Friday the 17th of March, we opened for our 20th year here at the Fur Peace Ranch. It has been such an odd winter… some really cold days, some really warm ones… lots of rain an not much snow. Weather… gotta love it. This weekend started out cold but wound up in the 50’s. Rainy and muddy… thinking about it… typical for Southeast Ohio. It was great having Jack back on site again and our annual Double Dose Class went well.

Saturday night Jack and I played a two set concert in the Station…

Hot Tuna 11, 2017
The Acoustic Duo
Jorma Kaukonen & Jack Casady
The Fur Peace Station
Darwin, Ohio
Saturday, March 18, 2017

First Set:
1. Ain’t In No Hurry
2. Second Chances
3. Hesitation Blues
4. What Are They Doing In Heaven Today?
5. Nobody Knows You When You’re Down And Out
6. I See The Light
7. Candy Man
8. Watch The North Wind Rise
9. In The Kingdom
10. How Long Blues
11. San Francisco Bay Blues
Second Set:
1. Whining Boy Blues
2. Death Don’t Have No Mercy
3. That’ll Never Happen No More
4. Come Back Baby
5. Brother Can You Spare A Dime?
6. Sleep Song
7. Good Shepherd
8. Living In The Moment
9. Keep On Trucking Mama
10. Bar Room Crystal Ball
11. Water Song
12. Keep Your Lamps Trimmed & Burning
13. Encore: Genesis

We’ve got so many good things coming up this year… great classes an shows at the FPR, great gigs and tours coming up for me and Jack. Yeah, so far so good. Everyone is alive and well and you can’t ask for much more than that. Spring is here now and I look forward to some of this mud drying up.

Onward!


Comments

  1. Comment made on March 30, 2017 by jim hitchcock

    First time I saw him was at the San Bernadino Swing Auditorium, Together tour. Edgar did a set, Johnny did a set, then they joined each other, recording it. Some night.

  2. Comment made on March 30, 2017 by Brian Doyle

    I saw Johnny Winter in a small bar, the Mount Ivy Pub in Rockland County, New York some time in the 80’s…

  3. Comment made on March 30, 2017 by johno

    Instead of going on our usual trip to Florida we took the kids one year to Williamsburg, VA and Washington DC in March during cherry blossom season. We went to Jamestown, The Smithsonian, The White House, The Capitol etc etc – what a trip. The kids still talk about the trip to Washington. If you haven’t been to D.C in March and see the cherry blossoms you should – it is really magical. It really is.

  4. Comment made on March 30, 2017 by carey georgas

    They were in full regalia. I had never seen them in bloom. Absolutely beautiful.

  5. Comment made on March 30, 2017 by johno

    @carey georgas
    Did you see any cherry blossoms? They are beautiful.

  6. Comment made on March 29, 2017 by carey georgas

    Naw, man, I’m tellin’ the truth…

  7. Comment made on March 29, 2017 by jimhitchcock

    @carey georgas

    Oh, no kidding.

  8. Comment made on March 29, 2017 by carey georgas

    Hey Hey, I just got back from a little trip to DC, and lucked into a ticket for admission to the African American History museum on the mall. Saw Chuck Berry’s red Cadillac, Lightnin’ Hopkins’ electric guitar, and Leadbelly’s acoustic. Really a cool addition to the National Mall.

  9. Comment made on March 29, 2017 by johno

    Poor Felix – I think him and Gail were married – she shot him in the head when he fell in love with another woman. Sounds like Vampire Women.

  10. Comment made on March 29, 2017 by HOGAN

    Hi Jorma,

    Heard the weekend was outstanding…
    Wow congratulations on 20 years
    Livin the dream,,,,,
    See you guys in a couple of weeks
    Safe travels
    Hogan
    🙂

  11. Comment made on March 28, 2017 by carey georgas

    @jimhitchcock
    Johnny could get a joint jumpin’ like nobody’s business. Saw him in a little club in Nederland, TX back in ’80, he liked to have blown the walls off that place.

  12. Comment made on March 28, 2017 by jimhitchcock

    @Kevin

    SNL Archives | Episodes | 04.18.1992 [snlarchives.net/episodes/?19920418_green]
    snlarchives.net/Episodes/?19920418

    Episodes Guests Impressions Seasons Sketches Update > < Aired: April 18, 1992 (S17E18 / #324) Host: Jerry Seinfeld. Musical Guest: Annie Lennox. Cameo: Johnny Winter .

  13. Comment made on March 28, 2017 by Brian Doyle

    Too bad those outtake bootlegs are what some people thrive on. What a wasteful way for a good bass player to go.

    It would make sense that they would change it to Jimmy cracked corn to remove the rebellious context.

  14. Comment made on March 27, 2017 by Kevin

    Same here Jim, any clues to the source of that broadcast. I had forgotten about that appearance. I think I caught it by mistake that night and haven’t seen or heard of it since.

  15. Comment made on March 27, 2017 by jimhitchcock

    @Carey Georgas
    Just a life long love of Johnny & Edgar 🙂

  16. Comment made on March 27, 2017 by Ham n Eggs

    Pete Seeger felt that the song was actually ” Gimme Cracked Corn” a reference to what slaves were punished with when they rebelled. Fed the worst of the worst. The protagonist in the song didn’t shoo the blue tailed fly and it bit the horse,which threw the enslaver into a ditch where he died.
    Lincoln asked the song be played when he went to Gettysburg to give a short speech.
    Ties in nicely with ” blood stained banders “.
    Peace
    Love All Ways
    Clearwater Festival is Father’s Day weekend in NY

  17. Comment made on March 27, 2017 by Carey Georgas

    Hey, Jim, you’ve mentioned Johnny more than once in here. We were raised in the same neck of the woods, so I’ve always claimed him as a native son. Cut my teeth on his Texas boogie. You got connections to the Lone Star state by chance?

  18. Comment made on March 27, 2017 by John B

    Jimmy crack corn…..

  19. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by jim hitchcock

    Somehow a 1992 episode of SNL got recorded on my DVR last night

    And there, alongside G E Smith, was one John Dawson Winter.

  20. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by Dead Head

    @jim hitchcock
    You’re the man…….

  21. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by jim hitchcock

    The trip is already planned : )@Dead Head

  22. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by Dead Head

    I need to secure an appointment with Carlo

  23. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by carlo pagliano

    Sangre de toro
    Sangre de vida
    Pink shields fluoridate the gasiform horizon where my wondering mumbles pitch back and forth figurin’ out the sound wave on stage at the FPR, just last night.
    Good G-d gave us the prerogative to spacewalk with our fantasy, so go here I go.
    Always in my life Jorma!

  24. Comment made on March 26, 2017 by Kathy long island

    Dear Jorma and Jack. Just bought tkts for Westhampton in June, can’t wait! Electric Hot Tuna! Love you electric or acoustic, love electric a little bit more….. saw you last winter at Beacon not this year had surgery chemo laid up over 6 months after 12 hr surgery with 6 surgeons. Jorma your blog and pix area bright spot in my day! Thank you. I had my pic taken with you and Jack at the beacon i paid extra but when it came time to take pix and talk to you I was tongue tied! Of course you and Jack look great in pic but I do not! Then i look at pix and you are both holding magic markers to sign stuff and i bought a cd i already had so u guys could sign it and duh forgot everything when guys showed up. Bummed out i didn’t get to downstairs to have your birthday cake! How does one get one of those passes?! You are a man of great words and a lifesaver luvvin the music ,

  25. Comment made on March 24, 2017 by gregg

    yea nick next best thing, check out you tube tuna 11/20/76 the video starts out rough but clears up. three giants from those yrs. come out of the haze and into to view ah how sweet it is. Gregg

  26. Comment made on March 24, 2017 by Doug Mlyn

    @Nick L. Eakins
    if you can make it to Indianapolis, you can catch them Electric with Tedeschi Trucks (looks like the closest to Iowa city), unless my geography is off.

  27. Comment made on March 24, 2017 by Nick L. Eakins

    I still have about a hundred or so vinyl LPs tho I no longer have a turntable to play them. Most of the records are in only marginal to fair shape. Hey, I played them and often times when I was blitzed on this, that or the other. Out of all of them, only my copy of Double Dose does not sound like the Rice Crispy Boys in a menage a trois. I always valued and cared for those two records much more than the rest. My friends and I enjoyed many of the tracks aired on what had been a premier FM station in West Central Iowa. Anyway, I wish I could have seen the band during its RAMPAGE years. Unless I can get to one coast or the other, I don’t know as if I’ll ever be able to see Electric Tuna. I saw Acoustic Tuna the first time the boys played the Englert in Iowa City. I enjoyed the gig immensely but I’d still like to catch the electrified group before all my orbits are completed,,,, or one of theirs.

  28. Comment made on March 24, 2017 by rich l

    ‘In Spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.” Margaret Atwood

  29. Comment made on March 23, 2017 by chappy

    I got turned on to HT in 1980 as a freshman at Ohio University via the Double Dose album. Despite having a few Airplane albums I was not at all familiar with HT. A good friend and I were hanging out on the monument on the college green when he heard someone playing guitar on the other side of the monument. He said “that guy is playing Hot Tuna’s Water Song.” He explained who HT was and let me borrow his DD vinyl. I wore those discs out and became a huge HT fan! A few years later, living in Columbus, I meet Hurl at the record store when I go to purchase the Pair A Dice Found CD. Ironic that you moved to Athens area and John is the FPR manager. I think I still have all my old back issues of The Tuna Times. Thanks for all the great music!

  30. Comment made on March 23, 2017 by johno

    I also think Burgers was the best album Hot Tuna ever did. It is classic Hot Tuna.
    They were touring, promoting Burgers the first time I ever saw them play – April 1973 – a friend had front row seats and dosed me. I had never heard of Hot Tuna before. They played all night long and I remember thinking to myself – as the sun came up – it’s a whole new day.

  31. Comment made on March 23, 2017 by Doug Mlyn

    I wore out double dose when I was in my teens.. I played it so much that I remembered every little comment, every little sound from the crowd. Brings back some memories, some good, some not so good 🙂

  32. Comment made on March 23, 2017 by Sweetbac Jr.

    Thanks for responding, Jorma
    yeah, that was a drag about Felix…lots of casualties from that era.
    Regarding “Double Dose”, I always assumed the timings were trimmed down to fit on vinyl. Loved the version of “Rock me Baby” that ended up on that greatest hits cd.
    An outtake that WAS worthy was the version of “Fools Blues”(I’m guessing ’72-’73?)you guys did…sounds like it’s from the “Burgers” sessions….LOVE to have an expanded studio/live edition of “Burgers”….might be the best album Tuna ever did.

  33. Comment made on March 23, 2017 by Sweetbac Jr.

    “Double Dose”…Ahh….The classic electric Tuna record from the golden age.
    Could you speak a bit about that album, Jorma?
    How did Felix Papalardi come to “produce” the record…and I’d imagine both nights
    were professionally recorded from the theater 1839 sessions, is it possible to release the unedited shows in they entirety?

    • Comment made on March 23, 2017 by Jorma

      I met Felix in Copenhagen a couple of months before Double Dose was recorded. He was working with a Danish band called Gasolin. I liked all the guys. We subsequently did some gigs together in the States. Anyway, I always liked Felix’s style and he seemed like the right guy for the Double Dose gig… and he was. Jim Jones and the People’s Temple had an edifice right next to 1839. Their short wave transmissions to Guyana were bleeding into our gear and we had to ask them to quit chatting while we were recording. Then there was Jonestown, but that’s another story. For gear we had the Wally Heider mobile unit… nothing but the best, right? There was a lot of work in post on that project. There are no unedited tapes that will ever see the light of day. For me, outtakes are outtakes and that’s why they didn’t make it on the album. As for poor Felix, a couple of years later he and I talked about doing a project together. The tentative name for the band would have been MAD. Mutually Assured Destruction. His wife Gail put an end to this idea by parking a bullet in his head.

      Good times…

  34. Comment made on March 22, 2017 by Matt

    Hey, it would not be a real ranch without some mud and dust.

  35. Comment made on March 22, 2017 by johno

    If you build it – they will come.
    Happy Anniversary Jorma.

  36. Comment made on March 22, 2017 by eaglesteve

    Wetlands.

    Good times with Mike Falzarano when Jorma used to play his guitar a lot on his lap, and sometimes a pedal steel.

  37. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by DennisK

    Congrats on 20 years Captain!

    I recall attending a benefit show at the Wetlands in NYC, to help fund the future guitar camp. I knew right then and there, I was going someday. Today, I am fortunate to have been guest a few times. The hospitality, musicianship, comradery and easy going vibe is palpable (as if, it is truly in the soil).

    My FPR experiences will stay with me forever. Those who have been, know what I am talking about. Those that have not, should strike while the iron is HOT! Wishing you many more Jorma. Be well. See ya soon,
    DennisK

  38. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by phil zisook

    And a great setlist to boot! All the best for good health, good gigs and much nachas in the days to come!

  39. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by Chappy

    Great sets last Saturday. You and Jack never cease to amaze! Thanks for another great show and thanks to Vanessa, Hurl, and the entire staff at FPR for the great hospitality.

  40. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by Dan

    Congrats Capt. Any business that makes it 20 years is doing something right.

  41. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by Rick dickerson

    Ohio weather the only thing predictable is that it’s unpredictable. Can’t complain to much this winter has been fairly mild. Can’t wait to fire up the motorcycle and head to the FPR it is such a nice ride from Lancaster and we really enjoy Smiles and all the folks there.

  42. Comment made on March 21, 2017 by carey georgas

    Spring ain’t hiding, it all got hogged up here down south. I don’t remember the spring flowers and the trees budding out as early as this year. We had like one week of winter. Like you say, though, gotta love it. Good to see you so fired up about your year. Still hoping maybe I can make it up to Red Rocks. Best wishes for a safe, healthy and prosperous season of gigging and touring. Peace.

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