That Time Sturgill Simpson Gave Me His Door Money
By: Michael Venutolomantovani
Tags: Rock, Music, Country Music, Sturgill Simpson, Nashville

It was chilly, the trees that dotted the interstate were bare and the sun was returning home to the horizon as we raced toward the Music City. We were en route to—or coming home from, I can’t remember—South By Southwest and I had booked us on a bill at a little club that was tucked beneath a record store.

We rarely played the big stages.

It was one of those shows that only tend to happen in Nashville. The kind that’s more dog-and-pony, girl-in-a-floppy-hat or guy-in-tasteful-denim-and-way-too-expensive-boots, generic snoozefest formulaic jam industry wankery showcase than it was a proper rock show. The kind of show that has eight or ten bands delivering rapid-fire twenty-minute sets, playing the same pedal steel, singing about the same whiskey they drank on the same tailgate of the same truck. The kind that we were wholly unaccustomed and you could sense how out of place we were from the minute we walked in the door, beaten guitars and horns in hand.

Everyone was impeccably dressed and tremendously good looking and I thought for a moment that we were on a Hollywood set of Nashville as opposed to the real thing. I was confused as we pushed our way through the throngs of musicians who far outnumbered the fans in the crowd, and I realized almost immediately how likely it was that despite our best efforts we were not going to win these people over—that no matter how well we played or how hard we tried that our brand of euphoric, beer-soaked Jersey Shore bar rock wasn’t going to connect with these folk. Our guitars were drenched in far too much distortion. Our drummer hit way too hard. We drank beers on stage at an alarming rate. We didn’t dress very cool. We cursed way too much between songs.

Regardless, and as ever, we were going to bring as hard as we could and dare them to hate us.

After the fourth or fifth band finished we were beckoned to the stage. Knowing we only had twenty minutes with which to make a statement, we worked faster than usual to set up our gear. Once the mics were placed, we shouldered our guitars and took to our de facto positions. The crowd looked on more intently, knowing that we weren’t about to bring the same kind of faux-country that had been brought all night.

“Hit the snare.” The sound man’s voice bellowed through the stage monitors as we begun our quick line check, the small room packed with the well-dressed country hitmaking hopefuls.

Boom. Boom. Boom. We were on the clock and it was ticking.

“Ok,” he said. “Let me hear the left guitar.”

“Hey man,” I interjected. “If it’s cool with you we can just rip it and you can figure it out as we go.”

“Sure thing!” He replied happily. “Everything’s pretty much set from all the other bands. If you guys need anything, let me know.”

With that, we tore into our best six songs. All hit, no quit. Punch’em in the fucking mouth and if they aren’t having it then fuck ’em. We came here to start a party. Let’s go.

The faces in the crowd wore a convincing mix of discomfort and confusion and it made our crew very, very happy. If they’re not going to like us, we’d prefer they hate us. At least they’ll remember us.