January 2022 VOCAL Songwriters Showcase

The January 2022 VOCAL Songwriters Showcase, simulcast on Zoom and Facebook Live, featured two veterans of the Richmond music scene, Steve Nuckolls and Jim Puckett.

Introducing the performers, was Matthew Costello, VOCAL President who, while waiting for the viewers to arrive, kicked off the show with a couple of pre-recorded songs, one from each of the performers. “When Rain Turns to Snow’ was from Steve, who later did it live, and “Sunshine Knows Your name” was Jim’s offering, also done live later on.

Steve Nuckolls
To start the live show, Steve began with a series of songs written during the pandemic. “Her Celebrity” offers a tale about she makes him her celebrity of love. Lessons from his father were sprinkled through the next song “Nothing At All” with the advice, if you can say something nice about somebody, say nothing at all. This was followed by “There’s Future For Us” self explanatory and then “Black and Blue” opining how things could be in a perfect world, if we didn’t beat up on each other so much. “Hell Out Of Hereway” is a tale of the singer not being accepted in his own home town, and all the abuse suffered, until he can get the hell out of there and find a new place to live. “Six Feet Away” has the singer keeping social distance between himself and others for fear that if he doesn’t, he will end up six feet underground. The next song in his set, was an older song “Praying For A Rocky Top” which hopes the singer will find those traits of comfort that he found in his hometown, he will find in other places, He analogizes that feeling as in a Norman Rockwell painting. Closing out his portion of the show, he did the live version of the opening song “When Rain Turns to Snow“. A nice love song about how much his lover makes him feel warm and comforted when the weather changes.

Jim Puckett
Jim began his set of 10 songs, with “Breaking Ground” about infrastructure and all the progress that needs to be done to bring society into harmony, this was followed by “Vegas By Now” a tale of two people blowing their chances of making it to Vegas by making bad decisions. “The Only Stars” was a sad song about love lost: The stars (that were) in her eyes are now only the stars in the sky. “Feelin’ Lucky” describes some scenarios where the singer escaped from losing his life, like drowning or caught in a fire and is glad to be alive. Next up, “Brave New Face” a stoic look at trying to hide from a relationship that fell apart. “Here Comes The way It Goes” was followed by “So Help Me” which says “I’ll go as far as I need” (to go) to make things go smoothly again. “Mae June” is another sad tale of an ending relationship in July, a play on the title, but we should enjoy that which we have had up to now. “Shaky Leg” was kind of a nonsense song about a dog shaking his leg. The last song in his set was the live version of “The Sunshine Knows Your Name” in which the singer tells the object of his love “black clouds remember the rain and embers remember the flame” but for you “The Sunshine Knows your Name” And who wouldn’t like that.

Great night for music at the VOCAL Songwriters Showcase as always when such fine performers as above do their songs.