The Hard Crackers Release Party for Issue #9 on Saturday, January 7th, went off with a bang, not of the NYPD variety. Between 20 and 30 peopleย were in attendance.ย The Freddyโs Bar Backroom was filled.
John Garvey gave an introduction and laid out the Hard Crackers journey since our last event at Freddyโs, which was in October, 2019 (pre-Covid).
John Pinamonti then performed a Dave Van Ronk song about an unfortunate commuter on New York Cityโs IRT (โGeorgie and the IRTโ). Before he sang, he provided a brief lesson on the alphabet of the cityโs subway system.
Tim Bruno (pictured above), who came up from Maryland, read two of his HC piecesโone from the new issue titled โFrom Here to There,โ about his tribulations traveling to work at a community college in Maryland and the more profound tribulations encountered by students at the college and an earlier one, posted on the Hard Crackers web page, on the human power embodied in standing for drinks in a local bar.
Mike Morgan did a reading of excerpts from his article on his journeys to the South from the new issue. He tried out a couple of new jokesโthe verdict is out about whether they worked or not. (โThe verdict is in, they crashed.โ MM)
In between Mikeโs reading and Timโs second appearance, John Pinamonti sang a Drive-By Truckers number โCarl Perkins Cadillacโ, a song about Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins (the Million Dollar Quartet) in Sun Studios, Memphis circa 1956.
After the program ended, people stayed around, talked, and hung out.ย All in all, a good Saturday afternoon shindig.