I just got back from vacation with my brother and his family on Martha's Vineyard, one of my favorite places on this green earth. All weekend long we had the dial set to 92.7 WMVY, a distinctive radio station playing a strange mix of adult contemporary with an islander vibe. They may play artists you know but they rarely go with the obvious song selections, opting instead for recent releases or album cuts rather than singles. Its here you can check out late career cuts from the likes of Ry Cooder, Dr. John, Rickie Lee Jones, Van Morrison, Suzanne Vega etc.

One of the tracks we heard was this curiosity from Robbie Robertson's (The Band)1986 debut solo album. When asked about the inspiration for "Somewhere Down the Crazy River", producer Daniel Lanois commented: "Robbie Robertson was describing what it was like to hang out in Arkansas with Levon Helm in his old neighbourhood. He was telling me about the hot nights and fishing with dynamite, and was asking someone for directions for someplace somewhere down the crazy river. ... I had presented him with this toy instrument that Eno introduced me to called the Suzuki Omnichord, like an electric autoharp. He found a little chord sequence with it that was sweet and wonderful. As he was developing his chord sequence I recorded him and superimposed his storytelling, which I was secretly recording, on top. That was the birth of 'Somewhere Down The Crazy River.

SOMEWHERE DOWN THE CRAZY RIVER