SUNDAY, SEPT. 2:

Wanda Jackson blew my sorry little mind. At seventy years old and with a career spanning over fifty years, I feared her voice would lack that raw, high-pitched sound that I find so endearing. As soon as she began “I Gotta Know,” my mouth dropped in amazement. Mid-song, a group of rockabilly girls started fighting and destroyed one another’s hair-dos. Wanda’s band stopped playing after they noticed the fight, but she flailed her little arms around and they restarted to play another verse/chorus until everything calmed down. In between songs, she admitted to having a “senior citizen moment” because she would sometimes forget the words. Her senior citizen moment didn’t end there. She forgot to plug in her acoustic Daisy guitar and played unplugged for several songs. The back-up band was super sharp. The drummer looked and dressed like a priest and the stand-up bass player could have been Gob from Arrested Development’s twin (just add a leopard vest). Her guitar player is the producer for her new record, I Remember Elvis, and the piano player had performed on several Elvis Presley records. My other favorite songs of the set included “Funnel of Love,” which gave me the chills, and “Fujiyama Mama,” which was her only #1 hit—in Japan (so ironic). For the encore, she played a medley of “Let’s Have a Party” and “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin On’” by Jerry Lee Lewis. The crowd went completely nuts. The weirdest moment of the show was Wanda Jackson telling the crowd how she accepted Jesus Christ into her life in 1971 and then a dude yelling, “You’re hot!” What a fulfilling hour spent with a room full of greasers. Wanda por vida. (MS)