How’d They Miss THAT?: Lou and Peter Berryman put the joke in folk with Saturday show at Freight & Salvage

It’s perfectly understandable. There’s so much music happening in the Bay Area in any given week that there’s bound to be at least one concert that deserves a shout-out but failed to get any press. This humble blog feature is the consolation prize. This is … How’d They Miss THAT?

It’s no mystery how this one flew under the radar: a pair of sixty-something singers, an accordion, a 12-string guitar, lots of polka rhythms and an almost overwhelmingly Midwestern sense of humor. Suffice to say, it won’t be the hippest concert in the Bay Area this weekend, but Lou and Peter Berryman aren’t going for hip. They’re going for clever, funny and charming, and they generally succeed on all fronts. I mean, just look at their smiling faces over there.

A pair of divorced musicians from Madison, Wisconsin, who nevertheless continue to perform together (hey, they’re like The White Stripes of the silly folk music!), the Berrymans have been a humorous, prolific voice on the festival and coffeehouse circuit for more than 30 years. Just a glance at a few of their song titles should give you an idea of what’s in store when they return to Berkeley’s venerable Freight & Salvage Coffeehouse on Saturday:

• “Amalgamated Gigawatt McGoo”
• “Cheese & Beer & Snow (30º)”
• “Cockroach Christmas”
• “Dem Deer”
• “Double Yodel”
• “I Don’t Believe you Like My Shirt”
• “Madison Skyline (Smokestacks of MG&E)”
• “Moo Moo Moo”
• “Unfulfilled Sneeze”
• “When Did We Have Sauerkraut?”
• “Who Put the Sigh in Siberia?”

I recall the Berrymans being a regular feature on the “Folks Like Us” program on the Detroit public radio station when I was growing up. I still find myself occasionally (and involuntarily) singing the chorus to what is probably their best-known song, “Your State’s Name Here,” which takes a wry, Mad Libs approach to the cliche of wistful state theme songs.

• What: Lou and Peter Berryman
• When: 8 p.m. Saturday (doors at 7 p.m.)
• Where: Freight & Salvage Coffeehouse, 2020 Addison St., Berkeley
• Cost: $20.50 in advance,  $22.50 at the door
• Ticket link