John Friday, Coastal Cowboy
John Friday is a
self–described "Tropical Balladeer and Displaced Pirate" who
originally hails from Maryland. The singer/songwriter's eclectic background
includes a stint as a crabber on the Chesapeake Bay, as well as assorted
attempts at college, studying subjects from biology to business. After an
injury ended his thirteen year Army career, Friday settled in the Naples area
of Florida and started writing songs and performing in the local bars. In 2009,
he released his first full length cd, "Coastal Dreamin'", which included
the rollicking ditties “Ain’t Missing a Thing” and “Rita’s Going Wild”.
That’s the intro to an
interview I did with John, aka “The Teddy Bear of Trop Rock”, a couple years
back. Since then, I have had a number
of chances to hear John play live – including a memorable House Concert in
Atlanta where he played…and played…and played…for over four hours, mixing in
his impressive collection of originals with some creative cover songs. That
event, hosted by a group I co-founded called the Atlanta Trop Rock Alliance,
was also the first place I heard some of the tunes that would wind up on his
latest cd, “Coastal Cowboy” – also a collection of mostly originals with a
couple of carefully chosen covers..
The cd kicks off with the
rocking party starter, “Beachfront” where John describes a typical Parrot Head
pot luck: “You bring the tequila, I’ll bring the salt and limes”. The next track, “Home”, brims with optimism
and positive vibes – over a shuffling guitar track and 60’s Soul organ fills.
It’s hard to hold a frowny face when you have a church choir singing, “So
happy” over and over! As someone who can’t wait to ditch the city life for a
Salty Piece of Land, the whistful “Coastal Dreamin’”, track three on the cd,
has become the soundtrack to my life – as well as a source of inspiration. Like
the song says, “…these coastal dreams are all I need to get me through the day”.
Other stand out cuts
include the title track, which jumbles together images of Cowboys and Sailboats
(sort of a Trop Rock version of Bon Jovi’s “Wanted Dead Or Alive”) and “Kisses
With My Coffee”, a sweet and sentimental love song with a super catchy chorus. Friday’s
twisted sense of humor takes a front seat in the half kids’ ditty/half barroom
sing along, “Nils The Rasta Viking”. “He took his shield and made a steel drum
out of it…he’s Nils the Rasta Viking, drinking rum and aquavit”. I mentioned
covers earlier – Michael Franti & Spearhead’s 2009 Summer hit, “Say Hey (I
Love You)” gets the Teddy Bear treatment, and John pays tribute to one of his
musical inspirations, Dan Fogelberg, with a beautiful ballad titled “When
You’re Not Near Me”, a cut from Fogelberg’s 2003 cd, “Full Circle”.
Yankee Jack, Key West Conch-troversial
Sitting up close to hear
Yankee Jack in a bar is like being in
the front row at a Gallagher show – eventually, you’re gonna get hit with
something. Only, in Jack’s case, it’s not sledgehammered fruit – it’s humor,
mostly of the “not politically correct” variety. Tourists, foreigners, gays,
fat people, skinny people, women with large breasts – breasts in general. They
all get lovingly attended to (or skewered) at a Yankee Jack show. Typical Jack
Joke (paraphrased): “They’re outlawing mini skirts on Duval Street. The problem
is the testicles hanging below the hemline”. Bad-dum-bum. If you’ve been to Key
West, chances are you’ve heard Yankee Jack. He holds court most weekdays at the
Bull and Whistle on Duval and – given
the open air layout of the first-floor Bull – the laughter and music is usually
heard spilling out into the street.
Key West Conch-troversial,
Jack’s latest cd of original material, is a conglomeration of “straight” material
with plenty of his over the top musical comedy. The opening track, a tribute to
his adopted home town (originally from new England, Jack moved to Key West in
1989) “Cayo Hueso”, mixes the two. One minute he’s singing about sleeping on
the beach under the stars, the next he’s admiring a woman with “a great
caboose”. “Same Sex Sunday” is not about spending part of the weekend hanging
out with your own gender, like the title might imply. Instead, it’s an ode to
stuck in a rut marriages (“What we used to do like stars of porn is scheduled
now for Sunday morn”). “Jesus Was a Democrat” will probably tweak those on the
Right but, then again, Conservative has never been a word associated with Key
West. “The Last Mudslide” is a musical shout out to Jack’s main employer that
floats a familiar theme – a Key West
visitor that isn’t quite ready to head back home (“I’m strapped in a plane and
I wish I were back – drinking Mudslides on the bar at the Bull”).
More of the larger than
life Yankee Jack’s humor appears on “If It Flirts, Floats Or Flies, Rent It”
(“A woman gives you nookie, but she might wind up to look like Snookie”) and
the title track, another tribute to his adopted island home, “Very Conch-troversial”
(“The Southernmost point is my new home, I come from a land they call bitch and
moan, and half this island’s getting stoned”). But, just when you think you’ve
got Jack figured out as a jokester and humorist, he slides comfortably into a
soft piano ballad like “The Sea”, or a catchy Trop rock toast to a seaside
town, like “Casco Bay”.
For a taste of Jack’s live
show, check out his cd, “The Best Of Yankee Jack Live in Key West”. Just don’t
sit too close to the speakers. http://yankeejack.com/
