Got a Song in Your Heart? The Spirit Will Set It Free

For nearly a decade, the Spirit has been a finishing school of sorts for San Diego rock ‘n’ rollers who write and play their own material and hope to one day graduate to the big time.

Among the celebrated alumni of the tawdry Bay Park nightclub are international “roots rock” champions the Beat Farmers, whose latest MCA album, “Pursuit of Happiness,” made it onto Billboard magazine’s Top 200 LPs chart; blue-eyed soulsters the Jacks, recently signed to Rounder Records; and talkin’ bluesman Mojo Nixon, singer of such irreverent college-radio classics as “Stuffin’ Martha’s Muffin” and “Elvis Is Everywhere” and manic star of a series of MTV promotional spots.

In an effort to enroll even more untried local talent, Spirit owner Jerry Herrera has launched a new recruitment campaign.

Every Tuesday night, the Spirit now plays host to what Herrera calls “The Songwriters Showcase,” a five-hour amateur show in which from 10 to 15 San Diego wanna-be’s perform three original songs apiece.

Sign-up time is 7:30 p.m. and the music starts an hour later. The ,budding stars play for free, but at the end of the night, Herrera gives them a cassette recording of their performance.

“We’re giving anybody and everybody a chance to present their wares, to do their own thing, whatever that thing might be,” Herrera said. “And instead of displaying their talents in some living room or garage, they’re performing in a room filled with people, some of whom might be talent scouts for major record companies.”

Since the weekly “hoot nights” began July 26, Herrera said, they have attracted everything from punk-rock bands to maudlin singer-songwriters “doing tearful ballads.” Also showing up, from time to time, have been an occasional comedian, mime and juggler.

“Last week, we had a juggler who was just terrible,” Herrera said with a laugh. “But everyone had a great time--nobody threw things at him.”

Two and one-half hours of rare video footage of Bob Marley and Peter Tosh will be shown Saturday night at the California Theater downtown. Among the clips included in reggae historian Roger Steffens’ cinematic tribute to the two late Rasta greats are Marley’s performance at the Zimbabwe independence-day celebration on April 17, 1980, and a 1973 studio session in Hollywood with Marley and Tosh.

Also on tap are scenes from Tosh’s final concert in Kingston, Jamaica, in December, 1983, and a documentary of the events surrounding the 1976 assassination attempt on Marley, beginning with his arrival in the hospital and ending with his surprise appearance two days later at the “Smile Jamaica” concert.

The highlight, however, promises to be Marley’s performance at the landmark “Amandla” concert at Harvard Stadium in July, 1979, “which many people consider to be his finest performance ever to be captured on film,” Steffens said.

“It’s the most incredible performance of his life,” said Steffens. “It’s almost like he’s possessed. He makes three rousing speeches, and he dances all over the stage with his arms around the I-Threes, his backup vocal trio.”

Steffens has been an ardent reggae fan since 1973, when he first heard a song by Marley called “Catch a Fire.” He immediately began buying every reggae record he could find, eventually traveling to Jamaica in search of more records as well as video clips of his two all-time heroes, Marley and Tosh.

“Reggae has changed my whole life,” said Steffens, who in 1979 began acting as host of a popular reggae show on Los Angeles radio station KCRW-FM (89.9) and briefly served as Island Records’ national promotions director for African and reggae music. “From the moment I heard ‘Catch a Fire,’ I knew there was something incredibly important happening through music to transform the planet, and reggae was its sound track.

“What I heard was a spiritual awakening that united blacks and whites,” Steffens said, “and Bob Marley and Peter Tosh were the two people primarily responsible.”

SAILING: Four summers ago, a tiny flotilla of dinghies sailed into the Shelter Island Yacht Basin and dropped anchor a few feet from shore, just in time for an outdoor concert at Humphrey’s by Jimmy Buffett. Halfway through his set, the affable country rocker climbed onto a speaker bank and serenaded the seafaring freeloaders with three acoustic ballads that, recalls promoter Kenny Weissberg, “he dedicated to ‘the boat people.’ ”

“Word spread quickly from there, and it soon became a tradition, with more and more boats at each show,” Weissberg added. “It set an all-time record at Chuck Berry’s (July 29) concert, when there were almost as many people watching the show for free from the water as there were people who had bought tickets to get inside.”

Not that Weissberg really minds.

“It hurts me at the box office,” he said, “but it adds to the overall ambiance.”

FAMILY AFFAIR: The Beat Farmers return home Thursday night for a concert at the Belly Up Tavern in Solana Beach. Opening the show will be Comanche Moon, a fledgling rock band fronted by singer-guitarist Paul Kamanski, who wrote two of the Farmers’ most popular songs, “Bigger Stones” and “Hollywood Hills.”

Adding to the family affair atmosphere of this double bill is the fact that in the late 1970s and early ‘80s, Kamanski and Beat Farmers rhythm guitarist Joey Harris used to play together in the Fingers, one of San Diego’s first successful new wave nightclub bands.

BITS AND PIECES: San Diego rockabilly revivalists the Paladins, whose second album, “Years Since Yesterday,” was released last month by Alligator Records, plan to relocate to Austin, Tex., by summer’s end . . . Acclaimed British “chicken-picking” guitarist Albert Lee, who has toured and recorded with the likes of Jackson Browne, Eric Clapton and Joe Cocker, will perform Friday night at the Belly Up Tavern. The Mighty Penguins, from San Diego, will open.