What do Los Angeles, CA, Lincoln, NE and Nashville, TN have in common? No, this is not the start of some joke. If I’d been joking I would’ve said, a giraffe walks into a bar and the bartender asks him if he wants a long neck. The giraffe says, “No thanks, I already got one.” Or, a duck walks into a bar, orders a beer and tells the bartender to, “Put it on his bill.” Or, what does a fish say when he hits a wall? Dam. Or, there’s these two horses named Pete and Rose. Now, I don’t have enough space here to tell that joke, but if you catch me some time and you have an hour or two to kill, I’ll tell it to you. No, the answer to the question is that these three diverse locations were all places that Brad Colerick recorded portions of his CD Cottonwood. I’ve been to Nashville and Lincoln, but I haven’t been to L.A., but I’m still going to say that this is one of the few things that these towns have in common. Let’s see, not a lot of corn in Nashville, not a lot of pop country music in L.A. and not a lot of gangs in Lincoln. Yep, they’re almost as diverse as my un-ending supply of jokes.
My favorite tree has always been a cottonwood tree. When I was a kid we had a creek that ran through several of our pastures and there were these huge cottonwoods that grew along the creek. I always loved to go there and just watch the leaves rustle. In western KS, a tree is somewhat rare, and the cottonwood is the king of trees in this area. So I was immediately drawn to the title cut of this CD, and it didn’t disappoint.
That
Cottonwood tree sends a message to me
That my heart soon will be safe at home
Far from the ocean and clear of the mountains
Right here on the prairie I'll be
The lyrics on this CD are a little to optimistic for my taste, I’m more of a sad song guy, but there is one sad song on here. Every Single Day is about when you can’t forget that one and you see them everywhere in everything.
Every
Single day
Everywhere I turn I see you
My world drifts away
And leaves me here alone
Just me and my heart
And no good place to hide the memory
Most of the songs here are about his family and the great moments in his family’s history. You can tell he cares a lot about his family in the songs he writes about them. Like I said, most of these songs are upbeat, not in tempo, but upbeat in tone. This is a CD if you need a little bit of glass half full in your life. And we all need a little of that from time to time.
It feels
good to hear you say
Hello sunshine, it's a good old day
Come what may, come what may
So what have we learned today:
- Lincoln, L.A and Nashville do have something in common
- I know some great jokes
- Dale Gribble says that jokes start with what do you get when you cross a, and knock, knock, I’d like to add that they can also start with an animal, religious figure or object walking into a bar
- And Cottonwood is a good CD if you need a little sunshine in your life (except for Every Single Day, which is for us sad song people)
I’ll give this CD 3 out of five jokes.
So anyway, this string walks into a bar. Now, this bar is in a rough part of town and there’s a sign behind the bar that has big bold letters that states: “WE DON’T SERVE STRINGS.” Well this string ignores the sign and orders a beer. The bartender stares down at this little string and barks, “Can’t you read, we don’t serve your kind in here.” So the string walks out of the bar and frays the ends of himself, then ties himself into a knot. He walks back into the bar and orders a beer. The bartender says, “HEY, aren’t you the string I just threw out of here.” And the string replies, “Frayed knot.”