Diamond in the Rough by Shawn Colvin Read Free Book Online Page B

studying anything that I can now, in hindsight, imagine I might have enjoyed. Music theory, no thanks. Philosophy, poetry, religion, art history, even the drama department didn’t feel right, and here’s the reason: My sense of balance was built on pretty thin ice, and without the confines of home, which afforded me something to rebel against, I was lost and extremely insecure. I’d never thought realistically about my vocation—it seemed to me that the world of academia, so revered by my family (my father had his Ph.D. by then, and Geoff was at Harvard on scholarship), was a drag, and I just always figured I’d do something “fun” like acting or painting or singing. Well, I was a mediocre actress and an even worse artist.
    However. I could sing. And where does one go to sing in a college town that likes to party? Right down to Illinois Avenue, the “strip,” to any dive that would hire me. My first official paying gig was at a bar called the American Tap, an old house converted into a bar. Colonial decor. For thirty dollars I played four forty-five-minute sets consisting of songs by Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, James Taylor, Carole King, Bonnie Raitt, Judy Collins, CSN&Y, Jackson Browne, Judee Sill, and, of course, the Beatles. I loved it. I felt like I was doing what I was meant to do. I entered my sophomore year at SIU but rarely attended class. Too embarrassed to drop out formally, I just let it go.
    Either I was playing somewhere or I was sitting in with someone else who was, more often than not, getting drunk in the process. I let Rollie go, too, and started dating a local musician named Jimmy Bruno. We lived the nightlife, closing down the bars and heading to whatever party ensued after that. Then we’d end up at Denny’s for a predawn patty melt to soak up all the beer we’d consumed. With the money I was making, I bought a turquoise-and-coral bracelet, a pattern that continues to this day—I love jewelry and clothes and shoes. I may have mentioned that my mother is partially to blame. I share her love of fashion but, alas, not her sense of frugality. I make the money, I spend the money. I have a wardrobe my daughter envies, which is just as well, since it will constitute the bulk of her inheritance.
    I started attracting a local following and thought I was hot stuff. We had a strong music community in Carbondale, and as I got better, I performed at other clubs in town. There was Gatsby’s, a basement joint next to a pool hall whose owner sported a bad comb-over. Gatsby’s had a proper stage, free popcorn, and the coldest draft beer in town. Up the street a couple of blocks was Das Fass, a German beer house of sorts, decorated with steins and wooden kegs. Das Fass had an outdoor stage, an indoor stage, and a downstairs room that resembled a bunker, where I played solo for a while, until I got the bug for company and more sound.
    I decided to broaden my horizons and add more players to my little scene. Jimmy could play the bass, and he’d made friends with a drummer named Dennis Conroy who had been in a group called the Cryin’ Shames. Dennis also played the tablas, which are hand drums originally from India. Let me just say right here that tablas are a bad idea. They have a distinct ring when played, and the ring can and needs to be tuned for each song key, which requires the pounding, up or down, of small wooden blocks on the side of the drum to adjust the tone. And Dennis was a perfectionist. Who would ever have thought that endless amounts of time could be spent between songs waiting for the drummer to tune? I took a major leap and went electric, hiring Jim’s friend Jack O’Boyle on lead guitar, which ultimately meant putting Dennis on a real drum kit, effectively ending the infernal tuning of the tablas. We were the Shawn Colvin Band. Rock ’n’ roll!

    Shawn Colvin Band—Jack O’Boyle, me, Dennis Conroy,
and Brian Sandstrom—SIU campus, 1975
    Our repertoire consisted of the same material