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First set was Ellery Eskelin's NY Trio with Gary Versace on organ and GH in the rotating drum chair. I will get back to that set if I have the heart.... the main reason I was determined to be at The Stone last night was to see and hear three of my long time favorite musicians in the long standing collaborative group known as Bass Drum Bone. Having seen the band once before a few years back @ Cornelia Street Cafe and having listened to the group on record often and having listened to the three musicians in various combinations with others in ways that depending on the year or the decade as somewhere between often to obsessively (especially the drummer), I knew pretty much what the band and these veteran musicians do. helluva sentence, aye??? that being said, I wouldn't exchange 10:10 PM through 11:20 for very much on this earth. In combination with last Wednesday , Gerry Hemingway is now my wife's favorite drummer. This band is a grooving, cranking, slamming bar band playing in a totally quiet perfect acoustic environment and we got to experience it from a few feet away. They start with scratchy improv into a classic Ray Anderson piece (from March of Dimes) and 15 minutes later we are screaming and the great man of the Bone part of the trio is grinning ear to ear!!! on Hemingway's Dance for Edward (for Edward Blackwell) - a tune which Ed really liked according to Gerry. This thing went from downtown to Africa and back and forth. Lordy fucking Lordy!! 25 minutes later, I'm speachless. I might have then lost my mind but I know they finished with a Mark Helias piece called Land's End. I know you all wouldn't believe it and I wouldn't have either as I had never heard of it, or heard it, but it was more outrageously phenomenal than the Dance for Edward piece. Who Knew?!? again like Wednesday it was done and we went home with silence from the car stereo no need to wallow too much on why EE wants to impersonate A combination of Ben Webster and Stan Getz and the second set almost eliminated the thought or question why he wants to do that odd imitation based playing in tempos that barely touch medium speed and when they do, he quickly brings his two wonderful band mates back to numbingly slow and nod inducing non tempos. Thumbs Up and Hands Down, baby