'On Second Thought'

Spencer Theater: Sweet riffs showcase the stage on the mesa

The Spencer Theater last Saturday might well have been named in honor of David Spencer, the gifted, expressive guitarist for the Sisters Morales who slid his bottleneck across sweet, melancholy riffs in drop D tuning and then a song later fired off exotic ranchera progressions.
The Sisters' Ruidoso debut was a homecoming of sorts, back to Houston of the 1980s, when Lisa Morales and I would occasionally cross paths along the local club circuit. She was one half of 'Lisa & Marie', a rock/blues outfit she shared with Marie English. Those were the days of the long, crazy nights when the party never ended but a deadline always followed. Each of us was actually working in that environment, and each of us since, in our separate ways, has escaped to saner climes.
What I learned back then was to give artists a chance. As a music critic I could be rather rough on, or simply unmoved by, any number of local acts vying for attention. Two months later that particular band or musician might have improved immeasurably. Art is a process of finding your voice. I needed to withhold snap judgments, at least in the paper.
I also learned the dangers of what I called the Backyard Syndrome the purely human impulse to take for granted the commonplace. The late, great Stevie Ray Vaughan and such topflight numbers as the Fabulous Thunderbirds and Clifton Chenier and Marcia Ball came through town so frequently I began to yawn.
How I would kneel to see Stevie Ray descend with that Stratocaster his brother Jimmie wrote a great song to the effect, Six Strings Down and serenade me one more time. How much would I love to see Long Tall Marcia Ball blow through the Spencer and pound those keys once more.
So, life is like that, and art teaches us to enjoy and appreciate the moment and those who share in its fleeting ways.
And if the Sisters Morales ever suffered the Backyard Syndrome, they came into the hallowed Spencer forced inside by the rain as a composed, veteran touring act deserving of a showcase setting. And a showcase it was. This is where an old rock critic begins to understand the potential of this theater out on the mesa and recognize its significance to a rural area that is off the Interstate of contemporary musical culture. The Sisters Morales arrived seasoned and confident, and the Spencer stood up to that, gave them the audience, the ambience and the acoustics although outside they could have really cranked it up. It was a fitting scene for a music that¹s almost indigenous to our area, wafting from just over the border of the Sonoran Desert, learned in the home down Tucson way as Lisa and Roberta were growing up.
And now they¹ve all grown up as artists, along with bassist 'Cornbread' and percussionist Vicente Rodriguez, and after the show they all gathered in the foyer to sign autographs and pass old times and meet with still more obscure Houston characters such as Drew Hubbard, formerly of the band the Footnotes, who long ago relocated to Las Cruces.
Everybody pledged to have the Sisters return next year, and if the Spencer wants, I can recommend a whole bunch of acts I used to take for granted.

Marty Racine - Ruidoso News - Aug. 12, 2005