In the evening we travel to Genis to see Ronnie Caryl perform at St. Christophe’s bar. Ronnie Caryl is a guitar player and used to work with Phil Collins. To repeat, Phil Collins had a guitar player and I saw him play in Southern France. No, I am not making this up.
We pull in and the square is full of cars, the bar full of life – Folks young and old smoking hand-rolled cigarettes, holding plastic cups of beer while children race through the crowd. We meet a young French woman also working as a farmer. She says the work makes her tired but then she knows she’s alive.
Near midnight, Ronnie takes the stage with his band right behind him. He is large and they all have ponytails. Something like Jerry Garcia with a lizard for a keyboard player. After fumbling through a few verses of “Mustang Sally” everyone takes solos.
How strange: to be in a French town full of French people, watching them dance to shaky covers of American music played by a bar band. I suppose it was refreshing to be in front of live musicians again. But it was also surreal and a little upsetting. Iowa’s open mic night as an American export, following me to France like the monster follows Frankenstein. Ronnie plays well into the night, far later than I care to remember. For the record, there was no “In the Air Tonight.” Though quite a funky version of “I Can’t Dance.”
We pull in and the square is full of cars, the bar full of life – Folks young and old smoking hand-rolled cigarettes, holding plastic cups of beer while children race through the crowd. We meet a young French woman also working as a farmer. She says the work makes her tired but then she knows she’s alive.
Near midnight, Ronnie takes the stage with his band right behind him. He is large and they all have ponytails. Something like Jerry Garcia with a lizard for a keyboard player. After fumbling through a few verses of “Mustang Sally” everyone takes solos.
How strange: to be in a French town full of French people, watching them dance to shaky covers of American music played by a bar band. I suppose it was refreshing to be in front of live musicians again. But it was also surreal and a little upsetting. Iowa’s open mic night as an American export, following me to France like the monster follows Frankenstein. Ronnie plays well into the night, far later than I care to remember. For the record, there was no “In the Air Tonight.” Though quite a funky version of “I Can’t Dance.”
