South of the Moon

WHY 'CRABMEAT'? Little Jerry Thompson grew up near the ocean in Dewey Beach, Delaware. Listening to the waves crash, the small sickly crustacean dreamed of boarding a Viking vessel and ravaging the coasts of New Jersey, carrying off frightened tourists to be sold as slaves or tossed overboard to pacify the deep sea spirits. That day never came. In it's place there was finally a dark night of cards, drunken debauchery, and the consumption of vast quantities of seafood. The morning rose dank and fearful on young Jerry, by this time a callow youth with the pale furze of manhood just darkening my cheeks. I set out with the garbage for the Dempster Dumpster by the highway side. Nothing loathe, I scooped up three paper bags of the sloggy goop and plopped down in Don Wood's tiny sports car, only to realize, standing to dump the load, that paper gets waterlogged and gives way, in this case coating me with the juice of many pounds of seafood and beer. Having only one set of clothes for the long weekend, I toughed it out, to the jeers of my peers, who stuck me with the handle 'Crabmeat,' a name whose pejorative edge rankled until...It became a way to set myself apart from the pack, to put my stamp on the tiny scruffy bit of turf that is MINE MINE HAHAHAHA. Gasp wheeze, snorf? I have appeared at the World's Fair,and Veteran's Memorial Auditorium in San Francisco, with the poet Charles Bukowski. I've played Sloppy Joe's, Key West; Philadelphia's Tin Angel, and the Ram's Head in Annapolis, as well as watering spots from Toronto to Missoula to Rome and Galway. I have shared the stage with the Pointer Sisters, Richie Havens, Steve Forbert, and Tiny Tim. My tune 'Hot Springs' aired on Doctor Demento, and I was a guest on Kate Wolf's radio show in Santa Rosa, CA.