There was not a giant, fancy tour bus parked outside. There wasn’t a line of fans that extended the length of a football field down the street. There wasn’t a security team that outnumbered the entire police force. As a matter of fact, there wasn’t a police officer in sight. It was just one guy and his acoustic guitar.

Recently I saw Joe Touchette, an acoustic performer out of Taunton, Massachusetts. He was playing at Hell, a club in Providence, Rhode Island whose name most definitely fits the look. It was as dark as night inside, almost as if there was a power outage and only the emergency lamps were on. Graffiti lined the walls, the doors, and even the ceiling. The whole place reeked of lovely mix of beer, bodily fluids, and bleach. The only thing that was missing was the fire and Satan. He must have had prior obligations that night.

After sound checking, there were a couple hours to spare before the show started so we decided to walk around Providence and grab a bite to eat. As we came up to the Providence Performing Arts Center, we saw a tour bus, and a few tractor-trailers parked in the rear loading dock. Once we got to the front we saw the flashy billboard which read “Ben Folds, October 10, 2009 7 P.M.”

“Hey that’s tonight!” I said. “And it starts at the same time. I think he may be stealing your crowd.” Joe quickly responded back.

“All the people I really want to be there are going to be there. I’m not in this for the money, fame or fancy tour bus, even though I couldn’t complain if it came my way”

We stopped by the Pizza Queen, a small pizza and sub shop that also had a mini convenience store behind the counter with cigarettes, candy and scratch tickets up for sale. He told me about what he wants to do with his musical career, which all came down to making a solid local music scene back in Taunton. I can attest to the fact that Taunton lacks this. He tries to hit every open microphone night that goes on in Taunton and the surrounding towns and even hosts his own open microphone night at Rune’s Café, a small bar and coffee shop with a bistro-like setup in the center of Taunton, every other Thursday night. On occasion, he invites everyone to his house where he will put on a private show in his basement with some other acts of his choice. Most of the acts he met through playing at the open microphone nights and you can see the network of performers in the surrounding Taunton areas he’s trying to build.

We finished our pizza and headed back to the Satin’s playhouse. There a line of maybe four or five people making they’re way into the club. He said hello and thank them and we stepped inside through the same door as everyone else used. Inside there was a few more people, all whom which Joe appeared to know very well. Besides the massive size difference, the crowd differed greatly from most concerts you’d see like the Ben Folds concert down the street. Everyone seemed to know each other. It felt more like a friendly gathering than a show. About an hour had passed and the club was holding roughly thirty people or so. It was show time.

Joe captivated the crowd better than most full bands that I have seen. Everyone was huddling with each other, singing along to every word of every song. It was unlike most acoustic acts. He wasn’t sitting in a stool playing quietly for a few people sitting down at tables sipping on coffee. He stood tall playing loud and crisp, singing in the faces of his friends. He ended his set and everyone was begging for more. I’m almost positive he played every song in his repertoire because he said he had nothing else he could play. That never happens!

~~~~That's all I really have so far. I'm still working on where I want to go from there.