Being on stage with Justin Farren is difficult. Let me sum it up like this: I was playing a song swap show with the wonderful Michael Prysock many years ago and he paid me a lovely compliment in the most Arkansas way possible. He looked over at me in the middle of the show and said “I know song swapping isn't a competition, but you findin' all the flat rocks.” Justin has a whole bag of flat rocks and some kind of crazy throwing technique that makes them skip for miles. If you have to sit next to him on stage and trade songs, you'd best bring your A game. Justin has been forcing me to bring my A game for a lot of years now. Photos from all of our little tours together have been popping up a lot in my Facebook feed lately. Makes me remember some great times. Once, after a show outside Austin, the woman I had been dating at the time, whom I referred to as the overly long “the woman I have been dating” met us at a cafe for lunch. Justin watched us interact for a little less than an hour and after she left, pronounced “That's your girlfriend.” And he was right. And I'm now married to her. He's an insightful dude. But he can also hum, over and over, the same four bars of some random song we heard on the overhead speakers at a gas station for 200 continuous miles without realizing he's doing it.
I'm not sure what I'm getting at here, other than that Justin is an artist I greatly admire and he's a good friend and we never tire of each other's songs and stories. I think the takeaway from the show we're doing at Austin Acoustical Cafe will be that we genuinely enjoy our time on stage together. I think the hope is that that will transfer to the audience and so you will have a good time with us. And that's all I ever really wanted out of a career in music, to have fun and make other folks have fun in the process. So come see us skip some rocks. You know... metaphorically.
- - Andrew Delaney