May 1, 2024

(From 3.19 session again, 53:20)

I love Bill Harkleroad/Zoot Horn Rollo's playing so much on Trout Mask, Mirror Man Sessions, Decals, Spotlight Kid etc - he's the first thing in mind when I pick up a slide, which I barely do. I need to do it more, and do something with lines like this, which I would only come up with through slide.

When I lived briefly in Chelyabinsk in 1998, I brought a steel string and a slide with me. The Russian folks I met were transfixed, it was so "American" to them. They didn't want to hear my singer-songwriter attempts, nor my modern experimental playing, just slide. My housekeeper/caretaker/surrogate mother Valentsina would turn the radio off when I came home from work and just point to the guitar and the slide and say "Pazhalsta" (please). It got me thinking any sound I made was a good sound as long as it was with intention, for which I thank my Siberian fan club from 1998.

Image couresy brother Mike Strassburger, from a collage he made and stuck to the door of their dishwasher.