A late start this morning… I make plans to meet Guy, Paul and Mark for lunch. They are waiting for me at a sidewalk café in the heart of the city at the Praça da Figueira. We walk down towards the magnificent archway to the Praça do Comércio, window-shopping and people watching. It is a busy area, crowded with pedestrians. Even so, a man approaches me and asks me to buy cocaine. I decline, but he wants me to taste it. Even with all these people around, he tears open the small packet and I taste it. It is weak, but not cut with garbage. He names a price for 2 grams, I tell him I don’t really want that much, but after about 15 minutes of haggling I buy some. My friends are not surprised at my behavior, but they are not interested in drugs. Yesterday while I was seeing Bob Dylan, they had dinner at the oldest tavern in Portugal, the Cervejaria Trindade (Beer Hall of the Holy Trinity). We decide to go back there for lunch, and I am glad they are willing to make a repeat visit. Built on the foundations of a former convent, the interior walls are decorated with hand painted tiles depicting the elements and seasons as buxom women. The food is delicious, especially the gambas (prawns). After lunch we walk by the ruins of the Carmo Convent, a Gothic church that caved in during the earthquake of 1755. We ride the famous Elevator of Santa Justa back to “downtown” Lisbon, and from there we catch the open-air double-decker bus for a tour of the city. The bus tour is lovely, the breeze keeping off the heat of the sun. We don’t learn very much history from the commentary, but I get a better sense of the geography of the city and see most of the major landmarks. We ‘ooh and aah’ at the hand-painted exterior tiles adorning many buildings and walls. We see Batman protecting the streets of the city. The bus drops us off at the bottom of the Parque Eduardo VII, by the monument to the Marquis of Pombal. We ride the Metro to the Cais de Sodré train station, which Guy refers to as Keyser Söze (the elusive character in the movie The Usual Suspects). I guide my companions through the festival grounds, after all it is my third night in a row here. We take a few beers and various sandwiches from the vendors and commandeer a table. Donavan Frankenreiter finishes his act and we move to take stage right positions for Neil’s set. It is the last night of this leg of the tour – it resumes in August after Neil spends a few weeks in the US for some TV appearances and his 30th wedding anniversary, and probably to check-in on his alternative fuel project Linc-Volt in Kansas. These recent shows have seen Neil break out a few major surprises, first A Day In The Life and the resurfacing of Time Fades Away after 35 years. Me and the boys have been speculating all day as to whether Neil will do anything unusual tonight. We mostly conclude there will be no “smoking rabbit” tonight (a cross between pulling a rabbit out of the hat and a smoking gun). We all agree there is a strong likelihood he will play Cortez The Killer (it will be the first one in the summer tour, last played in February in Amsterdam and Antwerp). No smoking rabbits, but my 40th Neil Young concert (and Paul’s 50th) is an excellent show – very satisfying opening electric set featuring Powderfinger, Cortez (as predicted) and a very funky Rockin’ In The Free World. My 11th live listening of Spirit Road is just as enjoyable as the first one last October. I love this song! During Mother Earth the video crew did a great transition with a shot of the moon above us superimposed beside Neil on the pump organ. Beautiful! The acoustic set is mellow and this audience loves hearing The Needle And The Damage Done, Heart Of Gold and Old Man. The final electric portion is sublime, Neil looking somehow relaxed and frenetic at the same time. How does he do it? The Beatles encore probably surprises most of the audience, but we are expecting it, and I try to take it in deeply as this will probably be the last time I see him play it. Afterwards we get some more beer and try the Farturas – a kind of fried dough, poured as a spiral into a vat of hot oil as you watch. Delicious and the guy we watch making them is a master craftsman. We also try a chocolate-cream filled variant that is out of this world, and I only smear a little bit of chocolate on my new Neil Young Summer Tour shirt.
Near a sandwich vendor called Leitão no Pão (literally piglet on loaf) we meet Ricardo, a large guy wearing a handmade shirt that says God is Young on the front in huge letters, and Love & Only Love on the back. I have an old friend who is a descendant of a Portuguese Leitão, so I ask the food vendors for a business card or menu to take him as a souvenir. The owners are also named Leitão and they gladly give me a free baseball hat with the company name as a gift for my friend John. So generous! We split up near “Keyser Söze” and I walk back up to the hostel in the Bairro Alto. Change into long pants and non-chocolate stained shirt, do a line or two in the bathroom, and hit the bar crawl. It is not as much fun lurking the Bairro Alto by myself, I discover. At one point I am standing on a corner reading email on my phone, and a young man says something to me in Portuguese. I reply ‘não falo português, fala ingles?’ and he says “a little bit” and asks me if I want company. I shrug and he makes a grab at my “two-headed” cell-phone. I hold on tight and shove him with my other arm, and we both turn in opposite directions and move away fast. A little shaken from the attempted mugging, I walk back down the hill towards the hostel. Then I see four people get out of a cab, and the two guys are wearing Neil Young t-shirts, so I say hello. They have just come from the festival grounds, and are looking for a place to drink. They are Neil fans from the Basque country, and only one of the girls, Eztidias, speaks much English. I guide them back to the Rua da Atalaia, but it is 4:00AM and all the bars are closing. Although we cant communicate much, I feel I have found some friends. I share the last of my goodies with some of them, and they appreciate it. Now that I have companions, it is much easier to mingle with the people in the street and we find out where the after-hours places are located. Waiting in line to get into the Musicbox club, I am showing them Neil videos on my camera. We meet a Spanish guy named Giuseppe who came by himself from Valencia for Neil. He is quite literate musically and speaks good English and we chat quite a bit. Inside the Musicbox they are playing “minimalist techno” and showing clips of vintage cartoons and newsreels on the projection screen. The morning crowd dances and drinks, sheltered from the morning light in its darkened interior. I make like a wallflower and share my rolling tobacco with various people. One guy, and Englishman named Wes who lives here, gives me the lowdown on the club scene. He introduces me a to a sharp dressed fellow named Gabi who seems to run a bar, and who knows all the regulars here. When the Musicbox closes at 7:00AM, Wes and Gabi encourage me to join them in the next club over, but I decide to start sobering up and shifting gears. |
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