Third Thursday at Highland Grounds

This month's Third Thursday was an all "God, I wish I wrote that song" session. Each artist did one song which was a cover of another LA artist. They could also opt to do a Christmas song, and in fact several people did Christmas songs by other LA artists. There were more great LA bands and musicians there than you could shake a stick at. Here's the part of the lineup that I saw and what they played (for the ones I remembered what they played):

• Darryl Jensen & Wendie Colter - Silver Bells
• David Kaufman - Cowboy's Work is Never Done (Sonny Bono)
• Heather & Curt - Her First Merry Christmas (Buddy Judge)
• Rick Hromadka - Goodbye (Phil Rosenthal)
• Michael Quercio - Feliz Navidad (Jose Feliciano)
• dragsterbarbie - Los Angeles (John Doe)
• Wayne Resnik - Cover of Rolling Stone (Shel Silverstein)
• meta Tonic - ?? (Eileen Lucero)
• Steve Stanley - ?? (Mike Randle)
• The California Navels (i.e. The Julies) - Miss World (Courtney Love)
• Ritt Henn - I Give Up (?)
• Kim Fox - Tabernacle O'Clay (Tony Perkins)
• Randell Kirsch & LuAnn Olsen - ?? (LuAnn Olsen)
• Steve Barton - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (Jimmy Webb)
• Probyn Gregory - ?? (??)

The only real cheats here were Michael Quercio (Jose Feliciano was a New Yorker), and Randell Kirsch, who covered a song by his wife & co-band-member (in Show of Hands) Luann. Michael explained that an LA radio station recently switched over to an all Spanish music format and played Feliz Navidad for 24 hours straight. Since Randell was the billed person, I guess it's only a minor cheat.

The Julies dressed up like a 20's juke band and played Miss World by Courtney Love, which was very funny. Imagine Julie singing "I made my bed and I will lie in it, I made my bed and I will die in it." in a Betty Boop voice and you've got the picture.

One of my favorite numbers was by meta Tonic. They have a little bit in common with W.A.C.O., in that they have an eclectic mix of instruments for a pop band. They did a song by Eileen Lucero (of Charmed and PG-13). The song, and particularly their arrangement of it were very nice. I'll have to check out their full set at Spaceland in a couple of weeks.

Anyway, enjoy the pix -