Rickie Lee Jones posted this on Facebook today: "Cat Stevens, recent RocknRoll hall of fame inductee, (as if there is any hall but the one in your own heart,) is going on tour again. could be good. I was at the rock n roll hall of fame once. the waiter took my speech from my place at my table. i needed that speech. then the paper complained about me meandering. I sang poorly with Sting, but I danced soarly with Ray Davies. Pete Townsend and Phil Spector were the only people who talked to me." I love her candor and philosophical bent (the hall in your heart). I interviewed Rickie a few years ago, for Vanity Fair's website, at Cafe Henri in the Village. When she spoke about becoming suddenly famous with the release of her first album, I noticed the young woman at the table next to us looking over to see who this was; I'm not sure she knew. I'd lost sight of Rickie myself for a long time and was glad to find out she was still making music, still sounding great, still rocking the boat. (At her concert a few nights before, I'd seen her fiery response to a heckler.) She's now in the process of making a new record, using PledgeMusic to fund it. I got in touch with her when I was going to L.A. a few months ago--we'd communicated briefly after the interview, during which she'd suddenly and sweetly said, "Your eyes remind me of my mother’s eyes"--and she wrote back that she's now living in New Orleans, ending with "let me know if you come back this way love to say hello." Hey, that's reason enough to go to New Orleans, isn't it?