Brian Kenney Fresno " Balloon" Live @ Steamers Jazz Club Sept 29, 2011

Brian Kenney Fresno opened the CalProg concert @ the world famous Steamers Jazz Club in Fullerton, Ca.
When "Alice in Wonderland" author Lewis Carroll invented the term, "nonsensical," he must have had Brian Kenney Fresno in mind. With his 12-stringed Warr guitar and a head full of rambling narratives, Fresno explores the outer ranges of weird at a frenetic pace. Many of the songs on Fresno's 1999 Bonghit Records release, "F is for FRESNO," publicize the colorful idiosyncrasies that occur in and around his hometown of Fresno, Calif.

Fresno's most popular song is "Bobby Salazar," the story of a low-stakes insurance scam involving "a visionary Mexican restaurateur" from "the Central San Joaquin Valley in a town called Fresno." During live performances, Fresno distributes photocopied "Bobby Salazar" menus and invites audience members to follow along as he reads the menu items verbatim. "Beef and cheese quesadilla on a corn tortilla, $2.95," he sings, "Tangy house salsa, complimentary per order./ Tostada compuesta/ Tostada compuesta, $3.95."
On "Ma Dog, Ma Truck, Madera," Fresno lampoons his rival city, Madera, "a place just north of Fresno where people are willing to settle for a little bit less."

For the refrain, Fresno directs a massive, cascading sing-along of the repeated lines, "Moonshine and meth labs and chop shops and drunk cops."That's good fun, people.
For all its overt weirdness, the music of Brian Kenney Fresno is in no way half-baked. Fresno is masterful on his guitar, simultaneously tapping snappy bass lines and jazz-style rhythm chords with his left hand while picking melodies with his right. Furthermore, his ludicrous themes are oddly liberating, like the song "Stoner Detectives," in which Fresno encourages listeners to imagine a playful escape with "Point and Stash, the stoner detectives, (who) go looking for suspects with a special perspective." I still have to thank him for everything, anyway. It's a really conversational song in which I try to make light of Emmett's lawsuit against Mark.

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Music

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