Well, maybe not the worst thing, but I always hate it when the song gets to the good part
  -- and then it fades out - just as it's getting to the good part!!!    Argghhh!!!

 The two that always bothered me the most were sixties songs.
 Maybe that was because AM radio was so hung up on three minutes songs.

 The worst cut-off ever has to be Otis Redding's "Try a Little Tenderness."
 Otis has a way of caressing words like few men that ever held a microphone,
 and surely, Tenderness was Otis's greatest song, right?

 And just when the drama starts building, just as the song approaches greatness,
 they ran out of time and had to fade away - but...

 Every live band that ever covered the song fixed that mistake by riding the big finish
 for another five minutes or so, with it's climbing cadences and keep on climaxing.

 The best I've ever seen it done was by my good friend Windy Austin of the very famous
 Hot House Tomato Boys, formerly known as Zorro and the Blue Footballs.
 Windy let me videotape the band a few nights back when I was in the business, and when
 he does Tenderness, it's the most exciting thing you'll ever see onstage in a nightclub.
 When I get BartCop Radio flying, remind me to play a clip of that.

 The second-worst cut-off was a song by the original Blood Sweat & Tears.
 You old people might think Blood Sweat and Tears started with David Clayton Thomas
 singing "Spinning Wheel" and "You've Made Me So Very happy," ....but no.

 The first Blood, Sweat & Tears album had a different vocalist, one Al Kooper, who went on
 to produce the early Lynyrd Skynyrd albums. Easily the best song on that first album was
 "I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know," and it's been finally been rescued ...by Paul Schaffer.

 In a genius melding of genres and styles, Paul started singing this extra-great song every Friday.
 They use it as a bridge to link the third ansd second-last commercial breaks.  Paul starts singing
 then he leaves the piano and takes center stage, screaming the lyrics like James Brown.

 I don't know if James did it every night, or if he still does it, or if this was a one-time thing,
 but twenty years ago I paid top-dollar for a video of a thing called "The T.A.M.I. Show."

 Sidebar:
 Filmed in 1964 at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, The T.A.M.I. Show ranks with Woodstock
 as one of the best concert films of all time. But the real reason to watch T.A.M.I. is the show-stopping
 James Brown.  Accompanied by the Famous Flames, Brown gives a performance that proves once and
 for all he was the greatest showman in the history of modern music. And in what may be the biggest
 faux pas in rock history, the Rolling Stones attempt to follow Brown's performance. For all their
 dynamic presence, in Brown's wake the Stones look like pathetic wannabes. Keith Richards said
 the biggest mistake of their career was following James Brown at the T.A.M.I. concert.

 Click  Here  to read more

 What James did at the T.A.M.I. Show, was get alllllllll worked up in some really coo blues song,
 and he falls to his knees and r-e-a-l-l-y belts out some my-baby-done-left-me-blues to where the
 crowd isn't sure if James is giving us tonight's performing - or is having some kind of breakdown?
 The band keeps playing, but they all have one eye on James, who's still singing his ass off!.

 James stays down, so eventually, a couple of band members take James's cape from it's stand,
 and drape it over his shoulders and they help him to his feet. ...and the band keep playing.

 You can see they're comforting James, telling The Godfather of Soul, "It's OK, it'll be allright."
 They get James almost to the back of the stage when James breaks free from their grasp and runs
 back to the front of the stage, falls again to his knees and pours out another another verse or two.

 Wow!
 It was spectacular.
 If you're a U2 fan, you might compare it to Bonos performance at Live-Aid in 1985.
 Nobody knew what was going on, but as long as the band kept playing, the crowd was OK.
 It was the performance that changed U2 from a good rock band to a worldwide sensation.

 So James belts out another verse or two, and his "cape men" have decided James is truly in no
 condition to continue the show, so they try again with the cape.  Like last time, they get James
 covered and on his feet and almost to the back of the stage, when James comes roaring back!

 Down on his knees, he's begging his woman to stop treating him so badly.

 (This is why the Stones didn't want to go on after James Brown - that man's hard to follow)

 ...which brings us back to Paul Schaffer and the band. Each Friday night, about fifty minutes
 into the show, the band starts playing "More Than You'll Ever Know," and Paul starting wailing.

 "I'm just a man, in the wilderness - ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!  I looooooooooove you, baby,
  I  looooooooooooooove you," and he's screaching like Michael Bolton with a compound hernia.

 But then, ... then comes the mystery cape holder.

 The first time I saw it, it was Pataki - holding the cape for the emotionally-destroyed Paul Schaffer.
 True to form, Pataki got the cape around Paul and got him almost off-stage, when Paul breaks free
 and runs back to the front of the stage, and ocne again falls to his knees screaming "I loooove you, baby,
 I'm just a man, but I looooooooooooooove you."  ...while Pataki stood there, unable to help poor Paul.

 The second time I saw it, I was Donald Trump, that guy from dave's show "Ed," did it, but last night
 it was so cool because everyone in the audience is waiting to see who the surprise "cape man," will be,
 and out comes "Hal Gurtner," Dave's old producer from NBC - the man who taught Dave half his stuff.

 (His real name is Hal Gurnee, but Dave always called him "Gertner.")

 It was a touching moment, because I think Ol' Hal had a stroke a few years back, or maybe
 he just got too old to keep up with Dave's schedule. In the old days, whenever Dave would get stuck,
 he'd ask if everything was OK in the control booth, and Hal would always say something funny and
 make Dave laugh and get him back on track, but it was great to see Hal again.

 And thanks to Paul Schaffer for closure on the second-best never heard ending to a song ever.

 In closing (applause...) what Schaffer has done was take this great BS&T song, and melded it with the
 dramatic stage performance of perhaps James Brown's best moment, and ended up with a comedy classic.

 Watch Dave next Friday - see who the mystery cape man will be.
 

  James's famous cape, enshrined in the Hard Rock

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