Hangin` with the superheroes

INSIDE Worcester
A Journal of Observation and Opinion ■ July 8th, 2013
Hangin’
with the superheroes
“Mikey 3B” prepares to go onstage at “PaulieStock” 2013.
“Play it again Sam.” 13th Worcester District State. Rep. John
Mahoney chats with PaulieStock Organizer Paul Collyer.
PHOTOS/ROD LEE
OUR TOWN/ROD LEE
Lordy, lordy
PaulieStock delivers
a rip’snortin’ good time
CHANDLER ST.—It was a steamer of an afternoon but
Jumpin’ Johnny Sansone & The All-Stars were hotter
even than that.
No disrespect to Worcester’s “Out to Lunch” series on
the Common or Chuck & Mud at WCRN’s first-ever
Block Party on Salem St. but only Paul Collyer’s New
Orleans Jazz n’ Blues Festival—otherwise known as
“PaulieStock”—can raise temperatures with the audacity
of a California wildfire or a blast furnace.
What better way to help wrap up PaulieStock’s threeday run than Sansone ending his own blistering set with
the song that the Blues Review described as “equal parts
contempt, resignation and guarded hope” a song that
“drips from his nasal cavity and singes the floor…?”
That would be “The Lord Is Waiting And The Devil Is Too.”
No one present wanted it to end
and it almost didn’t as Sansone with
his long white hair and in his black
shirt and blue jeans brought out the
harmonica and wailed and wailed
and wailed until he could give no
more and then staggered back and forth across the stage
by way of enunciating the point “you ain’t ever seen
nothing’ like this, folks.” (SEE PHOTO, NEXT PAGE).
He was right.
As Billy Joel would say “maybe it’s a lunatic you’re
looking for.”
“Where’s Eric Lindell?” Absent from
PaulieStock, this
year. “It breaks my
heart he’s not here,”
Eric Bergstrom of
Foster, Rhode Island, ordering food
from the OneLove
Café table, said..
Bergstrom was still
having a good time.
“This is my fifth or
sixth
(PaulieStock),”
Bergstrom said. “It’s
a great little venue.”
“The Village of Piedmont” has been known for a lot of
the wrong things but then the Chandler Business Association (CBA) came along and began changing attitudes
and perceptions. PaulieStock is a reflection of this, an
event that bristles with the same energy Paul Collyer
brings to his relentless championing of the neighborhood
on so many fronts.
Asked what he thought of PaulieStock as he prepared to
sign copies of his new CD, Sansone said, “it’s great.”
Even Satan would agree.
Where there’s a Stolz...
SALEM ST.—WCRN 830 AM’s Hank Stolz and his
trusty man Tonto (Sherman Whitman) have managed to
outlast such previous morning drive-time mainstays of
CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE
“Better find the Lord before I (the devil) find you!” was the
hair-raising message Johnny Sansone delivered to appreciative fans at PaulieStock 2013.
CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS PAGE
the station as Peter Blute and Upton Bell by maintaining solid
ties with an audience they had forged a relationship with even
before their arrival at the studio on Franklin St. A festive first-of
-its-kind WCRN Block Party on Salem St. on June 25th will
only further that cause. “We’ve wanted to do it since we got
here,” Mr. Stolz said, as
fellow radio personality
Steve Jones-D’Agostino
beamed his approval.
Someone was heard to remark “we should do this
every week!” (Mr. Stolz is
pictured at right with Mr.
Whitman).
The event had a little bit of
everything including a speed bag courtesy of the Massachusetts
National Guard that registered the power of each contestant’s
punch. In other words, the Block Party was a real knockout.
Mr. Murray, Ms. Riik, Ms. Albano-Selzo
Birds of a feather
Mr. and Mrs. Dan Verrico , with Ed Bourgault, lent a flashy designer touch to the North Worcester Business Association’s yearending Summer Social at Tweed’s Pub Restaurant on June 19th..
The event also marked the completion of host Jim Donoghue’s first
year as NWBA president. A great evening was topped off by
“whoopee pies and Klondike bars,” Mr. Donoghue said. The
NWBA is the city’s largest business organization with 139 members. Its monthly luncheon meetings, which resume in September,
typically draw 50+. (PHOTO/COURTESY MICHELE HOEY SLOAN)
CITYWIDE—An update on three of Worcester’s luminaries.
Tim Murray had bar ely settled into his job as new pr esident/
CEO of the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce when
he received two awards for his prior work as lieutenant governor. The Mass. National Guard at Joint Force Headquarters
(Hanscom Air Force Base) honored Mr. Murray and his State
House staff for their public service on behalf of the military and
soldiers’ families; also the Mass. Association of Vocational Administrators (MAVA) presented Mr. Murray with its 2013 David
F. Cronin Award for his efforts in support of vocationaltechnical education. Meanwhile Veterans Inc. and the Shrewsbury St. Area Merchants Association have lost the services of
two valued members in Amanda Riik and Lisa Albano-Selzo,
respectively. Ms. Riik has taken a position in the city manager’s
office after eight years as Veterans Inc.’s director of public relations and outreach. As for Ms. Albano-Selzo, in leaving
LightLab Designs she is also bidding adieu to the SSAMA.
What an asset to Shrewsbury St. she was, with a role in everything from The Taste of Shrewsbury St. to the Columbus Day
Parade! Her departure prompted a flood of thank-you emails.
Councilor-at-Large Kathleen M. Toomey said Ms. Albano-Selzo
brought “energy, vision and class” to the promotion and beautification of Shrewsbury St. Paul Barber of The Flying Rhino’s
own message to Ms. Albano-Selzo was “the street will miss
you...thanks for all your hard work, compassion and friendship!”