We started the evening in Luther's French Quarter Cafe. I tried the not-so jammin "Jammin Jambalaya", while my companion had a lack-luster helping of New Orleans Red Beans and Rice. Both were accompanied by rather cakey pieces of corn bread. Neither dish was horrible, but certainly nothing to write home about either. I found myself gazing at the po' boy sandwich of another diner, and wishing that I had gone that route as well.

As usual, the club area was cold. I planned ahead this time, and wore a sweater. I must confess that while Luther's is a fairly decent nightclub, it is by no means my favorite venue in town. Audience noise, plus the noise of people buying tickets at the door, were frequent distractions. Add to that the cocktail waitress checking on our drinks, and you can miss quite a bit. I recommend *not* sitting on the side closest to the entrance, as this seems to be the worst area for extraneous chatter. Fortunately, we ended up sharing our table with a very cool couple, who provided a nice counterbalance to the loud, bouncy drunks standing in front of us.

The show started with Joy Dragland, of Smokin' With Superman and Joy and the Boy. I missed the name of the ensemble she was with last night, due to crowd noise. I liked her voice better than I liked their songs, but I enjoyed the set.

After their set came the unannouced second opener, Bob Hillman. He had an husky, unconventional voice and a witty style, but he didn't win over the audience. In fact, he seemed fairly defensive and a bit confronational during his set. According to his posted reviews, he tours with Vega quite a bit and was well-received in Madison at previous shows. It was hard to tell last night whether he was confrontational because the audience wouldn't settle down, or if they wouldn't settle down because he was confrontational. We were amused, and actually tried to get the drunks in front of us to shut up while he played, but overall, it was a very noisy bar throughout his set.

There is no question, though, that Suzanne Vega's portion of the night was the best. I had no idea that I knew so many of her songs. She has a Retrospective: The Best of Suzanne Vega album out now, so most of the songs were off of that. She had great stage presence and her band was solid, particularly the bassist. She wasn't as talkative with the audience as say, Dar Williams, but she gave us enough to build a connection. She really communicated most through her songs, which were sung clearly and with feeling. She joked about the amount of minor key songs she writes, but even with that, we left the show on a very up vibe.

I'd say more, but the sounds of thunder from outside are convincing me of turn off my computer.