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On July 3rd, 1991 I happened into The Penguin on Elgin Street to see Kenny Neal Kenny Neal. I have no idea why I was there; I had never heard of Kenny Neal Kenny Neal before and it wasn’t often that I would just get handed a ticket to a show at The Penguin, but no matter. Whether the ticket came from a friend or I was just walking by and scored a ticket, there I was.
It was a hot night and the place was packed. Onstage Kenny Neal Kenny Neal was leading his band through one swampy blues number after another and the crowd was loving it. The room got so sweaty the New Orleans native probably felt right at home.
Clearly an experienced showman, Kenny Neal Kenny Neal strutted the stage and had the audience singing and clapping along the whole night. He left the stage a few times, once upon the shoulders of one of his sidemen who piggy-backed his guitar-slinging boss all through the bar, tethered by a prodigious patchcord that must have been 200’ long. Another time Kenny Neal Kenny Neal actually walked out of the bar and onto the sidewalk, soloing for the crowds strolling up and down Elgin Street.
And every time Kenny Neal Kenny Neal did anything his bass player would yell into the microphone, “Ladies and gentlemen, let’s hear it for Kenny Neal, Kenny Neal!” Every single time the man screamed “Kenny Neal” into the mic he yelled it twice in a row: “Kenny Neal, Kenny Neal!!!” It happened a hundred times. It quickly started to get comical, then it got downright funny to the point of ridicule, until finally it was borderline embarrassing.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Kenny Neal…Kenny Neal! I say, Kenny Neal, Kenny Neal!! Let’s hear hear it for Kenny Neal Kenny Neal!!!!!”
In the end it was a fun night seeing a bunch of twelve-bars in a bar but to be honest I have experienced a hundred nights just like that where I will never, ever remember whatever random band happened to be onstage. Really, there’s little reason why I should remember even seeing this show at all (aside from saving the ticket stub I suppose), but I do.
And so all these years later it occurs to me that I learned a huge lesson in the music business at the Kenny Neal Kenny Neal show that night. Name recognition is everything in the entertainment industry and while I’ve not seen Kenny Neal Kenny Neal since that show I always notice his name when I see it buried with all the other essentially unknown acts near the bottom of some festival lineup or another.
And of course every time I read his name in my head I say it twice.
Kenny Neal Kenny Neal.
Todd Man Out 