Naked Blue, the Baltimore-area
pop folk band, appeared in concert on the evening of July 17, 2005, as
part of the Columbia
Association Lakefront Summer Festival. The audience was not very
large, but our neighborhood was well represented (left photo). We had
previously enjoyed them at a private party, and there was some talk
in the neighborhood about hiring them for a block party. Gail
took the opportunity to buy their entire catalog of CDs (right photo).
Naked Blue (as a duo) gave
another concert
in Columbia on August 11, 2005, at the Dorsey Search Village Center
(right photo). In addition to their own songs, they sang John Sonntag's
All I Wanna Do
Is Dance (which NB recorded on their live album Thursday, October 21st), Cyndi
Lauper's Time
After Time and Sheryl Crow's Strong
Enough.
Naked
Bllue returned to the
Dorsey Search Village Center on June
29th, 2006, as a duo. With only about a dozen people in the audience,
it was like a private concert. They played Pride at my request (apparently
not on their usual play list), Dear
John at Gail's request, Miami
by request, We
Will Fly, Pink Hat, I'd Do Anything, Shame, Shame, Shame, Extraordinarily, and repeated All I Wanna Do
Is Dance and Time
After Time. They also played Forgiven,
a recently updated song that has never been recorded. They recently did
several concerts in Florida including one on Merritt Island.
Naked Blue played Dorsey Search Village
Center again on July 10th, 2008, as a duo (left photo). They drew a
much larger crowd (right photo) than in 2006 although many seemed to be
personal friends. Earlier in the day they had played a concert in State
College, PA. Since on August 14th they will play at the Joni
Mitchell Tribute Concert at Strathmore Hall, they played her
song Big Yellow Taxi
(although they plan to play a different song at the tribute). They
finished the concert with Extraordinarily
as an encore.
Naked Blue returned to Columbia
on July 31
as a duo (Jen and Scott Smith) at the Hickory Ridge Village Center
(left photo), supporting Ruut as part of
the Columbia
Association Lakefront
Festival on August 6, and then as a band at the Festival on August
12 (right photo). They really kicked it up a notch as a band,
interacting with the
other musicians, and playing more rock 'n roll. The keyboard player had
an interesting speaker system (a Leslie speaker?)
with rotating elements inside a wooden enclosure. After the show he
told me that it was about 30 years old. The playlist included Fade Away from the album Wish, and
Jen explained that it was inspired by a
handsome guy in a Jaguar stuck in traffic on the Washington Beltway.
They also
played Cyndi Lauper's Time
After Time and What Good is
Money from their first album The
Treasure and the Pearl.
There were two Naked Blue concerts planned
for Columbia in 2009, but the one on July 31 was cancelled late in the
day because of the threat of rain. The one at River Hill on Aug. 17th
(left photo) was shortened due to an approaching thunderstorm with
lightning. The venue was a plaza surrounding a water fountain in the
village center, and unfortunately no one knew how to turn the fountain
off. Scott had just purchased a new guitar, spent a lot of time
adjusting it, and finally went back to the old model after
intermission. We had a good time despite the problems. As usual it
seemed like half the crowd were old friends of the duo.
Naked Blue was back in River Hill on July 9,
2010, and were joined by Glenn Workmann on the organ. He is a well known local
musician, plays with several local bands including Crack the Sky, and was one of
the musicians on Naked Blue's Five by Five album. I had
talked to him after a Naked Blue concert in 2008 about his interesting
speaker system, which he also brought to this concert. Reportedly
he rarely wears shoes. Naked Blue played their usual favorites, tried Unspoken (which they had not played
in many years) at my request, added their new song Weightless, and finished with Last Train to Clarksville in
honor of the nearby town.
Note -- click on the
thumbnails to see larger images.