedent for the road ahead: small gatherings of folks who mostly know each other, and work together on various things that matter in their corner of the world. It's such a privilege to be welcomed into groups like that, to hear what people are concerned with, and to witness the difference that a few enthusiastic people can make in turning a town into a community. We soaked it up on the islands. It was only toward the end of the trip, as we got back into the cities, that I was reminded of just how special that is––how so many of the spaces we live in offer little chance for connection, and limited potential for magic. Those gigs take work. You try to bring the magic with you, but it wilts a bit on the way. At the end of one hard gig, I actually decided against playing "Kitchen Dance Party On" (which we'd been closing out every show with), 'cause I didn't feel like dancing like a crazy man in front of the seemingly bored and distracted audience. But at the last second I thought what the hell, that's what we're here to do. Dance in the face of apathy. 

Our last gig, in Revelstoke for their monthly Community Coffeehouse event, brought it all home. Our new friends Denis and Myra and a bunch of volunteers had been running this thing for nine years in the basement of the United church, with locals doing two songs each open-mike style for the first half, and feature artists playing a full set for the second. And there they were, folks of all ages and walks of life, coming together for a night of old-fashioned entertainment without screens, and talking about things that matter in their neighbourhood. As always, it's an honour to be a part of something like that. 

Our hugest gratitude goes out to the folks out west, for taking such good care of us, and welcoming us into their little pieces of paradise. My thanks are also due to the Canada Council for the Arts, who helped me out with both the BC tour and our most recent trip to Australia, reminding me once again how lucky we are to live in a country that invests in its arts. 

If you enjoyed the clip of the She'll Be Rights from Cobargo Folk Fest in Australia last month, here's a new one from that same set (caught by audience member Peter Whiter) that was inspired by the aforementioned Naomi Klein book: 

"Let Love Have Its Way" 

Alright, I've gotta leave it there for now, I've got a gig to play! Keep believing, friends. Big love, 

s

Hey there beauties, 

As is often the case, this Hobo Travelogue's being written at cruising altitude, while Bram and I wing our way homeward to Edmonton. It's been a good run down under, and though it's gone by in a bit of a blur, it feels like loads has happened since we landed in Melbourne five weeks ago. I suppose that's the thing with this life; so much unravels in the course of a day, a week, and a month. Looking back over the time since I first moved into the van––coming up on a dozen years ago now––it feels like it's been forever. The flip side of all that is just how busy it keeps me, and now's no exception. We'll be back in the saddle shortly upon return, reuniting with our badass bass playing pal Shari Rae for a weekend of gigs in southern Alberta and then a run out to the coast, our only visit for the year: 

Fri Apr 5 • Calgary, AB • Opening for Dala at the Calgary Folk Club (ALMOST SOLD OUT, get your tickets if you're in!) 
Sat Apr 6 • High River, AB • Foothills Folk Club show with Carolyn Harley opening 
Sun Apr 7 • Calgary, AB • house concert at Prairie Sky Co-Housing 
Fri Apr 12 • Dunster, BC • Schoolhouse concert 
Sat Apr 13 • Hope, BC • Secret Shop Show 
Sun Apr 14 • Salt Spring Island, BC • afternoon house concert 
Wed Apr 17 • Cumberland, BC • house concert 
Thu Apr 18 • Brentwood Bay, BC • house concert at Brentwood Bay Village Empourium 
Fri Apr 19 • Mayne Island, BC • opening for Jack Garton and the Demon Squadron at Groove Island Kitchen 
Sat Apr 20 • Galiano Island, BC • opening for Jack Garton and the Demon Squadron at the Rod & Gun Club 
Sun Apr 21 • Nanaimo, BC * Harbour City Concerts show 
Mon Apr 22 • Victoria, BC • Victoria Events Centre 
Wed Apr 24 • Vancouver, BC • East Van house concert 
Thu Apr 25 • Kelowna, BC • Dunnenzies Pizza on Lakeshore (the old Minstrel Cafe) 
Fri Apr 26 • Penticton, BC • The Dream Cafe 
Sat Apr 27 • Revelstoke, BC • Revelstoke Coffee House 

As I said, this'll be our only trip out that way this year. I'm planning to swing through the Kootenays in late August with Justin Farren, but I won't be back out west 'til May or June of 2020, so come see us if you want a dose to tide you over. And don't be shy about attending the house concerts, just be sure to book in! All the details, as always, are on my news page. 

In May we've got a weekend of shows around Edmonton with Melissa (in Rossdale, Spruce Grove, and Sherwood Park) that are all nearly sold out, so book in now if you want to come. Then I've got a run of solo shows around Washington and Oregon, making stops in Seattle, Vashon Island, Portland, Eugene, Grants Pass, Union, Port Townsend, Salem, Portland again, Conway, Shaw Island, Lopez Island, and Orcas Island. At the end of June we're playing my home festival, the North Country Fair, and then Pamela and I are heading off on the long drive across Canada, including stops at Mariposa Folk Fest in Ontario, Woodyfest in Oklahoma (by plane), Rollo Bay Fiddle Fest in Prince Edward Island, and on my way back, stops at Falcon Ridge Folk Fest in New York and Trout Forest Folk Fest in Northern Ontario. Have a look on www.scottcook.net/news.php for deets and dates. 

Yet again, Australia's been mighty good to us. Bram and I flew in on a Monday, coincidentally in time to have dinner with Corin Raymond and our Aussie pal Tamlyn Magee aka Anactoria before her show that night. Earlier that day we also reunited with our bassist Liz Frencham, and met our fiddler Esther Henderson for the first time, to have a first crack at the new songs I'd been writing by the woodstove in my friend Lisi's cabin. The next day we made a mission out to sleepy Corowa, Victoria in a rental car to pick up my Aussie home Skippy, who'd been convalescing at the home of my retired mechanic friend Tom, who volunteered to fix him when he blew his head gasket during my tour with Corin Raymond. 

We got to Tom's place and discovered that he'd not only fixed the engine, but also done a bunch of other work I didn't even ask to have done. I used to have to roll down my window to open the driver's side door; he fixed that. The back door used to only open from the inside, by reaching into the paneling and pulling a catch. Tom Richardson and I had spent over an hour trying to figure it out back when I first bought Skippy, and even thought we had it twice––prematurely high-fiving the first time, and prematurely chest-bumping the second time––only to give up, stymied in the end. Tom fixed that too. Even the big dent in the side––the thing that first caught my eye when I found Skippy on the buy-and-sell website Gumtree, that made me think I might get a good deal on him––he fixed that too. "Only 'cause me missus is such a big fan of your music," he assured me. He rebuffed all my thanks by saying "it keeps me off the street," but his heart was shining out clear. And as he was telling us about his recent four-day motorbike journey through the high country with a pack of mates, a young fella's eyes were flashing out of his 73 year-old face. He and his lovely missus Alida came out to our first show, at North East Artisans in Benalla, and we presented him with Skippy's roof rack (he'd mentioned wanting one, so he could put his canoe on top of his van), tied up with a ribbon. 

We spent our first weekend at Cobargo Folk Festival, on the south coast of New South Wales. Cobargo was the first Australian festival I ever played, back in 2014. Enda Kenny (who I'd just met) managed to talk them into giving me an unamplified write-in spot in a little shed venue, and the welcome was so warm that by the end of the weekend I was already making plans to return the following January and buy a van. This year was my fourth time at the fest, and it felt pretty triumphant to play the biggest tent, with a crowd spilling out the sides, on the Sunday. Here's a video of the band playing "Use Your Imagination" early in that set, shot by audience member James Polmeer. 

After Cobargo we headed up the coast as far as Bellingen, where Esther's from, and had an extra day to hang out in her mom's wonderful country oasis. It felt good to do Esther proud in her hometown, and I was grateful for her help in rounding up a crowd, having played for only a handful of folks our last time there. On the way back down the coast, though, Skippy fell ill again––bizarrely, en route to the very same gig he'd died on the way to last time. I left him with another tow truck driver, and we piled into Liz' car, making it to Kempsey in time to be received by the kind folks at the Odd Fellows Hall, and carry on down the coast the next day in a rental. As it turned out, it wasn't even going to be a big job to fix Skip, but we had gigs to play and lots of miles to cover, ending up at my old visa sponsor's festival in Mia Mia, Victoria by the Monday, three shows and some 1400 kms later. 

Tom, legend that he is, took over the repair from there, "as part of the unconditional guarantee" on his workmanship. He didn't tell me the details 'til afterward, but he actually got up at 2 in the morning, drove 3 hours to Melbourne with Alida, caught a plane to Coffs Harbour, took a taxi to the shop, and drove Skippy all the way home to Corowa, arriving back home at 2 in the morning. What a legend. 

Our third weekend was spent at The River Folk Festival, a new festival in Warburton on the Yarra (the big muddy flow that enters the ocean at Melbourne), up where it's just a gorgeous little river winding through the mountains. My Canadian songwriter pal Dana Sipos was there, as were the incredible old-timey duo Red Tail Ring; pals from Kalamazoo, Michigan that I met through the Earthwork Harvest Gathering. It was wonderful to see those worlds weave together. We played an amplified set in the hall, a barely-amplified set in a little church, and a mellow Sunday afternoon set out back of a cafe. Our buddy Josh and his crew at Pegleg Productions shot some sweet video of our sets, which you'll get to see as the new album rolls out. And on the Sunday night we had a jam out back of the pub with Rich Davies, Nigel Wearne, Khristian Mizzi, Mandy Connell, and many more, and I was reminded again of what a wonderful family this life has introduced me to. 

After the fest, we finally got started on the real work of this tour, which was making a new album. Recording's always a difficult and revealing process, subjecting your songs to a new level of scrutiny that you never feel until you put them under the microscope. You can play things live for years, but as soon as you take them into the studio, you notice things you never noticed before. You may end up wondering how they even go. It's always a challenge, and it always feels new, because we aim higher every time. This time was particularly challenging, mostly thanks to the newness of the songs, the difficulty of the parts (especially my vocal parts), the strain that weekends of gigs were putting on my voice, and my commitment to an earlier idea about our recording technique (for those who speak that language, I had it in my mind that we'd use a mid/side setup for everything) that wasn't flexible enough for what we needed to do. We ended up changing our approach, and changing a lot of the arrangements as well. One consequence of those changes is that we aren't coming home with an album in the can. But I'm confident that we made the right decision, and we're going to be happier with the finished product. One thing I'm particularly grateful for is more time to settle on the lyrics for a few of the newest songs. It does ramp up the challenge of getting everything (including the hardcover book it's going to be packaged in) done in time to release it in Australia this October, and the rest of the world next March. But those of you who've been with me for a while know that's par for the course. 

Our last weekend of shows was extra heartwarming, with a packed house show at Lianne and Paul's in Healesville (which has gotta be the house concert capital of Australia) where the audience sang along heartily––even to the verses of some songs––and the love in the air was thick as it gets, a hall show with the hilarious choir Men In Suits, and our finale at the Spotted Mallard in Melbourne, where I finally got to enjoy a full set from Liz, who was on fire with her longtime sideman Robbie Melville on electric guitar. And then there were hugs, loose ends both tied and untied, and see-you-soons aplenty. 

I did remember to take some pictures along the way, if you wanna have a look, here. My summary feels woefully incomplete, with so much missed (seeing koalas along the Great Ocean Road, watching the great Rory McLeod in a pizza joint in Kyneton, playing a backyard concert at our friends' place in Echuca with the best kind of country folks and a "Real Australians Say Welcome" tapestry on the wall, and as always, countless coincidences and connections tying this big world together), but that's how it goes with this life. So much happens in a day, a week, and a month; there's too much to tell. I'm just grateful to be in the flow of it, with my eyes open, and in such good company. 

Thanks, as always, for your generosity, and here's hoping our paths cross again before too long. Shine on, 

s

Hey friends, 

Just a quick Hobo Travelogue this month, and it's coming to you from the Vancouver airport, while Bram and I wait to get on a plane to Melbourne. Google tells me it's 34C there right now, but we're not gonna complain about the heat, 'cause nobody back on this side wants to hear it. We'll be landing Monday morning, meeting up with our Aussie bandmates Liz Frencham and Esther Henderson for a jam that afternoon, and by fortuitous happenstance, having dinner in Brunswick with fellow Canadian songsmith Corin Raymond that night. 

Our big mission's making a new album, but first we'll be tuning up the band with a run of sweet shows through familiar pastures: 

Wed Feb 27 • Benalla, VIC • North East Artisans 
Thu Feb 28 • Canberra, ACT • Smith's Alternative 
Fri-Sun Mar 1-3 • Cobargo, NSW • Cobargo Folk Festival 
Tue Mar 5 • Wingham, NSW • house concert 
Thu Mar 7 • Bellingen, NSW • 5 Church Street 
Fri Mar 8 • Kempsey, NSW • Hot Club at the Oddfellows Hall 
Sat Mar 9 • Newcastle, NSW • house concert 
Sun Mar 10 • Sydney, NSW • Southern Sydney Folk Club 
Mon Mar 11 • Mia Mia, VIC • Burke and Wills Folk Festival 
Tue Mar 12 • Ringwood, VIC • Victorian Folk Music Club 
Wed Mar 13 • Melbourne, VIC • Lomond Acoustica (just me and Bram on this one, with Mandy Connell and Dana Sipos) 
Fri-Sun Mar 15-17 • Warburton, VIC • The River Folk Festival 
Thu Mar 21 • Apollo Bay, VIC • house concert 
Fri Mar 22 • Ballarat, VIC • The Main Bar 
Sat Mar 23 • Bendigo, VIC • The Old Church on the Hill 
Sun Mar 24 • Echuca, VIC • afternoon backyard concert 
Fri Mar 29 • Healesville, VIC • Healesville House Concert 
Sat Mar 30 • Melbourne, VIC • hall show with Men In Suits 
Sun Mar 31 • Melbourne, VIC • finale at The Spotted Mallard, 4-7pm 

On our return in April we've got trio shows in Calgary and High River and a trio tour out to BC, then I'll be touring solo around Washington and Oregon in May. As always, the details for all these dates can be found on my news page. 

Last weekend I was in Montreal for the Folk Alliance International conference, and wow, what a crazy collision of creative souls that was! It's gotten dramatically bigger over the last few years, so much so that it's actually pushing the limits of a community gathering. There were so many people I love there with whom I didn't get to exchange more than a few words over the five days. But still, it was great to see old pals, to be introduced to some new artists, and to hear stars like Hawksley Workman, Lynn Miles, and Rising Appalachia playing in hotel rooms like the rest of us. I had a great scratch band, consisting of Mike Kerr on guitar, Curtis Glas on upright bass, and my buddy Jose Mejia on dobro, and we knocked out a couple unamplified 25-minute sets for capacity hotel-room crowds of ten or twenty people in the wee hours. Oh, and Birds of Chicago made me cry, Anna Tivel boggled my mind, and somewhat typically, the best jam I heard was by the service elevators. It's difficult to explain the bizarre world of the conferences to anyone who hasn't been, but I can at least report that folk music's in good hands. 

Since I last wrote you from Guatemala, I've been pretty overwhelmed with all the work I'd hoped to get done before heading to Australia. I really have made progress on all that, but I've also became aware that I could very easily spend all my time on it and still not get caught up, while never putting any time into the important work of writing songs for the upcoming album. There's always more admin that I could (and often feel like I should) be doing. And while it's what keeps this whole show running, it's not the work I feel like I was born to do, the work I can best serve the world with. 

In The War of Art (a novella-length pep-talk for creative types), Steven Pressfield talks about the myriad ways procrastination can stand in the way of our creative calling. It's always easier to do the things we know how to do, than the thing we don't know how to do. I've written songs before, so I guess I know something about how that work goes. But every new song is a new creation, with its own new set of rules. A new song is something I don't know how to do. And while I approach the whole process in a more workmanlike way than some folks might imagine, I still always wonder where in the heck they come from, and whether I've got any good ones left in me. 

My friend Lisi had offered the use of her cabin on Lac St. Anne, so I decided to take the opportunity to get away for five days. The polar vortex was careening around our part of the world that week, and it was crazy cold out, the kind of cold I remember from growing up in Saskatchewan: that crisp kind of cold where the snow squeaks, the wind burns, the moon wears an ice-crystal halo, and sound carries forever at night. Pamela came out the first night, but then left me with only the woodstove for company. It was amazing how much emotion came bubbling through me in that silence. All kinds of fears––that I wouldn't turn out anything of value, that I wasn't ready to make a record, that I was past my prime, that civilization itself was running out of time, that the whole system and the life I've built atop it was due to come crashing down any minute––and that less specific but bigger fear that we call anxiety. I felt so scared and sad and lonely that first night that I didn't know what to do with myself. But I sat with it. And then the songs started coming, bit by bit. I didn't know if they were any good, but I sang them to keep myself company. I had three on the go at the same time. Whenever one would start moving a bit, it felt like a rush of wind into my sails. I made myself laugh with the twists and turns they took. And eventually I thought I might have something worth showing somebody else. 

On the second-to-last day I found myself gripped by an almost irresistible restlessness, with thoughts of all the admin work that I should really be getting back to; with questions of whether any of this was worth anything, and whether I shouldn't just stop fooling myself and go back to work. I was reminded of what I've heard from friends who've gone through vipassana (ten-day silent meditation) programs, of how hard they had to fight (or succumbed to) the urge to flee. I resolved to stick it out for two more nights, and managed to pull another song out of the stay, which made four in total. All of them drew on earlier ideas, none of them was quite finished, and I'm still not even sure all of them will make it onto the album. But four songs is about my usual yearly output, and it sure was good to feel like the moorings had torn loose, like the heavy boulders were rolling around again. The moment of creativity, when you're holding something that you think might grow into something, but you still don't know what it is, before objectivity and judgement have come to pick it over, when––as I once heard Dar Williams put it––the window is open, that's a precious and holy moment, and it's one worth making time for. 

I'm gonna leave it there, friends, but thanks for reading, and I sure do hope to see you if and when we find ourselves in the same corner of this big world. 

Keep the window open, 

s

Hey beauties, 

This here's a quick ¡Hola! from the lakeside town of San Pedro la Laguna, Guatemala, where my compañera Pamela and I have been studying Spanish and digging deep into the muy tranquilo. I can't say I'm psyched to be returning to snowy Alberta, but one thing making it a lot more appealing is the thought of reuniting with the Second Chances for a few choice dates right away: 

Fri Jan 25 • Innisfail, AB • Ol' Moose Hall • call or text Ken and Maddie at (403) 391-4120 for tickets 

Sat Jan 26 • Calgary, AB • Bow Valley Music Club • SOLD OUT 

Sun Jan 27 • Sherwood Park, AB • R.Ouse Concert • SOLD OUT 

Wed Jan 30 • Edmonton, AB • Alberta Grown Series • tickets • Facebook event 

I'll be flying out to Folk Alliance in Montreal shortly thereafter, then me and Bram will be heading back down under to tour and make a record with our Aussie comrades Liz Frencham and Esther Henderson. We've added a few new dates since I wrote you last, including shows in Benalla and Echuca. For those folks in places we aren't visiting this time around, I'd love to hear from you about listening venues for our next visit in October and November, when we'll be releasing the album. On our return to Canada in April, the Second Chances will be playing some shows around Alberta and BC, and then I'll be doing a solo tour of the Pacific Northwest in May before gearing up for a summertime run across Canada. It'll be my first in a long while, and Pamela's first ever. There are a few festivals I'm not allowed to announce yet, but all the news that's fit to print, as always, is on my news page. 

There's not much to report music-wise in this Travelogue, but I do want to say a bit about Guatemala while I'm here, since it's done such a number on my heart already. It's been ages since I've been to Central America––eighteen years, in fact, since me and a bunch of pals flew to Costa Rica for a two-month visit that forever changed my life. I'd just finished an undergrad degree in Philosophy, and was gearing up to go into the masters program at University of Toronto, but I'd never been overseas. With all that happened in those first couple wide-eyed weeks, I suddenly knew that I couldn't go back to school. At least not then. Here I'd spent years reading philosophers who presume to talk about all possible worlds, but I knew next to nothing about the actual world! I had to see more of it. It was that same eye-thirst that drew me to Taiwan less than a year later, and has drawn me around the world since then. I'd thought it wouldn't be long before I was back down south on my side of the world, speaking Spanish. I'm surprised it's taken me this long, but god, it feels good. 

This is Pamela's first trip overseas, and naturally (being a mother and a generally responsible person, rather than a reckless partier like I was then) she read a little online about Guatemala beforehand. Both the Canadian and US government websites have some pretty strongly-worded warnings about traveling here, and I'm not saying their statements aren't based on facts. I just hope that they won't discourage anyone from experiencing this beautiful country, and opting for a "safer" option like an all-inclusive somewhere instead. Though we've seen very little of it, I've fallen quickly in love with this land and its open-hearted people. 

We packed light, but I did bring along a Honduran cigar-box ukulele that my pal Maurice Jones gave me before he died, and it's instigated plenty of beautiful moments so far. When anyone asks what it is, I offer them to play it, and I've been pretty amazed so far at how well they seem to pick it up, perhaps in part for its closeness, tuning-wise, to the charango. It's wonderful what music and even the sight of a unique instrument can do to bridge the distance between strangers. 

We spent our first night in Antigua Guatemala, which was the old capital until it was partially destroyed by an earthquake, and is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site with crumbling colonial architecture, rough cobblestone streets, and a really international feel (Pamela called it the Portland of Guatemala). From Antigua we made our way to Panajachel, on the shores of Lago Atitlán, a gorgeous caldera lake nestled between three volcanoes. The Mayan villages around the lake have seen plenty of backpacker traffic over the years, but most of the guesthouses, restaurants and such are down by the water, while the town centres, up the hill, have kept their beautiful, ramshackle local flavour. We spent the first three days in Santa Cruz la Laguna, a tiny, mostly car-free village, where we studied Spanish with a young Kaqchikel gal. We went to San Marcos to play a show, and serendipitously met up with some old pals including fellow Taiwan alum Eric Mandala. We marvelled at handmade textiles in San Juan, saw spider monkeys and pizotis (coatis) at the nature reserve in Panajachel, and were planning to head off the next morning to see some of the rest of the country, but after batting various imaginary itineraries around all day, we opted instead to spend our last week in San Pedro la Laguna, studying Spanish, and getting to know the place a bit rather than rushing through. 

My teacher, Francisco, is a young fella who lived and studied in Guatemala City for years but has returned home for the quieter life in San Pedro. Besides helping me immensely with Spanish, he's taught me lots about the town, the lake, Mayan culture, and Guatemalan history. He told me about the struggle to clean up the lake, and the difficult transition away from resource extraction back to more sustainable ways. He told me about the endemic corruption in the country, and the current president, a TV star with no political experience that many people hoped would change things, only to see him slide into more of the same. He told me about Rigoberta Menchú, whose mother, father, and two brothers were murdered in the Guatemalan civil war, and who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1992 in recognition of her long struggle for the rights of indigenous Guatemalans and prosecution for the crimes of the Guatemalan political and military establishment. He told me it was her book that awakened his conscience, and first got him to see the world from an international perspective. And I said thanks again for Noam Chomsky, who had a lot to do with the birth of my own class consciousness and my awareness of the propaganda in the stories I'd been told. 

As I'm sure many of you readers know, Guatemala's had a rough go, from the brutal Spanish invasion and exploitation onward. After independence they suffered under a succession of dictatorial rulers who oppressed their own population in service of foreign business interests, particularly the United Fruit Company. Jorge Ubico ran one of the most repressive regimes in Central American history with American backing, torturing and murdering political opponents, creating a vast network of spies and informants, and consistently favouring American business and the local elites against the peasant population, whom he forced to work without pay. In 1944, his brutality led to a popular revolution, an era known in Guatemala as the "diez años de primavera" (Ten Years of Spring), when Juan José Arévalo and then Jacobo Árbenz carried out massive social reforms, including vast improvements in literacy and labour standards, and an ambitious land redistribution program. Naturally, the United Fruit Company lobbied the US government to get rid of Árbenz, and the CIA engineered a coup in 1954, just as they had done the year before, when the democratically-elected leader of Iran got on the wrong side of US and British business interests. They installed a military leader named Carlos Castillo Armas, whose return to the brutal policies of his predecessors sparked an armed rebellion which lasted from 1960 to 1996. During the civil war, the military government carried out genocide against the indigenous Mayan population, with US knowledge and support. Whole villages were slaughtered, women, children and all, on suspicion of communist sympathies. If you find any of this hard to believe, I sincerely hope you'll read more about the history of US foreign intervention, particularly in Latin America, and consider what the past actions of the world powers might have to do with the current wave of refugees fleeing that part of the world. 

If you're curious, here's a 2013 article by Chomsky on Guatemala, and here are some excerpts on Latin America from Chomsky's book Rogue States. 

On Sunday we had a day off, so we went up the hill to the stadium for the fútbol season opener, which our boys won one-nil! It was so good to be out among the fight songs and firecrackers and coloured smoke, the hawkers with nuts and ceviche and shaved ice, the old campesinos in their cowboy hats, women in traditional huipiles, and youngsters in green and gold San Pedro F.C. jerseys. When the time ran out, the young victors knelt and prayed, and whatever you think about sports or Jesus, there was something undeniably beautiful about it. During our stroll back through town after the game, we came upon some kids playing with kites made out of little black garbage bags and red string, and my heart soared along with the kids' laughter and those little plastic sails. 

That night there was a total lunar eclipse, which we watched from the hammocks at the house we were staying in. We wondered about indigenous peoples' ideas about lunar eclipses, and recalled how the villain Columbus had used his knowledge of an upcoming eclipse to trick and intimidate the indigenous people of Jamaica into provisioning his men. It's another example of a common type of story, much like the one we've been listening to in Uruguayan journalist Eduardo Galeano's book The Open Veins of Latin America, of how people with technical knowledge use it to exploit those without. 

-- 

On our last morning in San Pedro, we got up before four in the morning to climb up a nearby mountain called Rostro Maya (so named because it resembles a sleeping Mayan face) with a guide we met on the street one day. We caught one of the local "chicken buses" (American school buses that get a redecorated second life on the broken roads of Central America) and strained up the staggeringly steep hills in the dark, then hiked through cane-fields and forest in the moonlight to look down on the lake from above. We could see five volcanoes from the summit, one of which, Volcán Fuego, was periodically coughing glowing lava and billowing smoke out into the twilit air. Venus was incredibly bright in the morning sky, sitting right next to Jupiter in a lucky conjunction. I was also surprised to spot the Southern Cross, which I've never seen from Canada, hanging low in the sky, with the pointers to its left. Marking the line, as my Australian friends have shown me, between the pointers and along the axis of the cross, directed me straight down, behind the mountains and around the world, in the direction I'll be heading soon. 

I'm finishing this Travelogue from the Houston airport, where we arrived today for a long layover. It's day 33 of the longest government shutdown in US history, and hundreds of thousands of government employees just missed their second paycheque in a row, but the folks here were in surprisingly good moods. One tall black older fella asked me about the ukelele and then said "Start playing! Donald Trump got my money, y'all make me happy!" When I obliged, he started singing "You Ain't Nothing But a Hound Dog", danced some seriously impressive footwork, and made all of us happy. He broke through the soulless game we've been told to play like it was nothing. He made America great again, right there and then. 

Before I sign off, friends, one last word about a bit of news we got while we were in San Pedro, that Mary Oliver had died. I only came to her in recent years, and I'm already incredibly grateful for the gifts she left with us. If you don't know her, but you love life, dig into her work. You'll find a friend. She writes beautifully about dogs, and days, about this world and our place in it. But for now, I'll just leave you with a poem of sadness and hope called "Of The Empire": 

We will be known as a culture that feared death 
and adored power, that tried to vanquish insecurity 
for the few and cared little for the penury of the 
many. We will be known as a culture that taught 
and rewarded the amassing of things, that spoke 
little if at all about the quality of life for 
people (other people), for dogs, for rivers. All 
the world, in our eyes, they will say, was a 
commodity. And they will say that this structure 
was held together politically, which it was, and 
they will also say that our politics was no more 
than an apparatus to accommodate the feelings of 
the heart, and that the heart, in those days, 
was small, and hard, and full of meanness. 

The promise in those words, for me, is the hope that we'll survive to look back on these days––to see them for what they were, and to grow beyond them. Here's hoping. 

I shot a bunch of photos along the way, if you wanna have a look here. 

Thanks as always for reading, and for all you do. Big love, 

s

Happy Solstice, beauties! Whether you're revelling in the full flush of the southern summer, or like me, deep in the longest night of the year, savouring the prospect of the days lengthening again, I hope this finds you feeling grateful and inspired. These points in our planetary cycle always remind me of the vastness of the forces we're subject to, the same way that being carried by the ocean makes you feel like a bit of flotsam in a giant tub. 

I made it back to Edmonton about a week and a half ago, and have been staying at my folks' place in the suburbs, tending to the many loose ends left by four long months on the road, and venturing out occasionally to see friends. My sister and her husband are home from Korea for Christmas, and it feels great to have the family together. It's especially wonderful to be off the road, and away from the stage. This last run was really productive, surprisingly lucrative even, but I'm not gonna lie, for the last couple weeks of it I was counting down the days. 

In the new year my dear friend Pamela and I will be flying to Guatemala for the first time, to spend a couple weeks on the wander and off the clock, and I've been dusting off my Spanish chops for that. But I won't be stepping back up to a microphone until the end of January, when I'll be reuniting with the Second Chances for a few shows I'm really excited about: 

Fri Jan 25 • Innisfail, AB • Ol' Moose Hall 
Sat Jan 26 • Calgary, AB • Bow Valley Music Club 
Sun Jan 27 • Sherwood Park, AB • R.Ouse Concert 
Wed Jan 30 • Edmonton, AB • Alberta Grown Series 

The details, as always, are on www.scottcook.net/news.php. In February I'll be flying out to Montreal for the Folk Alliance conference, and then Bram and I are headed back down under, to reunite with Skippy (who longtime readers will be delighted to know has been RAISED FROM THE DEAD!) and do a little tour with my new intercontinental stringband, The She'll Be Rights. For those unfamiliar with that delightful bit of Aussie English, it means "don't worry about it" or "it'll do", with a connotation somewhere on the spectrum between optimism and negligence. We'll be joined by our Australian comrades Esther Henderson on fiddle, and upright bassist Liz Frencham, who'll be opening the shows with solo sets of her own material. Liz is a formidable talent in every sense of the word, and a well-known presence on the Aussie folk scene. She's also got a lovely little studio in her backyard in tiny Trentham, Victoria, where we're gonna hole up and make a new album! But first we'll be tightening up the songs over a run of shows together: 

Wed Feb 27 • Benalla, VIC • TBC 
Thu Feb 28 • Canberra, ACT • Smith's Alternative 
Fri-Sun Mar 1-3 • Cobargo, NSW • Cobargo Folk Festival 
Thu Mar 7 • Bellingen, NSW • 5 Church Street 
Fri Mar 8 • Kempsey, NSW • Hot Club at the Oddfellows Hall 
Sat Mar 9 • Newcastle, NSW • House concert 
Sun Mar 10 • Sydney, NSW • Southern Sydney Folk Club 
Mon Mar 11 • Mia Mia, VIC • Burke and Wills Folk Festival 
Tue Mar 12 • Ringwood, VIC • Victorian Folk Music Club 
Fri-Sun Mar 15-17 • Warburton, VIC • The River Folk Festival 
Thu Mar 21 • Apollo Bay, VIC • house concert 
Fri Mar 22 • Ballarat, VIC • The Main Bar 
Sat Mar 23 • Bendigo, VIC • The Old Church on the Hill 
Fri Mar 29 • Healesville, VIC • Healesville House Concert 
Sat Mar 30 • Melbourne, VIC • hall show with Men In Suits 
Sun Mar 31 • Melbourne, VIC • finale at The Spotted Mallard, 4-7pm 

There are still a few nights off that could be filled, if anyone really wants to bring us to their town, just drop a line to grooverevival@gmail.com and we'll see if we can work something out. 

It's coming up on two months' time since I last wrote you kind readers, and I've covered a lot of miles since then. From Toronto to Pittsburgh and down to Morgantown, West Virginia, to see my birthplace for the first time since I was four years old, and even drop off my absentee ballot at the county clerk's office. I visited a friend in Thomas, West Virginia, a dying coal-mining town transformed into an artists' mecca, where tourists now flock to shop on the weekends and old-timers are getting priced out. I spent a couple days in a cabin in Manns Choice, Pennsylvania, where my hosts are trying to make a go of a farm-to-table restaurant in a Wonder Bread town. And I drove from West Virginia through Baltimore to Connecticut, where I reunited with innumerable folkie pals and had the opportunity to play for the whole crowd at the NERFA (Northeast Regional Folk Alliance) conference. 

On my way to a house concert in Pennsylvania the following week, I heard there was a big storm on its way. I set out toward Maryland the next day, thinking I'd get a hotel for the night if it got bad, but still pretty confident, as a Canadian who's driven through plenty of snowstorms. It hit hard when it hit, though, and I found myself stuck in rural Pennsylvania, with the road closed by fallen power lines, and all the other ways out of the valley almost impassably slippery. At one point I had nearly resigned myself to spending the night in the van, but was helped out by some country folks who apparently had more good sense than me. We didn't discuss politics. But it got me thinking about the two Americas, about the vast gulf between our languages and worlds, and those thoughts were never far from my mind for the rest of the trip. 

I tried out not mentioning the President in my shows for a change. Not because I'm afraid of people's reactions, but just because I don't know if it accomplishes anything to get people's guard up, or make them feel unwelcome in a crowd of mostly liberal folkies. And because I know people are hurting. Even if they don't understand the sources of their troubles, and point the finger in the wrong direction. And well, because the President would like nothing more than to have everything be about him. Why give his fire any more oxygen? 

Instead, I made a point of singing "If He Showed Up Now" at every show; a song about Jesus, who says in Matthew's gospel that taking care of the hungry, the homeless, the sick, and the imprisoned means way more than claiming to know him. Singing "The Come Heres and the Been Heres" by Chuck Brodsky (which felt like it was written for Thomas, West Virginia), and "The Christians and the Pagans" by Dar Williams, songs poking gentle fun at the smugness of both sides, songs to bring people together. Because the truth is, we need each other. 

Speaking of songs like that, I heard a new one from Rachael Kilgour at NERFA that made me cry: "Dad Worked Hard" 

After two of the best shows of the tour (and the year for that matter) in Maryland, I made my way through Harper's Ferry and down the length of the Appalachians to North Carolina. So many places I passed through were scenes of the Civil War. There were tangible reminders everywhere of how quickly this earthly garden can turn into a living hell, once people decide that the talking's done. 

While I was down there I got to share a show with Jonathan Byrd and the Pickup Cowboys at The Kraken, an other-dimensional boondocks hole-in-the-wall outside Chapel Hill. Jonathan put a sign above the stage saying "This Is Paradise", a nod to Toronto's Cameron House and a plain statement of the fact that, as our pal Corin Raymond sings, "that's exactly where we are." Their crowd was amazing, word-thirsty and invested, and the show was off the hook. The surreal sturdiness of the songs. The daring artistry involved in singing about Bike Week in Daytona Beach and reciting mind-bending poetry in the same set. The astounding theatrics and rock n’ roll swagger that the Cowboys bring to every performance. And most inspiringly for me, the bigness of the tent they manage to open up, with Jonathan giving shouts out to a local Democratic organizer and a fella in an NRA hat, the generosity of spirit that sees the good in people, not people in the abstract sense, but real people, neighbours. I met die-hards there who’ve been coming every week, and Thanksgiving-weekenders who just stumbled on it, and everybody I talked to had the feeling they were part of something special, together in that divey little tavern in the highway dark. 

It's healing work those boys are doing. Our culture's klaxon of bullshit is deafening. But when somebody feels like you're actually talking to them, it can open ears, and hearts. 

I made my way north over the Blue Ridge from there, played three lovely shows in Ohio and then drove up to the Cook family farm in northern Michigan, where it was most definitely winter, and hard to believe that I'd been riding a bicycle around Charlotte in a t-shirt not a week before. I visited my Grandma in long-term care, for what might be the last time. I hung out at my Granddad's old store, Cook's Country Hardware, where the regulars linger, drink coffee and shoot the breeze for hours, and any ol' mechanical problem presents an opportunity for jerry-rigging ingenuity. My uncle told me about the rigamarole around my Grandma's care, how the home cost $9500 a month, and how they would drain everything she had (and it's a good thing the land they're all living on's already in his name) before her insurance kicked in. I could see the hurt in his eyes at the brutality of the system. He was drinking coffee out of a Make America Great Again cup. We didn't discuss politics. 

I made a detour into Chicago to play a coffee house that's been presenting folk music every Friday for almost fifty years, and was delighted to see two folks who'd just stumbled on the Kraken that night in North Carolina. I sang to a love-filled living room of fellow freaks in Kalamazoo. I accompanied another uncle and aunt to the monthly steak night in a neighbourhood church basement full of cute older folks who didn't know genderqueer from kombucha. And I loved all of them. 

Most of all, I just wanted them all to meet, and see the good in one another. We don't have many chances to do that these days. But family, hard as it is at times, well, that's a chance to do that. I imagine many of you are coming up on such a chance right now, friends. And I wish you luck. 

Happy solstice, Hanukkah sameach, merry Christmas, and a blessed new year to you, pals. I couldn't do any of this traveling around without you, so thanks for that. Stay kind. Love one another, as best you can. And I'll see you down the road. Your fan, 

s

Hey lovers, 

It's still kinda hard for me to believe, but it's my last night in Toronto. I couldn't ask for a better sendoff than the one we're about to have at The Cameron House from 6-8pm tonight, in the company of my band-for-the-month The Backroads Scholars and one of my hugest inspirations, longtime friend and mentor Corin Raymond. We'll also be joined on a number by the choir from Don Heights Unitarian Congregation, where I sang a couple Sundays back! I'll be around there from 4:30pm, in case anybody wants to come down and chat before things get going. 

Tomorrow I'm moving back into the van and crossing the border for another five weeks of gigs in the States. I did a little re-routing since last time (most crucially, switching my Asheville date), so here's what it's looking like now: 

Thu Nov 1 • Pittsburgh, PA • Hospitality House Concert 
Fri Nov 2 • Martinsburg, WV • First Friday Coffeehouse 
Wed Nov 7 • Baltimore, MD • The Four Hour Day Lutherie 
Thu-Sun Nov 8-11 • Stamford, CT • Northeast Regional Folk Alliance conference 
Mon Nov 12 • Southport, CT • open mic feature at Horseshoe Cafe 
Wed Nov 14 • State College, PA • Happy Valley House Concert 
Fri Nov 16 • Columbia, MD • The Cooper's House 
Sat Nov 17 • Darlington, MD • Deer Creek Coffeehouse 
Sun Nov 18 • Asheville, NC • Isis Music Hall, opening for Noah Zacharin 
Mon Nov 19 • Charlotte, NC • open mic feature at The Evening Muse 
Wed Nov 21 • Chapel Hill, NC • guest at Jonathan Byrd's residency at The Kraken 
Fri Nov 23 • Pleasant Plain, OH • Plain Folk Cafe 
Sat Nov 24 • Columbus, OH • Columbus Folk Music Society 
Sun Nov 25 • West Chester, OH • house concert 
Wed Nov 28 • Petoskey, MI • Red Sky Stage, presented by Blissfest 
Thu Nov 29 • Rapid City, MI • house concert 
Fri Nov 30 • Downers Grove, IL • Two Way Street Coffee House 
Sat Dec 1 • Kalamazoo, MI • house concert with Samantha Cooper opening 
Sun Dec 2 • Grand Rapids, MI • Songteller Sessions at Creston Brewery with Nicholas James Thomasma and Kaitlin Rose 
Wed Dec 5 • Chelsea, MI • On the Tracks Songwriter Showcase with Jon Brooks 
Fri Dec 7 • Minneapolis, MN • The Warming House with Rachael Kilgour 

It does feel heavy going back to the States, with all the hatred and violence we've seen this past week, and especially to be visiting Pittsburgh in the aftermath of the worst anti-Semitic attack in American history. But I'm also reminded of the role music can play in healing. I've seen it firsthand this month, in the communities I've visited. My only hope is that my words serve to bring folks together rather than sow division. 

I sure have enjoyed having a home for a while, getting to know my neighbourhood and its cast of characters, checking out music most nights, and riding my bike around this leafy, lamplit city. Of course, I feel like I could go for another month of the same, but I'm grateful for the time I've had. Mike T. Kerr and Matt Coldwell have been my band for the month, and it's been such a joy making music with them. Our first weekend at the Cameron House had plenty of surprise visitors from afar: my friends Guido and Conny from Where The Birds Fly House Concerts in Germany, Jennifer Iredale and Peter Gray from Victoria (whose place on Mayne Island we used to record Further Down the Line), perpetual rambler Orit Shimoni aka Little Birdie, and our friend William Prince, fresh off a couple nights opening for Neil Young! We also had a couple far-flung guest stars, Heather Styka and Braden Gates. I decided there needed to be some kinda perk for the kind souls who came to the first of our five Tuesdays, so we gave the audience the opportunity to name the band. William kicked it off with "Scott Cook and the Top Chefs", and it pretty much stayed in the bad-puns-on-my-last-name territory from there on out, until Peter Gray broke from the form and won the contest (as determined by the Applause-O-Meter) with The Backroads Scholars. 

It's been great having a weekly gig, trying out new things with the band, and doing our best to keep the repeat attenders entertained. On weekends I've gone out for swings around the province, making stops in Barrie, Sudbury, Haliburton, Morrisburg (with William Prince), Hamilton (with Corin Raymond, the Backroads Scholars, and Brian MacMillan), Kitchener (with Craig Cardiff), Guelph (with Zachary Lucky), Grafton, Ottawa, Killaloe, and Perth. In my early years touring out this way, any one of those nights would've been the best show of the tour. It was incredibly humbling and heart-filling to play so many lovely rooms and connect with so many people in such a condensed bit of time. It also felt especially potent to be driving around Ontario at this time of year, wide-eyed at the blazing autumn, and remembering what rough shape I was in the last time I was here. I celebrated the one-year anniversary of my hospitalization on our second Tuesday at the Cameron House, and all month I've felt incredibly lucky to be alive, to have everything back that I'd let go of last year. Well, everything except drunkenness, which was better left behind. 

As amazing as the shows have been this month, my favourite thing of all has been the time at home, woodshedding, practicing yoga, getting to know the guitar fretboard, running through scales, frailing fiddle tunes on the banjo, and tackling friends' songs that I've been meaning to learn for ages. I've even enjoyed putting in long-overdue work on bookings, and taxes! I know I've said so before, but I'm even more deeply convinced of the central importance of practice, the daily work we put into the life we want. When I hear my housemate Spencer racing through pieces of music on his penny-whistle, or Mike Kerr busting out lyrical improvisations on the guitar, what they're doing seems utterly impossible to me. I'm tempted to think they've got some genetic gift that I don't. But more and more, it's impressed on me how that towering, seemingly supernatural, effortless display is built from the smallest building blocks, endlessly repeated and recombined. All the tiny, halting, sometimes-faltering steps add up to summits and views that seem unreachable when you're not walking. 

The same goes for writing a new song, which I also managed to do this month! Starting, committing, and following through is what matters. At the end you're left with something that it's hard to imagine didn't exist before, a new peak that looks unassailable, but you know full well was just built of tiny steps. 

Here's to all the little steps you're taking, friends. See you up there, 

s

Hey kind folks, 

I'm writing you from my new digs for the month, on the second floor of a late-1800s house in Toronto's Little Italy. My friend Jaron Freeman-Fox offered me his room while he's touring in Australia, and I couldn't have asked for better housemates than my hella talented pals Spencer Murray and Kaia Kater! I returned home yesterday to hear both of them practicing in their rooms, and was happily guilted into doing the same. It's a dreamy situation. I'm most excited to have a chance to stay put for a while, catch up on things, and get to know this town better. I've also got a dreamy residency for the month, playing every Tuesday from 6-8pm at the Cameron House, with help from Mike Kerr on guitar and Matt Coldwell on upright bass, and special guests every week. We're kicking it off extra special TONIGHT with not one but TWO killer songwriters as our guests: Chicago's Heather Styka and Edmonton's own Braden Gates. Come say howdy if you can! 

Here's how the next while looks: 

Tue Oct 2 • Toronto, ON • Tuesdays in October residency at The Cameron House with Heather Styka and Braden Gates, 6-8pm! 
Wed Oct 3 • Barrie, ON • Take Note Music House 
Thu Oct 4 • Sudbury, ON • Lively house concert 
Fri Oct 5 • Haliburton, ON • Maple Lake United Church 
Sat Oct 6 • Morrisburg, ON • Opening for William Prince at St. Lawrence Acoustic Stage 
Tue Oct 9 • Toronto, ON • Tuesdays in October Cameron House residency with Mike Kerr, Matt Coldwell, and surprise guests 
Sat Oct 13 • Toronto, ON • Saturday Sessions series at Inter Steer Tavern with Matt Coldwell on bass 
Sun Oct 14 • Toronto, ON • Don Heights Unitarian Congregation 
Tue Oct 16 • Toronto, ON • Tuesdays in October Cameron House residency with Mike Kerr, Matt Coldwell, and surprise guests 
Fri Oct 19 • Hamilton, ON • Staircase Theatre with Corin Raymond 
Sat Oct 20 • Kitchener, ON • Folk Night at the Registry with Craig Cardiff 
Sun Oct 21 • Toronto, ON • Neighbourhood Unitarian Universalist Congregation 
Sun Oct 21 • Guelph, ON • Guelph Roots house concert with Zachary Lucky 
Tue Oct 23 • Toronto, ON • Tuesdays in October Cameron House residency with Mike Kerr, Matt Coldwell, and guest Scott Wicken 
Fri Oct 26 • Grafton, ON • Fáilte House Concert 
Sat Oct 27 • Ottawa, ON • Tunes After Noon open stage at Moose McGuire’s with Greg Kelly, 1pm 
Sat Oct 27 • Pembroke, ON • Killaloe house concert 
Sun Oct 28 • Perth, ON • Perth Tea Room 
Tue Oct 30 • Toronto, ON • Tuesdays in October Cameron House residency with Mike Kerr, Matt Coldwell, and surprise guests 

All the details, as always, are on www.scottcook.net/news.php. At the end of the month I'll be moving back into the van and heading back Stateside for another run around, which still has some gaps in it that I'd be glad to fill: 

Thu Nov 1 • Pittsburgh, PA • Hospitality House Concert 
Fri Nov 2 • Martinsburg, WV • First Friday Coffeehouse 
Sun Nov 4 • Asheville, NC • Isis Music Hall 
Wed Nov 7 • Baltimore, MD • Four Hour Day Lutherie 
Thu-Sun Nov 8-11 • Stamford, CT • Northeast Regional Folk Alliance conference 
Mon Nov 12 • Southport, CT • open mic feature at Horseshoe Cafe 
Wed Nov 14 • State College, PA • Happy Valley House Concert 
Fri Nov 16 • Columbia, MD • The Cooper's House 
Sat Nov 17 • Darlington, MD • Deer Creek Coffeehouse 
Mon Nov 19 • Charlotte, NC • open mic feature at the Evening Muse 
Wed Nov 21 • Chapel Hill, NC • guest at Jonathan Byrd's residency at The Kraken 
Fri Nov 23 • Pleasant Plain, OH • Plain Folk Cafe 
Sat Nov 24 • Columbus, OH • Columbus Folk Music Society concert 
Sun Nov 25 • West Chester, OH • house concert 
Fri Nov 30 • Downers Grove, IL • Two Way Street Coffeehouse 
Sun Dec 2 • Grand Rapids, MI • Songteller Sessions at Creston Brewery with Nicholas James Thomasma and Kaitlin Rose 
Wed Dec 5 • Chelsea, MI • On the Tracks Songwriter Showcase with Jon Brooks 
Fri Dec 7 • Minneapolis, MN • The Warming House with Rachael Kilgour 
Sat Dec 8 • Winnipeg, MB • ANYBODY WANNA HOST? 

If you have any ideas for house concerts or other shows to plug the holes in my US tour, I'd be glad to hear from you at grooverevival@gmail.com. 

My last two missives to you dear readers were fired off from the passenger seat, with Melissa at the wheel, in the midst of the Second Chances' hectic summer. I'm pleased to report that we broke a lot of new ground. Doors that had long been closed are finally coming open. We got to play for lots of folks who'd never heard of us, and plenty of them took albums home with them. It was amazing. But it sure didn't leave a lot of time for reflection. 

Canmore Folk Festival, where we were headed when I wrote you last, was an absolute joy, and by far the biggest opportunity we've had in Alberta. The setting's incredible––among the pines in a town park with the Rockies towering on all sides––and the programming was superb. 

Our first set was a song swap pairing my trio with the unbelievably entertaining Steve Poltz, who just might be the best raconteur in the game today. I was actually kinda nervous going into it, knowing that anything can happen when he's onstage, and it's best not to make a plan. But I also had a bit of an ace up my sleeve. See, a couple years ago at the National Folk Fest in Canberra, Australia, I'd been out in the big crowd having my mind blown by one of Steve's sets. He was retelling an email conversation with his dad, reading his dad's words from his phone, and hilariously commentating the whole thing. At one point, scrolling through, he said "here he is, Joe Poltz," and read out his dad's email address. Feeling bold (and likely half-cut), I sent his dad an email right then, saying "You got a good son. Cheers from down under!" Within a day, I got an email back from Joe Poltz! My email signature has a link to a video of "Pass It Along", which he thanked me for, and in return, he sent along a recording of one of his poems. I responded with another video, and this ended up going back and forth through maybe a dozen emails of friendly chatting and poem-sharing. Steve had no idea any of this had happened. 

He usually has his phone plugged into the PA system during his sets, and does all sorts of crazy stuff with it (including carrying on conversations with Siri), but he hadn't used it yet. Near the end of the set I decided to go for it, told him the story about e-meeting his dad, and asked if he'd be okay with playing one of his dad's poems, which I'll share with you readers here, in case you're curious: "Winnipeg Mountie" 

Joe Poltz' voice came booming out of the PA, half-singing and making sound effects as he went. The audience loved it, Steve was losing his shit, and I could only marvel at what had become of a random lark years ago. 

The next day Dave Gunning, Jon Brooks, and I had the humbling honour of swapping songs with Buffy Ste-Marie. I would've been terrified if I hadn't been told that she's super nice. And it's true! She's a genuine, down-to-earth, 77 year-old legend, with a charming Saskatchewan-grandma accent and badass leather pants. She rocked the eff out with her band later on. Her new record "Medicine Songs" is powerful stuff, available wherever you buy music. This one especially stood out for me: "The War Racket" 

Another song on that album, "My Country 'Tis of Thy People You're Dying" comes from the 60s, but still rings true and timely today. I found an old clip of her singing it on Pete Seeger's TV show back then, which makes for pretty amazing viewing today. 

Like when I met Pete ten years ago, there was a bittersweetness in seeing someone sing the same truth they've been singing for fifty-plus years. On the one hand, there's a sadness in the fact that they've been singing it all this time and yet the world––for the most part––still hasn't come around, since it still needs singing. On the other, there's strength in it for younger singers––resolve to sing our own truth, whether the world's ready for it or not. 

Canmore wasn't the biggest festival we've played with the trio, but it was the first to trust us with a spot on main stage, and what an honour it was to sing for that beautiful throng on the last day! They bought so many CDs that I had to re-stock twice. Thank you, Canmore. 

Our next gig was Edmonton Folk Festival, and it was a real joy to return to my hometown fest after six years. During Steve Poltz' set, he called me and my friend Pamela up on stage to sing along on "You Were Meant For Me," which he and Jewel co-wrote, and then left us there while he galavanted through the crowd. I was elated for the Edmonton audience to get their ears on him, Buffy, John Craigie, and Shakura S'Aida. And Molly Tuttle blew my mind with her singing, flatpicking, and clawhammer guitar, a phenom in her mid-twenties, another reminder of the power of deliberate practice. But my favourite part of all was dancing our asses off to Sona Jobarteh and her band at the afterparty. 

The next weekend I moved back into my van Manny, which I hadn't lived in since my big health crisis last October. I drove up to Grande Prairie for my first time at Bear Creek Folk Festival, a wonderfully-curated fest in its third year, set in a lovely local park with the creek running through it. My friend Sarah Card, who founded the festival, was kind enough to trust me with a mainstage tweener, and also asked me to sing Gordon Lightfoot's "Alberta Bound" for the finale, which was a real honour. 

From Bear Creek I headed out to BC, stopped in for a day at the wonderful NimbleFingers Bluegrass and Old-Time Music Camp, and then drove to Vancouver to reunite with Kerryn Fields, at the end of her first Canadian voyage, for a house concert at C.R. Avery and Kathleen Nisbet's house. There were a ton of acts on the bill, and we were treated to everything from comedy through poetry, burlesque, Metis dance, a birthday freestyle from C.R., a new Kitty and the Rooster rap, and even some folk songs :) It was a heartwarming brush with Vancouver, and made me long to live there for another month sometime soon. But I was also really happy to get out of town that night, late as it was, and stand in the moonlight awhile. The border was uneventful the next day; though I must have waited about an hour in line, when the time came it was just two questions and a "have fun!". I felt a tangible weight lift as I drove away, feeling free, and glad to be back to my old modus operandi, living in the van and rambling in obscurity. 

I arrived at the venue in Bellingham to hear that the fella who booked it (and used to own it) had just parted ways with the establishment, and no real promo had been done. But I was supposed to play before The Jellyman's Daughter from Edinburgh, who I'd met two years back when we played Shelter Valley fest in Ontario, so we just decided to combine forces and play for tips rather than charge a separate cover for each show. My buddy Robert Sarazin Blake came out, and brought some lovely women who help with his Subdued Stringband Jamboree, and a few more folks wandered in, and the crowd was really warm and wonderful despite being less than twenty. I made some money, had some great conversations about local activism and life paths and such, and drove out of town just before midnight, feeling so grateful again for my lot in life. Drove along the coast a ways before I decided it was too pretty to pass in the dark, and pulled into a roadside turnout with a bunch of other vans. It was incredibly still on the cliff, with the big moon shining down on the glassy ocean, the silence only occasionally split by a passing car or a train going by down below. 

The next day I ventured on southward, hiking through the old-growth trees and over the big steel bridge at Deception Pass, watching the slate-grey ocean from the rocky beach, taking the old car ferry from Whidbey Island to the Olympic Peninsula, and stopping in Port Townsend to dig the crumbling, ornate architecture of that seaside town. On Bainbridge Island (a beautiful, tall-treed isle a ferry ride across the strait from Seattle, with reiki and rich folks) I got to see one of my heroes, Greg Brown, for the first time ever. I was super awkward meeting him, but it did me some good to see a man who'd taken on almost mythic stature to me, playing a normal gig in a small room and hanging around to sign CDs afterward. I've gotten to see my heroes come down to earth a lot this year, and it's been freeing and empowering to find myself without a shadow to stand in. Like Greg sings in "Your Town Now": 

"You young ones, it's up to you 
To fight the fight and I hope you do 
Oh I see in your eyes that you know how 
And it's your town now 
Your town now, it's your town now" 

I spent three nights in Portland, where I played a couple shows including a lovely backyard concert at blueswoman Lauren Sheehan's place, and enjoyed long bike rides around that leafy city. From there I made my way to Corvallis for another heartwarming house concert, and up to Mount Hood for a day of fumbling my way through fiddle tunes at Zigzag Mountain Oldtime Music Campout, before heading to Sisters to teach at Song Camp for my second year in a row. Last year's camp was a profound experience for me, despite feeling way out of my depth going into it, as an unknown on a faculty with Grammy winners. The creative director Brad Tisdel (who found me at a late-night showcase in a hotel room a couple years back) made a point of telling us that we were all exactly where we were supposed to be, that we just had to share some of what we'd learned along our journey so far, and it helped me get over my imposter syndrome. It felt so good to return this year, without the apocalyptic smoke in the air, and spend another week in that creative crucible with so many brave, blossoming artists. 

If you've got a minute to hear some new music, three among the many artists that blew me away at Song Camp this year were Susan Werner (check out "May I Suggest"), Joe Purdy ("It's Hard to Be a Prophet When Nobody's Listening"), and for the second year in a row, Anna Tivel ("Illinois")! 

They asked me again this year to sing the last song in the closing ceremony at camp, and again, the honour came with questions of worthiness: why me? To clear my head, I tried to remember that it wasn't about me. I was reminded of something Mary Gauthier was talking about at Kerrville earlier this year, how we've gotta serve the song, not the other way around. The work wants to come through us. We just need to let it. 

I remembered that again on Sunday morning, singing "Pass It Along" for the biggest crowd I'd seen all weekend, in their Community Celebration. And somehow, rather than buckling under the weight of the moment, it felt like something lifted off me. 

From Sisters I headed south for a couple days alone, including my first visit to Crater Lake, which is absolutely breathtaking. It was formed by a massive volcanic eruption around 7700 years ago. Wizard Island, in the middle of the crater, is a cinder cone that formed from later, smaller eruptions. The local tribes remember the big one in their stories, and some of their tools have even been found buried under the ash. Something that big sure can make you feel small in a way that also feels like a weight coming off. 

I drove further south after that for a run of five shows with the wonderful Justin Farren and family, who I met last year at Song Camp. One of these days I'm gonna bring them up and introduce them to my Canadian friends, and I guarantee you're gonna love them. For now, here's one of his brilliant songs to whet your appetite: "Little Blue Dirtbike" 

Our last show together was a Sunday afternoon house concert in an old goldrush town called Mokulemne Hill, California, and that evening I started the long trip across the country to Earthwork Harvest Gathering: through the pine forests of the Sierra Nevada mountains into Nevada's wide deserts, along the open stretches of "The Loneliest Road in America", through Utah's breathtaking red canyons, alongside the White River as it winds between the massive sentinel columns of the Colorado Rockies, and finally across the open pastures and green farmlands of Nebraska and Illinois. I spent the days in silence, or kept company by National Public Radio, a calm, nationwide voice of sanity and science that I'm ever more thankful for these days in America. As always, the journey over such vast country, the ever-unrolling succession of ridges and flatlands, the pavement mirages in the midday sun, the last rays of sunlight filling the valleys with gold in the long-shadowed evenings, and the starry nights and bird-chirping mornings in State Forest campgrounds were all road music to my soul. 

I pulled into the Earthwork farm five days later, with just enough time to rehearse with Fauxgrass, check in my merchandise, and take the stage. Seth Bernard (who grew up on the farm, and started the festival fifteen or so years ago) played right after me, and it was a joy as always to see him there, singing his songs where they mean the most. He took a break in the middle of his set and talked for a while, holding a clipboard, welcoming everyone to the farm, and emphasizing that it's not just a celebration; it only means something if it translates into real action in our communities. I really admire the way he manages to include politics and even ceremony (blessing a new well, or commemorating people in the community who died in the past year) in a way that doesn't presuppose any particular belief, that has room in it for everybody. I've learned a lot from him, and I've still got a lot to learn. It did my heart so much good to visit the farm again, to reconnect with my Michigan family, and to leave the festival on Monday without a hangover. 

From Earthwork I made my way into Ontario for a quick visit with the Anglers' old bass player, the Daz Bear, who'll be familiar to only looooongtime readers of this Travelogue, and who I last visited in Cape Town, where he was running an international documentary film festival. He's just immigrated to Canada, is living in his wife's hometown of Windsor for the time being, and is still just as hilarious as ever. 

The next morning I left the van in airport parking and flew to Austin for the Southwest Regional Folk Alliance conference. It felt pretty surreal to be in Texas after having just driven across the country to Ontario. I was surprised at how many people I knew from Kerrville at the conference, and also stoked to reunite with my pal Sarah Burton, who brought the Long Weekends' drummer (and now Dana Wylie's baby daddy!) Matt Blackie into our lives all those years ago, and who we used to see a lot of on the western Canadian festival circuit before she moved to Terlingua, Texas a couple years back. Folk conferences are a funny scene, with a few hundred (or a few thousand, in the case of Folk Alliance International) folkies gathered together in a hotel to talk during the day and sing songs into the wee hours of the night, and they don't leave a lot of time for sleep or reflection. But I got to play for a bunch of people who'd never heard me before, made some new friends, and found some opportunities that'll take me back down that way before too long. I love Texas. And I love the States. No matter how crazy it might look on TV these days, it's my contention that there, like everywhere, most people are fundamentally good and decent. 

Alright, I've gotta leave this here for now, I've got a gig to play soon! 

I put up some photos from the whole summer, if you wanna have a look, here. 

Thanks as always for reading, friend. And I sure hope to see you along this ramble, or the next one. 

You're a light along the path. Keep shining, 

s

Hey friends, 

Just a short Travelogue this month, coming to you again from the passenger seat, as Melissa steers us westward for our last string of BC dates, in Revelstoke, Golden, Kaslo, and Nelson. We're fresh off an amazing weekend at Calgary Folk Fest––a wonderful, adventurously-curated festival set among the trees on Prince's Island in downtown Calgary. I had my mind freshly blown by three incredibly powerful women in particular: Shakura S'Aida, Amy Helm, and Wallis Bird. And I had SO MUCH FUN dancing to the calypso rhythms of Kobo Town. We brought along our Kiwi friend Kerryn Fields, on her first visit overseas, and it was great to give her a first taste of Canadian festival hospitality. In addition to being a soulful singer, clever conversationalist, and all-around inspiring human, she also managed to best Alberta's own badass country chanteuse Mariel Buckley in a pint-skulling contest last night. Kerryn's coming with us for these next two shows, and then heading up to ArtsWells, so please give her a warm welcome if you're heading that way! 

Next weekend we're back in Alberta for Canmore Folk Fest (where I'll have the honour of sharing a stage with Buffy Ste-Marie!), then up to Edmonton Folk Fest, and then I'm heading up to play Bear Creek Folk Fest in Grande Prairie before I hit the long trail. It's an unbelievable honour to play all four of Alberta's major folk festivals in the same summer, and to share stages with so many greats. 

So yeah, here's how the road ahead looks: 

Mon Jul 30 - Revelstoke, BC - Summer Street Fest with special guest Kerryn Fields 

Wed Aug 1 - Golden, BC - Summer Kicks in Spirit Square with special guest Kerryn Fields 

Thu Aug 2 - Kaslo, BC - Bluebelle Bistro 

Fri Aug 3 - Nelson, BC - House concert 

Sat-Mon Aug 4-6 - Canmore, AB - Canmore Folk Music Festival! Our main stage concert is Monday from 3:30-4:20pm, and I've also got some sessions: 11:45am-12:45pm Sunday with Steve Poltz, 3:30-4:30pm Sunday with Coco Love Alcorn and Nick Waterhouse, 10:30-11:30am Monday with Jon & Roy, and 1-2pm Monday with Buffy Sainte-Marie, Dave Gunning, and Jon Brooks. 

Thurs-Sun Aug 9-12 - Edmonton, AB - Edmonton Folk Music Festival! On Friday, we're in a workshop called Talkin' About My Generation with The Bros. Landreth, Kaia Kater, and This is The Kit, 6-7:20pm on Stage 2. Our concert's on Saturday at noon on Stage 7, and on Sunday we're in a workshop called The Poet Game with Gunning & Cormier and Jon Brooks from 11-11:55am on Stage 7. I couldn't be more excited to play our hometown fest again. 

Fri-Sun Aug 17-19 - Grande Prairie, AB - Bear Creek Folk Music Festival! My set's at 11am Saturday on Stage 2, then I'm in a workshop with Sam Baker, Gunning & Cormier, and Guy Davis at 3pm Saturday on Stage 3, and another workshop with Little Miss Higgins, Braden Gates, and Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley at 11am Sunday on Stage 3. 

From there I'll be heading off alone, and won't be back until mid-December. There are still a lot of gaps in the next month's schedule, which I could really use some help with: 

Thu Aug 23 - Vancouver, BC - house concert with Kerryn Fields and special guests 
Fri Aug 24 - Bellingham, WA - with Robert Sarazin Blake, TBC 
Sun Aug 26 - Mt. Vernon, WA - private event 
Tue Aug 28 - Portland, OR - feature at Northwest Portland Hostel's open mic 
Wed Aug 29 - Portland, OR - house concert with Mark Graham and Lauren Sheehan 
Mon-Thu Sep - Sisters, OR - teaching songwriting at Sisters Song Camp 
Fri-Sun Sep 7-9 - Sisters, OR - Sisters Folk Festival 
Wed Sep 12 - Ashland, OR - house concert with Justin Farren 
Thu Sep 13 - San Francisco, CA - The Lost Church with Justin Farren 
Fri Sep 14 - Sacramento, CA - The Lounge with Justin Farren 
Fri-Sun Sep 21-23 - Lake City, MI - Earthwork Harvest Gathering 

If you can think of anywhere I should stop and play along that route (especially on the week between California and Michigan), even if it's somebody's living room, I'm all ears! 

After that big run, I'll be living in Toronto for the month of October, and playing every Tuesday from 6-8pm at the Cameron House with new recruits Mike Kerr and Matt Coldwell, as well as gigging elsewhere around the province, and in November I'm back down to the States. All my confirmed dates, as always, are on my news page. 

Since I wrote you last, we had a great little run around BC, singing mostly unamplified in some lovely rooms including Benvoulin Heritage Church in Kelowna, Cranberry Community Hall in Powell River, and the Heritage Playhouse Theatre in Gibsons. We even got a sweet taste of the best of East Van, dancing to Jack Garton and the Demon Squadron with the smiling freaks at the WISE Hall. It was great to smell the coastal air, reconnect with so many friends along the way, and share three more shows and lots more laughs with our favourite irreverent self-referential power duo, Kitty and the Rooster. We wrapped up the run among our nears and dears at Wild Mountain Music Festival in Hinton, and then played a sweet house concert at our friends Reuben and Angie's place in Edmonton, with a whole bunch of old Taiwan crew in attendance. 

This life's pretty amazing, friends. At times there's so much love flowing that it fills up your cup and spills all over you. Other times it's lonely and you wish for nothing more than to be easily understood. It's then, when the world's gone chilly, the last leaves are falling, and home seems a million miles away, that I'll remember these beautiful, bountiful, blazing days. Thanks for sharing them with us, friends. 

Happy trails and sunny days to you, 

s

Hey dear readers, 

I thoroughly intended to write you during my long convalescence on my old Albertan stomping grounds, and I did make some small beginnings on the task there. But that sweet stretch of stationary time ran out, as it does, and it came time to hit the road again before it was done. So this Travelogue's fittingly coming to you from the passenger seat, as Melissa steers us toward Kelowna for the second gig of our annual summer ramble around BC. It sure feels good to be back on the road with her and Bram. 

It feels like ages ago that I left Australia. It was the 1st of May, which was the first day of autumn on that side of the world, and by the magic of intercontinental flight plus the international date line, I landed back home around the very same time, except that on this side of the world, May 1st is the first day of spring. What a strange feeling, going from samhain to beltane, with a day out of time in between! 

Since arriving in Alberta, I spent most of my time catching up on bookings, finances, and general admin, and pouring myself into practice of various kinds: yoga, guitar scales, bluegrass flatpicking, playing with a metronome, learning other people's songs, frailing fiddle tunes on the banjo, taking voice lessons with the amazing Dana Wylie, and going to weekly classes in Lindy Hop and West African dance at Sugar Swing in Edmonton. I also found time for jamming with friends, riding bikes around to the many shows and patios on Saturday afternoons, getting out in the woods, and meeting friends' kids–some for the first time, and some all over again, boggling at how quickly they grow and get more and more to say. 

I did take one big break from home in the middle of my stay, flying down to Texas for my third visit to what has gotta be the deepest well of song in the English-speaking world, the Kerrville Folk Festival. It's a sweaty 18-day music marathon on a ranch in hill country, where a few thousand folks gather to share songs. There are shows at night, of course (four or five acts a night in the big theatre on weekends, and one or two each night in the small theatre during the weeks), but plenty of people don't even watch them. The real action's in the campground, where folks circle up and share songs, most of which they wrote themselves. 

Some of these folks have been coming for over forty years, plenty of them staying for the whole eighteen days, and their camps are well-established locales: Camp Nash Bill, where Bill Nash welcomes newcomers and holds court forebearingly and beautifully; Camp Cuisine, where plenty of mainstage acts hang out after-hours; the Crow's Nest, where I got to swap songs with Kerrville stalwarts like Chuck Brodsky, Brian Cutean, and Steve Fisher; and Camp Jews Don't Camp, where the song circles go late into the night, and the Bread Man's four bread machines churn out warm loaves, which he wordlessly hand-delivers to other circles-in-progress before ducking back to rejoin his. 

One constant gateway of new writers into that community is the New Folk contest, in which 32 finalists are selected from hundreds of entries to sing two songs over the first weekend. Lucinda Williams, Lyle Lovett, Steve Earle, John Gorka, Robert Earl Keen, Slaid Cleaves, James McMurtry, Nanci Griffith, Tom Russell, Robert Earl Keen, Jimmy LaFave, and many more luminaries were introduced to Kerrville that way. I sang first out of the thirty-two this year, and was humbled to get a standing ovation, but I wasn't among the six winners. I consoled myself with thoughts of my fellow losers Lucinda Williams, Jimmy LaFave, Nanci Griffith, Lyle Lovett, and Steve Earle. And with our gig the following Thursday night at Camp Cuisine, the legendary Club 7, where the year's losers and losers from years past ("once a loser, always a loser," they say) gather together to sing one song each, to cheers of "winner!" from the campsite crowd. 

I signed up for the songwriters' school in the week after the contest, and it was inspiring for my own songcraft as well as for the teaching of songwriting, which I'll be doing again in the week leading up to Sisters Folk Festival in Oregon this September. We had a great group of teachers this year, including Johnsmith (what a beautiful man), Gary Nicholson (who wrote "If The House is Rocking (Don't Bother Knocking)" among other hits), my buddy Connor Garvey, and the amazing Mary Gauthier. 

Mary's been writing songs with soldiers these past few years, and recently released an album of those collaborations called Rifles and Rosary Beads. She said she was really intimidated when she first got into it, worried that she'd have nothing in common with these people, never having held a gun, and being a peacenik, lesbian, and former drug addict. They surprised each other. She's made a ton of soldier friends through the experience. And she learned a deep respect for the type of people who enlist, even if they've been misled and used by our leaders. They're brave, and strong, and they want to serve. And when they see that telling their own stories through song can be of service, to help other traumatized veterans heal, well, they're brave and strong enough to share. 

Spending that time with Mary and hearing her stories really helped me make sense of the conflicted feelings I'd been wrestling with on landing back in the country of my birth, deep in the heart of Texas at that, with the repeated invocations of God and Country set against the display of flagrant criminality coming from the White House. It helped me check some of my own prejudices, my instinctive thoughts about the type of people who fall for the lies of politicians and clergy–or maybe I should say, people who see things differently than I do. It gave me hope for the great American experiment, for the possibility of saving what's left of the Republic, and what's good in the stories from the Bible. 

My last day on the ranch, a conversation in Camp Kerfuffle brought it home for me. The gist of it was that the Lord works in mysterious ways, or if you prefer different language, that Spirit works through us in ways we'll never understand. Sometimes God needs an asshole, one fella said. Sometimes, regrettably, you end up playing that part for others to learn from. And maybe now God's using a particular asshole in the White House to help the country grow up. 

The days were dizzyingly, nauseatingly hot down there, around forty degrees (that's a hundred, for my American friends) with ninety percent humidity, but the moonlit nights were lovely, with quiet song circles among the fireflies, bugsong and birdsong. Several nights I feel asleep in my tent to the serenade of a mockingbird running through all the songs he knew. 

There's a big sign at the gate to Kerrville that says "Welcome Home," and those are usually the first words your hear when you pull in. I'm so grateful to have found a home among folks like that. It wasn't long afterward that I was back at the festival where I first heard those words, and first found such a home, the North Country Fair. She turned forty this year, and she's looking better than ever. Her children have grown up and had children of their own. 

It was my first alcohol-free Fair, and it felt new for that. I still stayed up 'til 7:30 in the morning swapping songs, but my sight was clearer by that hour. And Monday sure felt a lot less dreadful and sad. 

The Long Weekends and I hosted the 11th annual North Country Fair Afterbender back in Edmonton on Wednesday, and while it's always a lot of work, I was reminded again of why it's worth doing: to bring folks together for an unofficial last night of the Fair, and to spread a little of that overflowing love around our city. We left town with a heartfull of it, shared some with the kind folks in Valemount last night, and we'll be carrying it around beautiful BC for the next two weeks: 

June 29 - Kelowna, BC - Benvoulin Heritage Church with Nils Loewen 
June 30 - Vancouver, BC - Jack Garton and the Demon Squadron CD release at WISE Hall with Kitty and the Rooster 
July 1 - Chilliwack ,BC - Canada Day at Tractorgrease with CR Avery, Kitty and the Rooster, Salt Thief, Tiger Moon, and the Lonesome Town Painters 
July 3 - Victoria, BC - house concert 
July 4 - Nanaimo, BC - house concert with Marian Van Der Zon 
July 5 - Cumberland, BC - house concert 
July 6 - Powell River, BC - Cranberry Community Hall 
July 7 - Gibsons, BC - Heritage Playhouse Theatre with the Rakish Angles 
July 8 - Vernon, BC - Gallery Vertigo 
July 10 - Kamloops, BC - Music in the Park 
July 11 - Prince George, BC - Omineca Arts Centre 
July 12 - Jasper, AB - Jasper Community Arts Habitat 
July 13-15 - Hinton, AB - Wild Mountain Music Festival 

All the details, as usual, are on my news page. 

After that I'll be spending another month around Alberta, and I'm proud to announce that the Second Chances and I will be appearing at the Calgary and Canmore Folk Festivals for the first time, with a swing back out to BC in between for shows in Revelstoke, Golden, Kaslo, and Nelson. We're also on the lineup for Edmonton Folk Fest, and then I'll be heading up to Grande Prairie for my first time at the new but by-all-reports-amazing Bear Creek Folk Festival. It's an incredible feeling to land all these gigs in the same summer. It's been a long time coming. 

If you're around Edmonton and want to catch us in a more intimate setting this summer, you've got one chance. Our buddy Reuben's been wanting to host us for a house concert for ages, and we've finally worked it out, Sunday July 22nd. That'll be your only chance to hear us outside of Folk Fest, and our only hometown show 'til January at the earliest, so if you wanna come, email transfer $20 to reubenjanderson@gmail.com to get the address and save your seat. 

--- 

Thanks for staying with me, dear readers. Last I wrote you I was in Tantawangalo, around the halfway point of two months in Australia with Corin Raymond. We were just about to head to Canberra for the National Folk Festival, which hadn't hired us but still managed to give us plenty of opportunities to play, sell CDs, and reconnect with the big Australian folk family. I was overjoyed to introduce Corin to that throng, and to have another chance to make music with our pal Liz Frencham. On Tuesday, before we left the fest, Liz and I started making concrete plans for my visit next March, when we'll be recording an album together in her studio. And I celebrated how far I felt from that Tuesday morning two years ago when I last left the National Folk Fest, with a shaky shame-over after a destructive five-day bender. 

From Canberra Corin and I wound our way north through the back country to Queensland, where we played some truly joyous shows in Brisbane, Mudgeeraba, Tintenbar (what a gorgeous spot!), Duranbah, Nambour, and Mooloolaba. Corin started feeling like he was in the Lord of the Rings, proclaiming "I am Nambour, Son of Duranbah! I bring you the Great Sword of Tintenbar!" (at which news, the King would say "Mooloolaba," which means, order has been restored, peace has returned to the Shire). 

On our way back down we played a couple lovely gatherings in Armidale and Nana Glen, and were en route to our gig in Kempsey when Skippy started to feel funny. Within a short while, he'd lost power and we were stuck on the side of the road with smoke pouring out from under the hood. Our new friends Pat and Belinda, who we'd just met at the previous night's show, pulled over to help, and correctly diagnosed Skippy's blown head gasket. After some discussion it was decided to load everything except the mattress into their van, and leave Skippy with a tow truck driver, likely never to be seen again. 

Corin wrote his own Travelogue about the tour, which dealt a lot with the theme of leaving things behind on the road (if you're not already a subscriber, you can sign up here, and you can read his Aussie travelogue here). As he put it in there, "Anything that isn't essential to the task at hand––in this case, fulfilling a zig-zagging, 40-date tour in two months––might lose its grip and be gone in the slipstream. For instance: your correspondence with family and friends, your list of things that need getting done, the email you're trying to put out to your list, your beloved copy of Helen Garner's True Stories (more on that), your shoes, your vehicle... if it's not tattooed to you, it might not make it. The concept of time itself can't even hang in for long––in fact, it's one of the first things to go." 

I guess I've learned that from all these roads over the years. What you can't carry, you can't keep. And it just gets smaller in the distance. 

The other big lesson the road teaches travellers, over and over, is that there really are a lot of kind people out there. Singing songs sure has introduced me to a lot of them. This trip was another extended reminder of that. Several near-strangers had already come to our rescue in Taiwan: Thomas Walk, who visited Bram in the hospital, took me up into the mountains to find our motorbikes at the crash site, and did most of the talking at the police station when we found a local with a truck to carry the bike back down to civilization; and Mike and Mary, who loaned us their Austin Mini for almost a month despite not knowing me beyond a couple nights of song and hangs. But the flood of unexpected kindness continued in Australia. My friend Jan, who I barely knew, took care of Skippy while I was in Taiwan, and drove me to the airport. My friend Bronwyn loaned me her house for long stretches of my earlier trip, and it also served as a haven of solace for me and Corin on our next go round, as did my friends Brett and Deb's beach house, and my friends Heath and Laura's house in Tantawangalo, from whence I last wrote you dear readers. Then there's Mitzi, who loaned us her car Busby for a run to Adelaide and back. Pat and Belinda, who stopped to help when Skippy died, and ended up loading all our stuff into their van and driving us out of their way to Kempsey for the next gig. And Colin and Denise in Kempsey! Colin got "Pass It Along" played on national radio a couple visits back, set me up for three amazing shows in the local Odd Fellows Hall over the last couple years, and loaded all our stuff into his vehicle to take me and Corin to find a rental car the next day. Then there were our many house concert hosts, like Peter and Jane Crone, whose Eaglemont living room was the best-paying gig of the whole trip, and who are actually building a theatre beside their house so they can present bigger shows! And of course all the repeat offenders who showed up at several stops along the tour. 

One of the greatest and most unexpected gifts of the whole trip, though, arrived in Ararat, our first gig after we moved into the rental car. I told the story of Skip's demise onstage, and after the show an older fella named Tom came up and asked me what exactly the problem was. Unfixable, I told him. A blown head gasket. That's fixable, he said, it's just a lot of work. Turns out Tom's a retired mechanic, and up for the job. While I had a hard time believing him at first, he finally convinced me to let him have a go at it, and got it trucked from rural New South Wales down to rural Victoria where he could tinker on it in the yard. I thanked him enthusiastically, but he just shrugged, "it's good to have something to do! When you get to my age," he said, "you're ready to give back to the world what the world's given you, and I'm happy to give back. Look, I've had a bloody good life, and from the sound of your life story you've done a fair bit too." 

Despite, or perhaps because of all the bumps in the road, the home stretch of tour was incredibly redemptive, singing for big audiences at the Upper Kangaroo River Hall (thanks Andy Gordon), the Spotted Mallard in Melbourne (alongside our amazing pals Liz Frencham and Lucie Thorne), the Troubadour in Woy Woy (thanks Mike and Ina), and Smith's Alternative in Canberra (my third visit to that lovely haven on this long trip), and closing it out perfectly with a house concert at Bronwyn's place, where I'd already spent so much time on this trip. Corin ended the tour with just a few CDs left, having sold around 500 copies, which is concrete proof of how well Australia's welcomed him back. Oh, and I saw my first echidna toward the end of the trip, and whaddayaknow, he was waddling alongside the road like a little hobo. 

We wrapped up the trip in central Victoria, where the settlers planted plenty of European trees back in the day, and it was a new sight for me, fall colours down under, and my breath in the night air! I figured that meant it was time for leaving. This life has a lot of leaving in it. I feel the bittersweetness of that even more acutely these days. I suppose I'm feeling everything more acutely without the booze, and the vaseline it smears on the lens of life. 

Lots of things are coming in clearer without that sedation. My dream life's deeper and richer. My sense of smell's stronger, and it carries long-forgotten childhood memories with it. The veil between the worlds feels thinner. 

Sobriety's been such a good teacher that I'm wondering what took me so long to enrol. It's been amazing to see how easily old habits fall away, when they once felt so ossified and immutable. Kind of like how fixed the worldly order of things feels, until somebody changes it. While I was in Taipei, I had a chance to shoot a little video for the first song I wrote after that close look at death, and I think it speaks to some of that: 

"What To Keep" 

Oh, and I took a bunch of photos while I was down under, if you wanna have a look! 

Well friends, I sure hope this Travelogue finds you flourishing, and enjoying the season, whichever side of the world you're on. And if that's anywhere around here, we hope to see you real soon! With bottomless love from the passenger seat, your fan, 

s

Hey friends, 

I'm writing you from tiny Tantawangalo, just outside Candelo, New South Wales. Candelo's my favourite Aussie village, and the place Corin Raymond and I have been calling home for the week. Our friends Heath and Laura are away, so we've had their charming farmhouse to ourselves. Well, us and the mice who moved in lately, and the poisonous black snake who recently took up residence under the ramp outside. 

I'll let you in on a secret right here, dear readers. All the stories we tell about dangerous Australian wildlife aren't true. They're just stories we tell to scare away the faint of heart, to keep these bountiful pastures to ourselves. 

Speaking of bountiful pastures, we've got some great country ahead of us in the month to come! We'll be tearing ourselves away from Candelo today, and heading up to join the throng at the National Folk Festival in Canberra. We weren't booked to play, but we've managed to persuade our way in, and will be singing as much as we can. I can already tell you that I'll be playing the Bohemia Bar at 6:30 or so this (Saturday) evening, then in the lovely Flute and Fiddle venue at 10:30 tonight with Liz Frencham on bass, preceding fellow Canadians the Good Lovelies. On Sunday, Corin and I are both singing a song each in the Broadway Folkie workshop at 5:10pm on the Majestic stage, and Corin will be playing the Flute and Fiddle at 11:15pm with Liz Frencham. I'm really looking forward to introducing Corin to the Nash family. After the festival we'll be making our way up north and back again, with the following stops along the way: 

Thu April 5 - Mudgeeraba, QLD - "Oh Canada" house Concert 
Fri April 6 - Tintenbar, NSW - Tintenbar Up Front 
Sat April 7 - Duranbah, NSW - house concert 
Sun April 8 - Nambour, QLD - Sunday Folk 
Tue April 10 - Brisbane, QLD - Brisbane Unplugged 
Wed April 11 - Mooloolaba, QLD - house concert 
Thu April 12 - Armidale, NSW - The Studio 
Fri April 13 - Nana Glen, NSW - verandah concert 
Sat April 14 - Kempsey, NSW - Oddfellows Hall 
Sun April 15 - Sydney, NSW - house concert 
Wed April 18 - Ararat, VIC - Ararat Live 
Thu April 19 - Benalla, VIC - North East Artisans 
Fri April 20 - Wollongong, NSW - Illawarra Folk Club 
Sat April 21 - Woy Woy, NSW - Troubadour Folk Club 
Sun April 22 - Kangaroo Valley, VIC - Upper Kangaroo River Hall 
Wed April 25 - Canberra, ACT - Smith's Alternative 
Thu April 26 - Melbourne, VIC - The Spotted Mallard with Lucie Thorne and Liz Frencham 
Fri April 27 - Eaglemont, VIC - house concert 
Sat April 28 - Ocean Grove, VIC - house concert 
Sun April 29 - Glenlyon, VIC - house concert 

It's been a many-storied month since I wrote you last, faithful readers. Corin and I had a great run around Taiwan in the aforementioned baby blue Austin Mini, Maximus, and many a Taiwanese person's day was made by the sight of us two big fellas folding out of it. We bounced that little go-cart around pretty much the whole island, making stops along the way to sing for lovely crowds at Paul Lawrence's house in Hualien, Lei Gallery in Taichung, and my favourite bar on the island, Bobwundaye in Taipei. Corin already had some fans in Taiwan, as I've been singing his songs there for almost a decade, but it was such a joy to see him blowing minds in person. And Taiwan blew his mind in return. It was his first visit to Asia, and he really fell for the island's food, scenery, and famously sweet people. He took to the Mandarin too, and was making up sentences by the end of the week, much to my (and our audiences') delight. I have no doubt he'll be back. 

We had a sweet trip down the east coast, ate a lot of fruit, backed down from a standoff with a big monkey, stayed with Tennessee Pete the fiddling Taitung pizza man, and happened on a han dan (寒單爺) ceremony, where bare-chested, tattooed gangster types playing the role of a god are carried around on a palanquin while people shower them with wads of lit firecrackers. In Taitung we also went to see The Black Panther, or rather Hei Bao (黑豹), which Corin wanted to watch for a third time, in Taiwan. And while it's certainly a groundbreaking movie for lots of reasons, it's also just a great superhero movie. Both Corin and I have spent plenty of time inside comic books, and it occurred to us yesterday that these travelogues we're both working on are actually crossover issues in themselves, like the Marvel Team-Ups of yore! 

I posted a few photos of the trip on Facebook, if you wanna have a look: Taiwan 2018 

A couple days after arrival we were back into the touring, and I must admit it was a bit of a challenging re-entry, coming off such a sweet time in Taiwan, and playing for tiny audiences on our first few nights here. I did all the bookings for this tour, and brought Corin over here on the premise that it'd be great, so it was a bit worrying, to say the least, for both of us. But things gradually picked up, and he got to meet some of the people who've played very important parts in my journey over here, people like my original visa sponsor and legendary impresario Andrew Pattison, and killer songwriters like Mandy Connell, Michael Waugh, Kerryn Fields, John Flanagan, and Liz Frencham, who's also downright godlike on the double bass. She joined us for shows in Bendigo and Yackandandah, and will be joining us again at the National, and on our finale show in Melbourne April 26th. She brightens my day every time. 

We met up with her one night at her favourite pub, the Radio Springs Hotel in Lyonville, where unbeknownst to Corin (the biggest cinephile I know), there's a tiny little movie theatre hidden in the back garden, complete with velvet curtains that scroll open, an antique cash register, a popcorn machine, and an old celluloid projector. The owner's a former projectionist from Melbourne who spends a lot of time tracking down rare films, and he found a doozy for Corin that night, an Aussie/Kiwi co-production called The Navigator, about a group of medieval Cumbrians who dig through the earth to save their village from the Black Plague and end up down under in the 1980s. Corin was tickled. 

I don't normally watch movies on tour, but I've enjoyed it with Corin. In Albury we saw a heavy one called Sweet Country, by an indigenous Australian director named Warwick Thornton, set in the outback of the Northern Territory in 1929. It's a brutal but beautiful film, and I really hope my Aussie friends'll make a point of seeing it. 

About a week into the tour, on our way to play a house concert in Healesville, Skippy's clutch died, on a hill in a traffic jam. We had to wait for folks to get by before we rolled back down the hill bit by bit. We pulled onto the shoulder the first place we could, and waited there for roadside assistance while our host Jonni drove out to get us. When he got there he couldn't believe it--the driveway we'd pulled into was his old place, that he'd moved away from in 1980 or so. 

Within five minutes of being welcomed at Jonni and his partner Cecilia's place, the Duck Pond, we had been offered a loaner car by their neighbour Mitzi. Busby's his name, a red Honda Civic who needed a run to stretch his legs. The road never stops throwing the twists, but it continues to provide all the same. We played for a refreshingly small-town country crowd in Cudgewa, then made our way west along the winding, muddy Murray River for lovely backyard concerts in Echuca and Mildura, and a songwriter showcase in Adelaide, before racing back for Michael Waugh's CD release in Melbourne after a few hours' sleep in a Bordertown motel. It was so worth it to be there, to hear those Aussie-as-it-gets, practical, healing songs sung to a full house that included his parents. 

A few hours' sleep and a thousand dollars later, we were back on the road in Skippy for another worthwhile early-morning run, out to Yackandandah Folk Festival this time. We only had Saturday and Sunday there, but Yack's one of my favourite festivals in this country or anywhere, and it was such a pleasure to go back with Corin, who'd played it about a decade ago with his duo The Undesirables. One of the groups had dropped out, so I ended up having a couple sets after all, which makes four years in a row at that fest. Lots of old friends were there, including my Michigan pals Lindsay Lou and Joshua Rilko, and a great jam came together out back of the pub on Sunday night with host Pete Denahy, the unofficial mayor of Yackandandah, who's already got a song-burr on the cuffs of Corin Raymond. I had dreamful creekside sleeps in Skippy both nights, and god, it felt good to be back. 

From Yack we drove over the Snowy Mountains to this beautiful valley, where our pals Dave and Rae hosted us and the Good Lovelies for a magnificent breakfast feast, my friend Sue Andrew set up a well-attended production of Corin's one-man play Bookworm in Bega, and Mike Martin and the ever-lovin' Candelo Arts Society put on a show for us in the lovely Candelo Cafe. We feel pretty well taken care of, let me tell you. 

So hey, we've gotta get on the road to the National Folk Fest, so I'm gonna have to wrap up this Marvel Team-Up here. I don't think Corin's crossover issue's gonna make it out quite yet, but that's only because he's taking the time to craft a more imaginative recap than this one. Trust me, the art's better in that series. The colours are brighter. The writing's tighter. This humble Hobo Travelogue's mostly just serving practical purposes, to be honest. But I reckon the best use this one could have would be to convince you folks to subscribe to his mailing list. Take my word for it, go on over to www.corinraymond.com and put your email address in the box on the top right. His emails don't come out quite as regularly as mine, but they're always a treat to read, and of course you can get off the train anytime if you don't enjoy the ride. But I imagine you will. 

There's one last bit of news, dear readers, one that I've had to keep under my hat for a while: I'm pleased to announce that I'll be playing two of Alberta's major folk festivals for the first time this year: Bear Creek Folk Music Festival in Grande Prairie August 17-19 (solo), and Canmore Folk Music Festival August 4-6 with the Second Chances! I've also got a couple more amazing bits of news up my sleeve, but I've gotta wait a little longer to tell you about those :) 

Alright, we've got a festival to get to. With all our love, from Tantawangalo to wherever you are, 

s

Hey friends, 

Happy lunar new year from Taiwan! I'm at the Catholic Hostel in Tianxiang, a tiny town at the top of Taroko Gorge where I found the time to write you several lunar new years ago, for those of you who were reading back then. I looked back just now (since this Hobo Travelogue often has a better grasp of my memories than I do) and was interested to see that it was from this time in 2012, shortly before I cut my hair and headed to Fulong for a month off the stage and off the sauce. That month saw me lose ten pounds and write three songs ("Mama Always Said", "You Don't Find Out in the End", and "Pass It Along"), an unusually productive time for me, and the kind I'm hoping for more of, now that my drunken days are done and I'm ever so gradually learning to slow down. Funny enough, at the end of that short Travelogue, after a musing on the passing of time, there's a postscript about Corin Raymond and his Canadian Tire Money caper, which had recently landed him on a host of Canadian TV shows and the front page of The Wall Street Journal. What a trip that now, in the first days of this Year of Dog, I find myself back here in the company of that same fella, just days into his first visit to this country, and in fact, his first visit to Asia at all. Time keeps rolling on, me and my pals here have more grey hairs, their kids are speaking two or three languages these days, and crazy dreams keep coming true in ways we never expected. 

Another thing I noticed in that old Travelogue was that I'd just played my first few Taiwan house concerts, the last of which was at Ryan and Iris St. Onge's place in Hualien City. I was excited to introduce the idea to Taiwan back then, because I'd seen at home how powerful an experience it can be to listen to songs unamplified, without the stage, the lights, and all the noise and chatter of a bar. Like Corin sings in "There Will Always Be a Small Time", "the music's gone back home again, nowadays we're playing in the parlours like the way they used to do." Well, whaddayaknow, it just so happens that today I'll be driving back down this gorge to Hualien City, to sing unamplified in Paul Lawrence and Romy's living room, in the good company of the man himself. We're inviting folks at 6:30, and Paul's kicking off the show with a short set at 7:30. It's by donation, with the usual magic-or-your-money-back guarantee. For real, catch Corin while you can. 

We've only got two more shows left on this island, and they're both unamplified and intimate as well: Saturday March 3 at Lei Gallery in Taichung (2pm doors for 2:30 start, reservations required), and Sunday March 4 at Bobwundaye in Taipei (7pm doors for an 8pm show, tickets at the door), then we're headed to Australia for two months of touring there. All the details on these Taiwan shows and our full Australian dates can be found on my news page, but here's the rundown in point form for those of you who like that: 

Wed Feb 28 - Hualien, TW - house concert 
Sat March 3 - Taichung, TW - house concert at Lei Gallery 
Sun March 4 - Taipei, TW - Bobwundaye! 
Fri March 9 - Upwey, VIC - The Skylark Room 
Sat March 10 - Bendigo, VIC - The Old Church on the Hill with Candice McLeod and Liz Frencham 
Sun-Mon March 1-12 - Mia Mia, VIC - Burke & Wills Folk Festival 
Wed March 14 - Melbourne, VIC - house concert 
Thu March 15 - Melbourne, VIC - house concert 
Fri March 16 - Healesville, VIC - house concert 
Sat March 17 - Cudgewa, VIC - Cudgewa Hall 
Sun March 18 - Albury, VIC - house concert 
Tues March 20 - Echuca, VIC - house concert 
Wed March 21 - Mildura, VIC - house concert 
Thu March 22 - Adelaide, SA, SCALA Show at The Wheatsheaf 
Fri March 23 - Melbourne, VIC - Michael Waugh’s CD launch at the Spotted Mallard 
Sat March 24 - Yackandandah, VIC - Yackandandah Folk Festival 
Sun March 25 - Yackandandah, VIC - Yackandandah Folk Festival 
Tue March 27 - Bega, NSW - Corin performs Bookworm (TBC) 
Wed March 28 - Candelo, NSW - Candelo Cafe 
Sat March 31 - Huskisson, NSW - Huskisson Community Centre 
Sun April 1 - Canberra, ACT - hanging out at the National Folk Fest 
Mon April 2 - Canberra, ACT - hanging out at the National Folk Fest 
Thu April 5 - Mudgeeraba, QLD - "Oh Canada" house Concert 
Fri April 6 - Tintenbar, NSW - Tintenbar Upfront 
Sat April 7 - Duranbah, NSW - house concert 
Sun April 8 - Nambour, QLD - Sunday Folk 
Tue April 10 - Brisbane, QLD - Brisbane Unplugged 
Wed April 11 - Mooloolaba, QLD - house concert 
Thu April 12 - Armidale, NSW - house concert 
Fri April 13 - Nana Glen, NSW - house concert 
Sat April 14 - Kempsey, NSW - Oddfellows Hall 
Sun April 15 - Sydney, NSW - house concert 
Wed April 18 - Ararat, VIC - Ararat Live 
Thu April 19 - Benalla, VIC - North East Artisans 
Fri April 20 - Wollongong, NSW - Illawarra Folk Club 
Sat April 21 - Woy Woy, NSW - Troubadour Folk & Acoustic Music Club 
Sun April 22 - Kangaroo Valley, VIC - Upper Kangaroo River Hall 
Wed April 25 - Canberra, ACT - Smith's Alternative 
Thu April 26 - Melbourne, VIC - Spotted Mallard with Lucie Thorne and Liz Frencham 
Fri April 27 - Eaglemont, VIC - house concert 
Sat April 28 - TBC, VIC - TBC 
Sun April 29 - Glenlyon, VIC - house concert 

After all that, I'm gonna go back to Edmonton and take a nice, long break :) 

The Taiwan trip's been a learning experience already. Bram and I arrived about a month ago, reunited with a whole bunch of my old pals, and got ourselves sorted out with rented scooters for the trip around the island. Our first show was a hard one, I must admit, singing to a noisy room in Taipei and feeling taunted by the old demons that always used to ask me why I even bother. I don't see those guys so much anymore, but they sure showed up that night. Thankfully, some kind folks also showed up to hear the songs, and by the end I felt like we'd found some redemption. The next night we sang unamplified for a cozy room at Hop In in Jungli, and it was easy to remember why this is all worth doing. 

From there we headed down to Taichung, where we sang for a rowdy but appreciative audience at Repent Gallery, and huddled in the cold alongside a bunch of great acts at The Refuge for Hobo Happiness IV the next day. We ended up staying on another day, since the weather was so bitterly cold, but when the sun finally peeked through the clouds and the roads dried up, we headed out southward for a night off in the mountains. It was our first good day of riding. As it was getting on toward dusk, we stopped at an intersection in a little village to discuss our options, and eventually decided on the small road to Fenchihu, a mountain station along the Alishan railway where I'd spent a night years before. About five minutes down that road we came up too fast on a break in the road, probably from an earthquake. I braked and went over it, but Bram didn't see it in time and went down hard. There was a second of ghastly silence before he yelled, and I could already see that his ankle was broken bad. Life got real, real fast. I didn't want to leave him lying on the road, but I had no idea how to describe the place we were at over the phone, so after a few panicked paces back and forth, I sped on back up the road to find help. Some locals called an ambulance for us, and I covered Bram up, and held him for a while, and tried to talk him through what seemed like an eternity before they arrived. 

They took us to the hospital in Douliu, a country town in Yunlin County, did x-rays and eventually told us he'd broken his tibia and fibula, dislocated his foot, and would need surgery, with plates and screws. Flying home with a broken leg sure didn't seem like a good option, but the country hospital's standards of cleanliness and care didn't inspire total confidence either. The doctor sedated Bram (who insisted on playing Big Bird's Lullaby on his phone before he dozed off, but still doesn't remember a thing) and re-set his foot, which was certainly one of the scariest things I've ever seen. That night in the hospital Bram got to experience his first earthquake, a long one that shook the room and flexed the hospital windows for what felt like ages. The epicenter was in Hualien, where we're headed today. It took down a hotel, and seventeen people died. It brought home even deeper how life can turn on a dime, how tenuous all our plans are, and what a high wire we're dancing on. 

I spent the first couple nights in hospital with Bram, cancelling our next show in Tainan, but after he was stable and settled I decided, with his encouragement, to go play three of the five remaining shows on that leg of tour. I was glad to visit Kaohsiung, Hengchun, and Taitung, to get in some riding around my favourite island, and see friends that I wasn't going to see otherwise on this trip, but I also felt torn the whole time about leaving Bram in the hospital, wishing he could see all the beauty along the way, and feeling his very palpable absence on stage every night. In Taitung I played for a seated, super attentive, mostly Taiwanese audience at a sweet venue called Tiehua Music Village, struggled with the question of how much of each language to use, and felt embarrassed at the paucity of my Chinese. Feeling so out of my comfort zone, with so much of my arsenal unavailable, brought back some internal struggles I thought I'd left behind. It was the most uncomfortable I'd been on stage in a long time, but beginnerhood's a good teacher. 

I saw two black eagles up close along that trip, a rare and thrilling sight for me. And on the long drive back to Douliu from Taitung, I inadvertently had the requisite Taiwan bike trip experience of being alone in the mountains without a phone or a map, not knowing any of the places on the road signs, not having seen another human in hours, shivering as I drove through mist so thick I could barely see, and contemplating where I might curl up for the night if I wasn't gonna make it to the hospital. I did make it after all, but I was grateful for the misadventure. It'd been too long since I felt that kind of excitement. 

They let Bram out of hospital after about a week, and he sure looked happy to feel the sunshine on his face again. My old high-school buddy and Anglers bandmate Tyler put us up at his place over the start of the lunar new year holidays. And a friend in Taichung loaned us a classic, baby blue Austin Mini, which put us on back on the road in somewhat ridiculous style. Life never stops throwing the twists, does it? 

Our friend and fine fiddler Kathleen Nisbet flew in a few days into the new year, for a stopover en route to the Philippines, and we three got to play one show together, for a cozy capacity crowd at Drifters in Wai Ao, with a whole bunch of old pals in attendance. Bram understandably opted out of the last bit of driving in the tiny car, and his travel insurance paid to upgrade him to business class on the flight home. Kathleen and I finished out the last of our dates with a sweet unamplified show alongside my pal Mike Mudd in Hsinchu. And then, somewhat unbelievably to me, after a couple days' downtime in Taipei and back on my old stomping grounds in Taoyuan County, I was driving the Mini to the airport to pick up Corin Raymond. 

He's been having a great time so far, getting into Chinese vocab more studiously than anybody I've brought to this island, and managing the jet-lag pretty well, all considered. We had a mind-boggling tour of the CD manufacturing facility where we've got all our last few albums made, and were delighted to meet our man Richard Huang (richard.huang@ilexmedia.com), who's been such a pleasure to work with over the years, and is even more charming in person. I've got some more crazy stuff planned for Corin, but I'm not telling him about it yet :) 

That's about all the news for now, friends. But I would like to share a new song with you, filmed by our friend Bronwyn on our last weekend in Australia, back when Bram was still swaggering. We're calling it "Tulsa", after the city where it was written: 

"Tulsa" 

Here's wishing you all the best in the Year of the Dog, pals. Thanks, as always, for reading and believing. 

Big love from here, 

s