Saturday Music Hall: Melissa Etheridge

I thought I'd feature Melissa Etheridge because we just saw her in concert at the Sandia Casino outdoor amphitheater last week. Above, she's giving her first performance in 2005 after going through chemo and radiation treatments for breast cancer, which she's since beaten, at least as far as anyone can tell at this time. She's doing a Janis Joplin thing with Joss Stone at the Grammy's, shaved head and all. Very powerful.

I've seen Melissa many times over many years -- throughout her long and pioneering time in the public eye -- and I have to say she's always been one of the most vibrant and exciting live performers I've ever experienced, whether it's just her and her Ovation or she's touring with some of the best musicians in the business. Three hour shows are the norm and she gives her all every time. Every time.

I admit I missed her very first performance in Albuquerque, which was at Corky's, the notoriously wild women's gay bar that was on San Mateo just South of Menaul for many years. She and her acoustic were joined by, of all people, a female sax player. By all accounts it was an impressive performance and the cassettes they sold were all over the Albuquerque lesbian community in no time. Melissa, seeking out free hospitality, slept on the floor of a local massage therapist's home. She was the talk of the town.

I saw her the first time at a now-defunct music club in Santa Fe sometime in the mid-80s. She looked like she does in the video above. Come on, admit it, many of you had hairstyles in that vein in that era. Wow. The crowd was unfamiliar with her and we were all amazed at her talent and the wild abandon of her performance. I recall she got three or four encores, with people standing on their folding chairs, going wild. It was smashing. One of those memories locked into my brain in high definition.

I've also seen her perform at the Kiva, Tingley, in Boston at the Berklee and Orpheum, in Denver at what was then called the Fiddler's Green and some others I can't even recall. Melissa's latest is "I Need to Wake Up," which she wrote for Al Gore's film, "An Inconvenient Truth." It can be heard at the end of the movie. A just released video for the song can be found at her website.