This past Friday, Greg Smith invited me to join the unpredictable crew at Tommy Thai in Kingsport for another impromptu jam session with singer/songwriter, Richard Houser. This time, we decided to at least have a few before the show and rehearsed a few songs over at Alan Gambles place near Skyland Drive early in the evening.
A few hours there and we headed for dinner at Kingsport’s new Thai restaurant and Sarah was waiting for us that night. She’s certainly a treat too. We settled on various entrees and before we knew it, she had a iced bucket of Coors Light for the band.
They start the music late at Tommy Thais – I guess to let the restaurant patrons out before the shuffling goes on, but sometime around 10.00 we were reshuffling chairs and tables to get the five-piece into place along the wall.
Paul Bellamy and his friend Judith were amused by our parade of gear, but it was no time before Greg, Richard, Alan and Jason Crawford and I were craddled in a narrow space along the wall.
At 11.00, Richard kicked off our show with Moondance, a jazz cover of ‘What you won’t do for love’ and before the first set was over Glen Harlow and Kevin Jackson showed up in the audience. Alan was humble enough to let Glen lay down some hippiy reggae tunes. He normally plays mandolin and sings bluegrass and I always heard he was a great drummer and the rumors are true!
There was a pretty good crowd tonight too and I was surprised to see Doug Habanna bassist for Goose Creek talking to Greg during the set about jumping in. We were without a bass player tonight relying on my left hand and I was glad for the reprieve, but the more we had on stage the louder it became and everyone seemed to have a good time.
The late-night parking lot at the Kingsport Mall is crowded with teens and their cars along ‘restaurant row’ and I must say the money was showy tonight too in front of Tommy Thai – Lexus, Mercedes…I had just spent $1000 on my old Jeep earlier in the day at Don Hill and was still brusied from that surprise.
Tommy Thai is quickly becoming popular among Kingsport’s 20something late-nighters and doing so with a combination of good food, a cheeky neo-asian vibe with fun, focused service that I’ve grown to appreciate.
At one time in the night, I was also enlightened by something you rarely see in Kingsport. Looking around, a tapestry of nationalities hanging out at one of Kingsport’s new night spots – Korean, Thai, Indian, African, some said Mulengeons and me…Nordic German with a band of drunk Irish/Dutch/Tennessee musicians.