KEY WEST :: FIELD REPORT :: ROUTE 1 PROJECT
OVERVIEW
Key West was supposed to be the ceremonial beginning of the Route 1 Project. Hurricane Irma made it something more urgent: a field station at the edge of a battered island chain, where debris lined the highway, residents returned to damaged homes and musicians were already helping the city find its rhythm again. From Wayne Sorbelli’s account of a creative community rebuilding itself to the discoveries of Tony Roberts and Lance Taylor, Key West revealed the Motherlode principle in real time—people, music and memory surviving because they remain connected.
DIARY
1st Transmission: Tuesday, September 26, 2017: Key West, Florida
Photo: Willie T's, Duval Street, Key West, Florida: 9/25/2017
I blew the last of the Norwood Space Center dirt out of my nose in Homestead, Florida two mornings ago. Curfews prevented me from entering the Keys the previous evening. In the early morning light, the 100 plus miles of the beginning of Route 1 were walled with personal belongings as if these inanimate objects were lining up and waiting for a parade to arrive. It featured the greatest collection of mattresses, baby carriages, refrigerators and freshly cut tree limbs. That was the status quo from Key Largo to Marathon. When I crossed the Seven Mile Bridge and dropped into Summerland Key, I entered Ground Zero. It was the beginning of where Irma made her direct impact. Downtown Beirut. Tornado Alley. Hiroshima Mon Amor. I actually cried.
Flipped boats, tipped campers, crushed cars, roofs gone. How do you rebuild from here?
The curfew was lifted just as I arrived in Key West as rehabilitators, linemen and returnees all scrambled for what hotel rooms were available since most were not ready to reopen. Rates jumped twenty dollars in ten minutes. Most of the wind damage in Key West was primarily trees. It's the water that's the problem. It's so hot, mold will come soon. I paid 200 for a tiny space where I couldn't even set up a place to work.
The gods worked a miracle for me yesterday afternoon and I was the first one in to the Marlin at the Southernmost where I got me a spacious suite on the second floor for $99. I have established HQ where I will be for the next 24 hours when then I will finally embark on this journey of a lifetime.
Still no cable. Internet is intermittent.
Wednesday, September 28, 2017. Escape from Key West
Lights On, Nobody's Home. DashCam of the Destruction. Coconut Grove. Playhouse. The Taurus. Chasing the Ghost of Fred Neil.
John V from the Green Parrot is zigging when I'm zagging. Lots of folks are just returning I have to be in Waycross, Georgia by 5:00 on Friday to make it to Waycross. Met with Luther, a close friend from my Key West days. I taught him the fundamentals of the guitar and I used to drag him up to play when I played solo gigs when I was Tyvek Velvette. I planted the seed for him to write a song for me that I can use for the Route 1 Project Soundtrack.
Tony Roberts/Green Parrot
People are coming and going. BarTab Larry left for Detroit. Tony Roberts headed out to Boston.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Photos: Charles White - Key West - 2017
VIDEO
The Key West GoPro footage from the 2017 Route 1 expedition will be added here as the moving-image archive is assembled this fall.
AUDIO
Selected field recordings and interview excerpts from Key West will be added here as the Route 1 sound archive is prepared.
INTERVIEWS
Inside Island Guitar, days after Hurricane Irma tore through the Lower Keys, Wayne Sorbelli described a music town already tuning itself back up. He had evacuated every guitar and amplifier before the storm, while other musicians lost trailers, homes and the fragile arrangements that allowed them to keep playing. Yet Key West’s clubs and performers were already turning tips, stages and benefit shows into direct aid for their neighbors. Sorbelli revealed an island where musicians can work every night without leaving town, audiences constantly renew themselves and people who arrive playing Jimmy Buffett covers eventually begin writing songs, painting pictures or making pottery because, as he put it, “art is catchy.” The image that holds the interview together is a hurricane-shattered banana tree in David Sloan’s backyard: its entire crown was gone, but after one day in the sun, a single green shoot appeared. Key West was damaged, displaced and grieving—but the music had already begun growing back.
DISCOVERIES
TONY ROBERTS
Tony Roberts represents the working musical life of Key West: a singer, songwriter and performer shaped by the island’s clubs, characters and constant exchange between local musicians and the people passing through. The Route 1 Project encounter continues on his permanent Motherlode artist profile.
LANCE TAYLOR
Lance Taylor opened another road through Key West—back through the Michael Dixon Band, the island’s independent music culture and his unforgettable proposition that Woody Guthrie was the first punk rocker. His story and video continue on his permanent Motherlode artist profile.
