On a recent
Friday evening, Carl Chambers' current working band - he, his wife Nancy,
and Joe Spann, now known as The Dizzy Rambler Band - played a mixture
of pop-oriented originals, traditional country songs, and country and
western swing.
The setting
was a noisy Skeeter's Restaurant on Sixth Street.
Ironically,
the 24-hour breakfast house is built on the same lot where Dante's lounge
which Chambers' old band frequented - was located some years ago.
On the right
side of a tiny stage, Chambers, topped with his traditional Panama hat,
decorated with a BMI pin, and clad in a Hawaiian shirt, sat closest to
the front. Nancy, in the middle, tilted her body away from the stage so
as to minimize attention that might be paid to her pregnant-looking body.
Spann occupied the left side of the stage.
Highlights
of the first set included Spann's fancy banjo work on a Lester Flatt/Earl
Scruggs tune, "Home Sweet Home," Chambers' and Spann's harmonies for "On
the Road Again," and a serious reading of Ernest Tubb's tongue-in-cheek
"I'm Walking the Floor over You," which was decorated with some tricky
Spann guitar fills.
In between
performances, Chambers described the alternately hot and cool reactions
of restaurant audiences.
"Sometimes
you'd think this is a party in here," he said. "But sometimes you can
hear the silverware."
The Skeeter's
gig is "more unusual than anything I've ever done before," he added.
Under a
sign proclaiming that "Everything good in life is either illegal, immoral
or fattening," the trio kicked off their second set with another Joe Spann
feature.
Finally,
the group got around to Chambers' big hit.
"She's everything
I've ever wanted and all I'll ever need," Chambers crooned, on the unabashedly
sweet paean to his wife. "Don't you worry 'bout my woman and what you
think she should be. She's close enough to perfect for me."
After a
crowd-rousing version of "Rocky Top," Tennessee's state song, Chambers
moved on to "A Brand New Me," which just may be the next "Close Enough
to Perfect."
"You took
my broken heart and put the pieces back in place," he sang. "You swept
out all the ashes and you built a burning fire."
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.
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Carl's Scrapbook: The 80s: Newspaper Article 