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Welcome to the weird, wild world of Col. Bruce

10:57 PM, May. 24, 2012

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Col. Bruce Hampton performs Saturday at Vinyl Music Hall. / Special to GoPensacola.com

Written by

Michael Smith

Filed Under

Top 10

Colleen Lowe, Health Care Worker

1. “White Light, White Heat, White Trash,” Social Distortion.
2. “Let It Bleed,” Rolling Stones.
3. “B.B. King Anthology,” B.B. King.
4. “Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols,” Sex Pistols.
5. “Garbage,” Garbage.
6. “Hellbilly Deluxe,” Rob Zombie.
7. “Blues Queen,” Bessie Smith.
8. “Dare to Be Stupid,” “Weird Al” Yankovic.
9. “Ramones,” Ramones.
10. “The Howlin’ Wolf Album,” Howlin Wolf.
Share your all-time Top 10 favorite albums with the world! Email your list to pnjmusic@yahoo.com.

“Let me call you back in 11 minutes and seven seconds,” says Col. Bruce Hampton after answering my call.

Exactly 11 minutes and seven seconds later, my cell phone rattles and shakes the desk. Another adventure with “The Colonel” has begun.

Somewhere along the streets of Ernest Hemingway, Miles Davis and David Lynch, you’ll run into Hampton. The legendary musician returns to Pensacola on Saturday to perform at Vinyl Music Hall, 2 Palafox Place.

Hampton’s avant-garde explorations in music have influenced artists such as Dave Matthews and groups as diverse as Widespread Panic and Phish. Hampton is also renowned for the creative launching pad he has given to dedicated musicians, including two-time Grammy Award-winning drummer Tyler Greenwell. Greenwell grew up in Pensacola and performs with the Tedeschi Trucks Band.

So, what does Hampton, the man once called “The Vincent Van Gogh of rock ’n’ roll” by Phil Walden (co-founder of Capricorn Records) look for in a musician?

“Well, to look like he can throw a baseball,” Hampton said, clearly joking. “I want him to look like a pitcher. I want him to look like Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale or Cy Young!”

Humor is also a big part of this adventure, as Hampton has shown throughout his music career of more than 50 years, an amazing history that has carried him to venues of all sizes and locales.

“I’ve played little bars in the middle of New Mexico that had 12 seats,” he said. “I’ve played the Atlanta Pop Festival for 600,000.”

But for Hampton, the real thrill is found in the more intimate venues like Vinyl.

“I really like anything under a thousand seats,” he said. “Then it’s still music, and you can get the magic pretty easy there. Once it gets over a thousand people, it’s almost a Broadway show. You really can’t take many chances if you’re at that level.”

Chances being taken, extraordinary music and humor will be in abundance Saturday night. The men of local group SiriusFace (Brooks Hubbert, Dave Easley, Scott George and Sims Chadwick) will be joining Hampton.

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This is an all ages show, and tickets are $5. Doors open at 8 p.m. For more details, visit www.vinylmusichall.com

Metal May-hem

This has been a crazy-busy month of metal shows for Pensacola. What better way to finish than with two heavy nights of music at The Handlebar, 319 N. Tarragona St., on the last weekend of May?

Tonight, New Orleans group Zync will headline the appropriately titled “Metal/Hardcore Show.” Six bands are scheduled to perform, including Pensacola groups Melee Attack and For The Fall. Doors open at 8 p.m.

One of the heaviest bands in the area, Acorns, will perform Sunday on a show that includes Little Wimp, Zerox 82 and The Percolators. If you haven’t seen Acorns (Dave Myers, Shane Langseth and Scott Dickson), be prepared for a sonic crush that will jar your equilibrium and leave you dizzy in all the right ways. Show starts at 10 p.m.

For more details, go to www.handlebarpensacola.com.

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