"581" performed 10 years ago!

Here’s another clip from a show I played in Chicagoland 10 years ago this month...it was March 25th, 1999. This was our opening tune that night, and I love how the instrumentalists interpreted this song.

That’s Andy Deitrich playing drums, Benji Derrick singing harmony and playing bass (that bass guitar was once owned by John Stirrat of the band Wilco!), and Matt Marohl adding some super tasty pedal steel.

It’s a pretty old tune, written in 1993 in Eugene, Oregon, and recorded for my 1994 album “Wherever” (the CD is out-of-print since about 2000). The song is about County Road 581 that runs South from my hometown of Ishpeming, in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. I’ve driven/ridden that road thousands of times in my life, traveling 13 miles to my Grandpa’s camp on Big Perch Lake, and I feel like I have every inch of the trip memorized. Here are the lyrics:

581

You want to get to where the pavement ends
You want to watch it as the acres fall
You want to cross the South branch on the narrow bridge
Find a passage to the reservoir
You take 581

Some kind of trouble waiting back in town
You need the county road to take you far away
You take the S-curves to the Wayside
Don’t stop ‘til you leave Faith behind
On 581

Are you farther than you’ve ever been before?
Can you feel the project closing in?
You pass the clearcut and the airfield
Don’t you want to just fly away?
Fly away...
On 581

For those of you Yoopers reading this blog entry, I’ll decipher some of the lyrics:
+ “pavement ends”: the pavement does end, and turns to gravel a bit after Perch Lake and before reaching Casey Lake.
+ “acres fall”: Ishpeming residents may recall the incredible change in the landscape in the late 80s and early 90s when much of the trees along 581 were cut down by loggers.
+ “South branch” of the Escanaba River
+ “reservoir” the Greenwood Reservoir
+ “S-curves” dangerous driving between the Stoneville Road intersection and the Beagle Club Road
+ “the Wayside” landmark tavern just past the S-curves
+ “Faith” Faith Lutheran Church, just past the Wayside
+ “the project” Project ELF (Extra Low Frequency), high-security miliary communications system installed in the woods South of Ishpeming to help submarines, etc., to communicate....rumored to have negative effects on animals and environment
+ “clearcut” more logging
+ “airfield” private airport near Perch Lake, close to the end of the pavement

Check out another video from this same show, the song "When Rising From The Bed of Death."