Oh, Joy

Phish released their new album, Joy, on Tuesday. I bought the digital files Tuesday night for $3.99 ? Thank you Amazon! I couldn?t listen to it yesterday, of course, because yesterday was Debbi day / Beatles? day and my ears were solely dedicated to another groundbreaking quartet of amazing musicians and writers.

So this morning I eagerly clicked my way to Joy on my poor, aging iPod (:hint: birthday coming ? I could do a lot of things with 160 gigs :endhint:) and, with windows down and car stereo very, very, very loud, I sped off on my way to work.

The first song up happened to be the very first new Phish song I had heard post-Coventry. Trey and Mike played Backwards Down the Number Line at Rothbury, nearly three months before The Announcement that Phish was getting back together. Backwards is a pop-y kind of tune and not really in keeping with the Jamtasticness that is Live Phish but I really like this song. It reminds me of my friends:

Laughing all these many years / We?ve pushed through hardships, tasted tears

If you walked backwards down my number line, you?d walk past years and years of laughter, tears, hugs, shouts, red cheeks and more. And all my friends. We go back a long time, not so much because we started early but moreso because we?ve had many years since. When Phish opened with this song at Deer Creek ? the first show back for all the friends I was sitting with who go way back down the number line with me ? the association became cemented. For me, that song is about Mel and Danielle and Craig and Peter (though he was absent from the show). And that?s who I think about when I hear the song now.

Next song is Stealing Time from the Faulty Plan. My husband really likes this song. I?m meh on it but it does have a really great line that is begging to be turned into a bumper sticker, if it hasn?t already been:

Got a blank space / where my mind should be

This is a harder rocking song, so no wonder my husband likes it. Have you noticed guys generally like their music a little louder and a little faster than gals? I don?t have a problem with that, just an observation. And yes, there are exceptions to Everything.

The title track follows in the third spot. Now, I like this song, it?s a little less loud and a little less fast. My husband, of course, doesn?t like it so much. But this song hits a little deeper when you find out that it was written toward the end of Trey?s sister, Kristy Manning?s, battle with cancer. She died April 29th of this year, less than two months after Phish conquered Hampton. I don?t know if she was an older sister or younger but I assume they were close in age and if he?s 45 years old (and he is, born September 30th, 1964, Happy Almost Birthday Trey), she died too young. Fuck cancer!

-- Sidenote: while looking up his age on Wikipedia, I discovered that the name Anastasio derives from a Greek word for Resurrection. No kidding? That?s poetic.?

So anyway, Joy, the song. It?s funny, I would not have pegged these lyrics to have come from the emotions Trey must have been mired in when he wrote the song but I can hear it in the music. A little bit haunting, a little bit tender with a cheerleader chorus trying very hard to see out the other side of tragedy:

We want you to be happy / Don?t live inside the gloom / We want you to be happy / Come step outside your room / We want you to be happy / ?Cause this is your song too

Phish doesn?t have many emotional songs. They have fun songs and they have story songs. This is a new kind of song. While I?m still firmly in denial of the fact, this song reminds me that we are all mortal and only getting closer to the edge of the coil. And that we can?t just pshaw inevitability. I don?t know if that?s in the lyrics or the music.

The next song, Sugar Shack, is a Mike song and it sounds like a Mike song ? part bluesy, part silly. I like it. I don?t love it but I like it.

Following Sugar Shack is the song that drives my husband nuts: Ocelot. Now, I may be a big reason why he loathes the song. When I first heard, it was catchy enough that I sang it often ? but I only knew one refrain ? so that?s what I sang a lot:

Ocelot, Ocelot / Where have you gone?

To me, Ocelot is a quintessential Phish song and deserves its place in the pantheon of silly Phish-animal tunes. Let?s see ? they have Ocelot, Possum, Llama, Sloth, (Run Like an) Antelope, Bug, Birds (of a Feather), Vultures ? Lizards. And I?m sure I?ve forgotten several and before you say it, Dog Faced Boy doesn?t count. They really like animals.

Following Ocelot is Kill Devil Falls which has earned much praise from fans. Jamworthy is the highest praise a new tune can get and this song has been linked with that word on several message boards. Another song I?m meh about. I get it and Stealing Time mixed up.

The next song starts off completely different than the live versions I?d grown used to; I thought Amazon had snuck a Thievery Corporation song into my shopping cart. I like the song, Light, but it isn?t one that sticks out in my mind. I can?t say I really know the words or the meaning and the tune is fairly generic to my ears ? but I like it.

Following Light is another Mike song, I Been Around, from the sounds of it, all 1:57 minutes of it. It sounds like the lyrics to a country song on repeat and it isn?t long enough to annoy me, so that?s good huh?

Onto the opus. Time Turns Elastic. Phish is a very symphonic band for being the rock band they are. Trey clearly dreams of being remembered for his compositions as much as his guitar greatness. In general I like his lofty compositions, even love some of them. The instrumental portions in songs such as Harry Hood, The Lizards, Divided Sky and Walls of the Cave are many of the reasons I spend as much time and money as I do on Phish. There?s something just otherworldly and yet so succinctly human about standing in a sea of people swaying to perfect music.

Unfortunately, Time Turns Elastic isn?t swaying me. There are, what? Three, four separate sections in this song? And the only part I really like in the nearly 14 minutes comes in the last three and a half minutes. Up to then, I?m just not feeling it. But then again, if memory serves me, when Phish released Walls of the Cave prior to the release of the Round Room album, I felt the same about that song. But I hadn?t yet heard that song live ? it was the live version that reformed my thoughts about it. I?ve heard TTE live, a few times. I really only enjoyed one of those versions and that may have been because I was in the lawn with husband and friends and simply enjoying the company.

I hope this one grows on me because I know they intend to play it a lot for awhile. I?ll keep an open mind and try to find more good in it than just the last three minutes.

Which brings me to the last studio song on the album and definitely my favorite: Twenty Years Later. Okay, is it just me or is practically this entire album about growing older and having memories? Get out of my head, Trey!

This song isn?t so much look back and laugh as Backwards is but rather more of an I-can?t-believe-twenty-years-later-and-I?m-still-upside-down* This is a song that soars. Eagle with outstretched wings circling high over the Grand Tetons, the whole deal. I love the chorus, it sounds like all four guys are singing on it. I have this thing about songs that escape the ABAB CDCD trap. Give me some lyrics that just barely fit into the refrain and only nominally, and not necessarily rhythmically, rhyme and I?m intrigued. This isn?t Britney Spears people! Twenty Years Later will be a welcome addition to any shows I am able to hear, most especially if I am at the shows. I will enjoy it very much.

The album ends with a live version of Backwards signifying that they do indeed expect that to be the one song that would get radio play if they were any band other than Phish. I?m cool with only the one version of the song on the album but they didn?t ask me.

So, since this morning when I listened to this album the first time, I have heard it two more times as I drove around to various locations for work and then at the gym. I don?t usually have the attention span to listen to an album so thoroughly but feel that I got an immersion in Joy today and it was joyful. I really like it. I really do. Bravo and welcome back!



*actual lyrics

Phishing in Hampton, VA

(Fred in the red hat and Jewel front and center, front page picture of the Hampton Daily Press Saturday March 7, 2009 - Love this picture!)

I know I'm a few days late on this - chalk it up to an attack of The Ick (awww, just like old times) - but I must interrupt the regularly scheduled programming (which for me is usually silence, is it not?) to gush about this last weekend, a weekend I heretofore dub: The Best Weekend Ever In The History Of The Whole Wide World or, BWE for short.

Okay, cut to the chase - if you didn't know already, Phish is my favorite band. Now, sometimes, I will say The Beatles are my favorite band because I believe they are Rock-n-Roll's quintessential Adam & Eve (don't give me that Elvis crap!) and I *so* appreciate their existence but to be completely honest: Phish is my favorite band. Phish shaped my mid-to-late twenties and early thirties as no other non-child-of-my-body entity possibly could have.

In 2004, when Trey announced they were kaput, I was bereft. What the hell would I do with my summers, how would I ever again enjoy music? I couldn't make every show they played after The Announcement but I certainly did my best! If they were going to make me say goodbye, I wasn't going to miss it.

Their last shows, in Coventry, VT, were a debacle. As if God mourned their goodbye as much as we did, the endless summer rains leading up to the festival so drenched the former cow pasture that non-economy sized cars were in danger of becoming mired in the festival for good. Saturday morning, a day after we pulled in and set up camp, I was awakened by The Announcement Part Deux on The Bunny, Phish's festival radio station: if your car hadn't yet left the highway, you weren't going to be able to drive in. The grounds were either puddle or mud, or both - it was by sheer luck that Jason spotted a hill when we pulled into our area Thursday night/Friday morning at 1 a.m. and forced me to help tote our gear up that hill to set up camp. The area behind our rental car - a non-economy sized car - glistened in the sun, as water will, and with my tendency towards laziness, our tent and gear would have been submerged in that, as many of our neighbors were. Thank God for sensible husbands!

The music at Coventry matched the conditions; the members of Phish mourned as we did, the end of this livelihood. Together, the fans and the band had enjoyed many years and the end wasn't just tearful on our side of the stage. I still have very strong emotions at the memory of Page cracking and breaking into a sob in the middle of Wading in the Velvet Sea. And when Mike and Trey handed their one-man trampolines out into the audience - the depth of the sadness that still hits me is kind of surprising even to me, especially given the events of this past weekend.

So. On October 1st, 2008, The Announcement Part Trois: We are coming back.

Getting tickets to the Hampton shows for March 6-8 was a little like getting your name called in the NFL draft. Good luck with that one. We did not have good luck. We were denied "mail" order (quotes around mail because it hasn't been Mail order since, like 2000?) and the TicketMaster onsale was a joke. If you didn't have 6 computers running consecutively on separate T3 lines, you didn't stand a chance. Or if you were a broker. That almost undid me.

So I failed to get tickets to Hampton and I was again, bereft. I couldn't miss the reunion show; I hadn't missed the first reunion show, how on earth could I stand to miss this one?! But, without a solution and multiple thousands of extra dollars and the lack of morals required to buy from a broker, it certainly seemed as though Hampton would go off without me. And in the meantime, Jason made other plans to help run an art show for Jim Pollock (Phish's main poster artist) for that weekend in Miami and it really seemed to be the end of the dream.

Then in January, I got a PM from a friend on a non-Phish message board who had managed to get 2 3-day passes to the shows. Turns out she and her husband couldn't make the shows and they wanted to offer me the tickets for only slightly above face before taking them to eBay.

Well, you can imagine what I did. I'm not even sure I got through the entire contents of the PM before yelling out a hearty Hell Yes!

From that point on, everything fell magically into place: Jason's art show plans in Miami fell through due to the cancellation of the Langerado Festival scheduled the same weekend as Phish's Hampton shows (you had to know that was going to be a problem!) so his anguish at possibly missing the first night (aka The Show) disappeared. Then he came up with a plan to have the art show anyway - in Hampton. Which then resulted in a free hotel room within walking distance of the venue. We found very inexpensive airline tickets to Norfolk, VA from Southwest Airlines. And my boss gave her approval for me to take off the Friday of the first show, asking only that I be back the Monday after the last show (another coworker in my 5-person department had already scheduled off for that Friday and Monday so getting even one of the days off was a gift).

By the time we had reached the seats our friends Jim & Kate saved for us Friday night, we were trembling with equal parts excitement and exhaustion. Jason had spent a hectic three weeks planning an art show from scratch and I had spent three weeks listening to his woes and trying to add insightful advice when I had it. And gotten four hours sleep the night before due to tapas and a Tea Leaf Green show with a friend. But mostly excitement.

Then the moment came: pre-show music faded quickly out, lights instantly down, the moment I had waited for for so long and been so lucky enough to get to experience when others, just as deserving or even moreso than I, were not as lucky. I had my phone out so that some of them could at least know the first song back practically when I did.

Fluffhead. Frickin' Fluffhead. NO WAY! How apropos. How long had people been clamoring for a Fluffhead and apparently, Phish had been listening. I quickly texted the name off and began a very long night of dancing. I had made a deal with myself that I wouldn't sit while Phish was onstage Friday night. Saturday and Sunday weren't part of the deal but my ass had no business cuddling up with a seat at the first show back. And I kept that promise to myself. They played a nearly two-hour first set, which sorely tested the promise, but the music selection and lack of Type II Phish jamming certainly helped. 17 songs were played in that two hours and I tried a mnemonic device to remember them all without the aid of paper or pen but eventually failed. I can remember a little bit still, though:

Fluff divided the chalkdust sample from his stash - aaaaaand that's where I decided to stop being a geek and just enjoy the moment (Fluffhead, Divided Sky, Chalkdust Torture, Sample in a Jar, Stash)

So, anyway, who knew buildings sweated? By the end of the show, the first time I ventured away from our seats up high Page-side, every surface of The Coliseum was moist, if not downright puddled. I avoided falling on my ass the entire weekend long (contributing, of course, to the BWE designation). I can't even do that in real life! Phish is magic. Okay, well lots of other people fell so maybe Phish's magic only extends to me and those with me. Fact is, I stayed upright all three nights and I count that as a resume-worthy achievement.

That first night back at the hotel, we (Jason, Jim & I) further plotted the poster show the next day. The hard work had already been done with the help of our friends Fred, Jewel, Jim M. and his wife Kate who all arrived in Hampton Thursday and could spare the time to help Jason set the stage and plan. But we still needed to plan Jim's room and so, stayed up till 3 a.m. doing so. Leaving us approximately 4 hours of sleep before we had to get up to finish setting up and run the show.

Due to the invisible partner's negligence, Jason had to take on the role of overseer of the whole show so I stepped in to assist Jim in his room. Luckily enough, the questions I fielded that day were ones I knew the answers to and we weren't in need of the particular insight that Jason or another person might have had on some of the pieces. My primary job was simply to take the money and keep the table full of prints, and I like to think I did an excellent job on the first, though I was remiss on the second (I forgot about the stash in the portfolio behind the cardboard until two hours before the show was over). Other than that, though, it was a very successful day for all the artists involved.

The show wrapped up late, as we knew it would, so we had to rush to break down Jim's room in order to get to the show on time with a little time to rest between - we had all been on our feet since 8:30 that morning. We made it in time, we found seats with some friends who had a nearly head-on view of the stage, and I enjoyed much of Saturday night's show sitting down, without any guilt. It was a great show and there were several parts I couldn't help but stand and dance, but there were several parts that made it easier for me to justify sitting down and resting my very tired feet.

Walking out of the Saturday night show, we stumbled upon a scene straight out of a nightmare: a group called the Nitrous Mafia from Philadelphia has lately become a gritty fixture at concerts and festival in the East and Midwest. They have backpack versions of nitrous tanks and can pick up and set down shop on an empty patch of earth and everywhere they land, wastoids follow. Saturday night, we chose the wrong path back and ended up walking right through a crowd of balloon-sucking shufflers, hisses of tanks and carnie calls snaking out into our path from the left and right. Jason grabbed my hand and veered us off the path and out of the uselessness and into some streetlights and we both made a mental note not to walk that way again. Wah-wahs make people dangerous.

Nearing our hotel, we met up with Jim and all expressed our great hunger so we ventured over to the Waffle House in our hotel parking lot and ended the day with some late night grease.

The next morning, we -gasp!- slept in. It was awesome. The bed in the hotel was very comfy. And yea, we did have to wake up to an alarm but not one set for two or four hours later. We managed to get a good seven to eight hours sleep and that was juuuuuuuuust fine.

We met our friends Fred & Jewel at the tavern across the street for lunch and ended up running into just about everyone else we knew, to boot. There we made our plan. Jason and Jim would go sell Jim's remaining prints in the parking lot and Fred, Jewel and I would go grab a spot in line and go for great seats. After I ran back to the room to get some necessities, we walked over.

By Sunday, the security working the lines had their job down. Friday it was pure chaos, Saturday, it was approaching some semblance of order and Sunday it was a no-brainer. We joined the left-most line and enjoyed a warm day in the shade.

Once it got close to doors opening, the order began to disintegrate a little. People from the back or people who hadn't been in line at all, attempted to move forward and circumvent those of us who had been waiting but we were ready. We heckled, jeered and outright blocked most of the rudeness coming forth. But when it came right down to it, trying to get good seats at a Phish show is no different than trying to get home in rush hour in a timely manner - you have to be out for yourself and you have to be willing to move past the slow people in order to get what you desire. I grabbed a guy I knew had been in front of me in line and told him I didn't mean to cut him off so he better keep moving but everyone else, especially the group of kids who successfully cut in ahead of us, I swept past. In this day and age, niceness is a luxury if you ever want to succeed. Sad but true.

And thanks to this attitude, both Jewel and I found perfect seats and it was up to Fred to choose which ones were more perfect. Jewel's seats won but I got the story:

Running in I saw a whole front row in the lowest seating Page-side and one large, shirtless guy guarding it. Now, chances are, he was trying to save the whole row, but it couldn't hurt to try, right? So I run down there and when he sees me, he pushes his hairy chest out and bumbles over.

"These are saved!" he bellows.

"You're saving a whole row?"

"They're saved! Move on."

"No, it's a whole row."

"I've been here since 2:30, get out!"

"Doors just opened, Dude. You obviously haven't been here since 2:30."

You can see where this is going. I'm like a little Yorkshire Terrier who thinks she's a German Shepherd; it makes life interesting. I'm not afraid of a fight because I'm not afraid of a little pain. That night, the only thing I was even slightly afraid of was getting mediocre seats when I'd had them the last two nights. That's what finally got me out of there with a "You're a fucking asshole you Goddamn prick, hope you fall headfirst - can't be any worse, right?" thrown over my shoulder loudly for good measure.

To his credit, he didn't chase me and kick my ass - the seats were that good!

So, Jewel's super spectacular seats were close enough that Jason & I could finally see the band's faces (Fred & Jewel had Rail first night so they enjoyed the seats). I do wish we'd put more effort into good seats on Friday night but at least we got them Sunday. At least I got the chance to see just how much fun the guys were having and how sincere their thanks was. All the joy we felt out in the audience, Trey and Page and Mike and Fish felt onstage.

So they opened that night with one of my favorite songs, a tongue-in-cheek older tune called Sanity and closed with one of my favorite songs, Tweezer Reprise, a call-back to the first night when they played Tweezer. By the time the last song finished, I was finished. I can't imagine having the energy I had in my younger days to go from show to show, spending all day in a car and all night at a show. Those were many, many years ago.

So, after three days and thirteen hours of sleep (4+7+2=Oy), what I hoped would be a good time but not the same as it ever was, was a BWE and I can't wait to go back. Farewell paycheck, farewell vacation days. I hope you saw enough of me in the last four-and-a-half years, Family 'cause if they ain't coming to your town, I'm probably not either.

The Boys are Back.

(my husband's video of the making of the official poster and some of the lot scene, including Pollock miracling a birthday phan)

Me Music Part II

Having had my eyes opened by The Dead and how much fun really great, live music can be, the next summer I joined my friends in getting tickets to see the Jamband heir apparent, Phish for one show at Alpine Valley in Wisconsin. We had all been listening to Phish for a few years thanks to the intriguing cover art on Rift, but most of us hadn?t yet seen them live and I wanted to have an experience like the one I?d had with the Dead at Soldier Field.

Alpine Valley is a ski slope in the winter and the trek between the parking lot and pavilion seats is steep ? down into the show, back up at the end when your energy has been completely drained from dancing through two sets. My friend and I were just leaving the beer platform at the border of lawn and pavilion seating when the band took the stage, and I have the most wonderfully vivid memories of taking long, smooth strides down the steep slope to our seats to the beginning notes of My Friend, My Friend.

At the end of the night, after having had the single best time to that point in my life, I realized that the Grateful Dead was just a very wonderful warm-up act for me. I came home from the concert completely rejuvenated and ready to hop on tour.

At the time, I lived in a three-bedroom with three friends from college, one of whom has a fascination with all things shaman. He had a set of animal medicine cards and profiled each of us with them, much as a Tarot reader profiles a client.

I don?t recall each of the individual animals that made up my profile ? perhaps *pt* does? ? but the reading as a whole was pretty spot-on in many ways and my totem animal, the Lizard, was damn accurate for who I was at that time. The card reads as such:

___________________________________________________

Lizard sat lolling in the shadow of a big rock, shading himself from the desert sun. Snake crawled by, looking for some shadow to coil up in and rest. Snake watched Lizard for awhile as Lizard's eyeballs went side to side behind his enormous closed lids. Snake hissed to get Lizard's attention. Slowly Lizard's dreaming eyes opened and he saw Snake.
"Snake! You scared me! What do you want?" Lizard cried.
Snake spit his answer from his forked tongue. "Lizard, you are always getting the best shadow spots in the heat of the day. This is the only big rock for miles. Why don't you share your shade with me?"
Lizard thought for a moment, then agreed. "Snake, you can share my shade spot, but you have to go to the other side of the rock and you must promise not to interrupt me."
Snake was getting annoyed. He hissed, "How could I bother you Lizard? All you are doing is sleeping."
Lizard smiled knowingly. "Oh Snake, you are such a silly serpent. I'm not sleeping. I'm dreaming."
Snake wanted to know what the difference was, so Lizard explained. "Dreaming is going into the future, Snake. I go to where future lives. You see, that is why I know you won't eat me today. I dreamed you and I know you're full of mouse."
Snake was taken aback. "Why Lizard, you're exactly right. I wondered why you said you would share your rock."
Lizard laughed to himself. "Snake," he said, "you are looking for shade and I am looking for shadow. Shadow is where the dreams live."
Lizard medicine is the shadow side of reality where your dreams are reviewed before you decide to manifest them physically. Lizard could have created getting eaten by Snake if he had so desired.

Lizard is the medicine of dreamers. Whether dreamers smoke you or dream you, dreamers can always help you see the shadow. This shadow can be your fears, your hopes, or the very thing you are resisting, but it is always following you around like an obedient dog.
___________________________________________________

Not long after the Phish concert at Alpine Valley, during the days of my roommate T blasting Phish everyday for a couple of hours after work, I first heard the song The Lizards. This was one of the songs comprising Gamehenge, a rock epic written by the lead guitarist for his college thesis.

Not surprisingly, given the elevated levels of my ego, I quickly adopted this song as My Song. Of course, in doing so, I had to ignore lines such as:

The Lizards were a race of people
Practically extinct from doing things
Smart people don?t do

Which isn?t at all difficult to do when the band stops singing and starts into the melody of the last third of the song. Like Harry Hood, like Divided Sky, like so many other songs they have written that don?t depend on the 3-refrain formula, the melody makes the entire song. Whereas the Dead excelled in poetry, Trey Anastasio?s gift is clearly in the notes between the poetry.

I have the most amazing time behind closed eyes at those moments.

The song is one of the rarer songs to catch at a show but I have lucked out and caught it twice, once at a show I brought my Mom to, which I thought was very nice of them. While I don?t feel much like a Lizard anymore, I still feel like the song is My Song and if they were to bust it out at the upcoming Hampton shows next weekend (starting a week from today EEEEEEEEEEEE), I would count myself even luckier than I already am.

Music to My Ears

Our air conditioning is out. Well, not out, per se, but not entirely working, let's say. The ... people ... who put together our condos weren't exactly working on all cylinders (that's me being nice) and so made it practically impossible to reach the filters for our air conditioner. They (the filters) are supposed to be changed 2x a year, we've been here since March, 2005 and this is the first time we've realized we can't reach them because they (the cylinder-less nincompoops - that's me being less nice - that built these condos) put riveted obstacles in the way - to the point where we will have to pay to get these things replaced. It's 86 degrees out there today. Oy.

* * * * * * * * *

On an entirely different subject (I just thought I'd mention the above paragraph so you got a good picture of my environment), I have been inspired to write a post about one of the things closest to my heart: music. But first, let me put some on so I can get further inspired ...

Mmmm Vampire Weekend, hell yea ... let's go.

We'll start with my favorite band of all time and no surprise because in this, I am as normal as a heartbeat: The Beatles. Seriously people, this IS rock music. Everything stems from The Beatles and [rant]don't give me that shit about Elvis or -god forbid- The Rolling Stones. I am firmly in JohnPaulGeorgeRingo camp and couldn't care less about MickDruggie1Druggie2Invisibleman1Invisibleman2 - the Stones would never have left London if not for the initial Invaders: The Beatles.[/rant]

The Beatles are the best selling group in musical history, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame could have been built on them alone. They enjoyed only one year of success in England before exploding into America and starting an audio revolution that would never again (yet) be rivaled. With the exception of Yellow Submarine, every album The Beatles released both in the UK and US held the #1 sales positions for multiple weeks. Between 1962 and 1970, The Beatles songs grew from short, Pop-py sing-a-longs to wandering, mind-bending exercises in existentialism - pretty much, as they grew so did their music ... and so did their audience. A young girl who might have screamed her entire way through a concert in 1964 would later be tripping face to "Dear Prudence" or "I Am the Walrus" as she enjoyed the farther reaches of her wild oats. I believe that is one of the most amazing legacies of The Beatles, that they could grow with their fans and avoid being looked upon as "a band I liked when I was young" of which there are SO MANY. And that they could then speak so clearly to those fans' children, of which I am one.

Despite all the great new bands I've been exposed to and fallen in love with in the years since I first built my appreciation for The Beatles, I will always consider them my favorite because they will always be the best. They are the Michael Jordan of rock and roll.

Holding the second spot in my heart, and a close second at that, is Phish. For this one I have my college friends to thank. One friend brought over the album "Rift" one night in our last week at school. He bought it for the album art and thank God for great album art because Phish pretty much defined my 20s and early 30s and has infiltrated so many parts of my life, I'd be a completely different person otherwise. I think some people find something a little pathetic about that statement but really, it is no different than saying a god or a faith defines you: it's all subjective, it's all opinion and it's all individual to the person and therefore nobody else's business to judge. I am defined by my faith and that is in music and not in air.

All-in-all, I've seen many Phish shows. We'll leave it at that. I could count them down (I have before, I've forgotten before) but the count is for competition purposes only. "Many" is as good a count as any.

My first Phish show was 8/10/1996 at Alpine Valley, WI. It was the first Phish show for many of my friends and, unbeknownst to me at the time because I hadn't yet met him, my husband. The experience and music both had such an amazing impact on me that I came ->thisclose<- less than a week later to heading to Plattsburgh, NY - ticketless and solo - for the tour-ending Clifford Ball Festival. I had my boss on-call, I had a ride from Detroit to NY - I was missing the ride from Chicago to Detroit and that, in the end, was what undid my plans. I still regret that.

Until their quote-unquote end in 2004, I based most of my vacations and family visits around Phish shows which makes me a bad daughter, I know. But they were THAT important to me. I met Jason because of Phish. And when they return (note the when and not if), I will find a way. Despite the facts that I'm in a new job now with a much stricter vacation policy and that we have goals now that require savings accounts and that the economy is such that both driving and flying are financially tough ... I will find a way.

In the meantime, I am satisfying myself with new music that excites me and makes me wish - just a little - that I was in high school now and therefore didn't look quite so silly as a thirty-something woman blasting The Killers or The Raconteurs in public. I have three favorite stations programmed on my car radio that fulfill most of my needs when not on commercial: WDRV for its devotion to the 60s and 70s (and sometimes 80s but only the good 80s), Q101 for its love of the Alternative (which is now mainstream, of course, as alternative must always become one day) and XRT for the blend of both and some new stuff to boot. XRT introduced me to Vampire Weekend which I started playing at the beginning of this (went through that self-titled album then onto Yellow Submarine during The Beatles portion of this posting and now I'm into The Killer Hot Fuss for what probably should be the wrap-up since I am supposed to do other things today).

All-in-all, I would say that of all art forms - even writing, says the writing major - I find more comfort and a Home in music. Some songs can tell a great story while other songs can influence a heartbeat and give my restless toes something to do. When I was younger, I went everywhere with my walkman (yes, I know that is a brand name but, like xerox and tivo, it has become the term for all in its category and, while I never owned a brand-name Walkman, I did own several of its competitors) and I couldn't even begin to impress upon you how exciting it was for me to graduate to a portable cd player and let's just say that my iPod is my 2nd best friend (behind Jason, of course) and, despite a 60 GB capacity, is nearly full with so much not yet on it. I like music too much for 60 GB to properly express.

There is music I dislike, certainly: a flat twang or an overplayed song (cough-stairway-cough) or what I call noodling which is a state of guitar-play in which the tune meanders hither and thither without actually going anyplace, and the only noodling I will put up with is Trey Anastasio because I know that eventually, he will go somewhere.

But for the most part, music is one of those subjects that I like to keep an open-mind on because I don't want to miss the best stuff each era has to offer by being mired up to the knees in my own era. My inspiration on this is my own mom who opened herself up to my music when I was a teenager and even though I won't have a child to do the same for me, I think I will succeed just fine on my own.

Rothbury (This One's Long and I Mean It)

I’ve been having a difficult time describing my experiences this past weekend at Rothbury so I will borrow the words from a headline I found online:

Rothbury: Summer Camp for Adults

We arrived on Thursday, about 2 or 3 in the afternoon. According to the signs on the highway, the next two exits led to the festival so we took the second exit and watched in our rearview mirror as all the rest of the cars behind us took the first. I don’t know if the first exit led to a line as I’ve experienced at past music festivals (Phish’s Big Cypress at 15 hours and Coventry at 14 hours to name a couple) but the second exit was clear sailing all the way through to the security line. Past that we hit a line of cars about a mile long and coasted at a nice clip for less than fifteen minutes into what looked like the Day Camping area on the map we had just been given. That is where they directed us to park and put up camp. I was behind the wheel so I gave myself as much extra space between our car and the one in front of us – now parked to our left - as they would allow – our tent is large enough to have closets so a measly two-to-three feet between the cars wouldn’t suffice.

Turns out the car to our left held only the driver, who had every intention of moving her car to wherever her group of friends was parked as soon as they could send her the emissaries to guide her there. Within another fifteen minutes, we had a good seven-to-nine feet of space between us and our neighbors: the Georgia Boys.

It took us about an hour to get our living tent and our bathroom tent (port-a-johns be damned!) set up, our clothing in the living tent’s closets, the bed inflated (manually) and sheeted, the cooler squared away and the bags that held everything thrown into the back seat of the car at which point we began making friends with the Georgia Boys.

Let me just say, there is something about southern young men and their impeccable manners that makes even the most cynical of people generally happy with society. If these young men had come from anyplace other than the South, their boisterousness would most likely have bothered me at some point during the weekend. But that accent, and the individuals themselves … we clearly won the camping neighbor lottery again.

It become clear as the first day wore on, that our campsite was a makeshift campsite, originally intended to only hold the cars of the people coming for the day and not staying through the night, but heavy downpours the day and night before flooded some of the intended camping areas and so the organizers had to improvise. We initially thought we got stuck with a very short straw when we thought the walk to the festival grounds entrance was a good 30-45 minutes but we took a closer look at the map after taking that long walk one time and realized that there was an entrance to the festival grounds just outside our camping area and that’s when we knew the second exit off the highway had been a smart move.

That first day, we took care of some poster-related errands as well as some exploring and that evening, we entered the festival grounds for the first time.

From our entrance (noted on the map at top), we could go to the right and experience the raves and discos and yoga sessions (2 hour-long sessions in the morning: Spiritual Gangsta Yoga) at the Tripolee Domes or go further and wonder at the giant art installation of flying monkeys (more on that later) or step into the giant tent coined The Establishment for environmental discussions and music or even head outside the main entrance near there and hit the General Store for replenishment.

After checking out some of the sights to the right, we took a left from where we first entered and headed to the Ranch Arena, the smallest of the three main stages, but not small by any stretch of the imagination. We caught the last few songs of the Zappa Plays Zappa set and decided to move on and catch the Mickey Hart band. We took a right out of the Ranch Arena area and walked under a banner proclaiming Welcome to the Sherwood Forest. The surrounding pine trees were entirely branchless up to about 20 feet, plentiful and seemingly-ordered in rows to the sides and between the two paths running parallel through the forested area. In various clearings, the Rothbury crew had built large onion-looking pods for people to sit in and chill. (It’s funny, I’ve heard many different names for these “gathering pods” and they are all food-related: one girl called them the big pumpkins, someone else called them the Apples and I think they look like Onions with open segments for people to walk through.) In addition to the Onions, the crew had randomly strung up dozens of hammocks between the trees for intense relaxation. Unfortunately, you had to be a very lucky person to get some swing time on one of them and we had no such luck all weekend long.

About halfway through the Mickey Hart set, we headed back through the forest to catch the Disco Biscuits set. By this point, the sun had gone down (10:30pm sunsets in the middle of summer in north Michigan) and both forest paths were lit up with an abundantly imaginative display of lighting and suspended, black-lit installations that held everyone’s attention (resulting in a lot of collisions and apologies). At that moment, I realized that the long weekend would be well worth the unusually pricey ticket; they aimed to blow every other festival out of the water.

Once we reached the Ranch Arena stage area, we headed up to the sound booth to meet up with a couple friends taping the show. I enjoyed some of the Bisco set but I don’t do very well in crowded situations so after a few songs, I talked Jay into walking out of the crowd with me and finding some food. Various food booths were operated at the perimeters of each main stage field so we found one at the edge of the Ranch Arena that looked good, grabbed our food and drinks and sat down at one of the picnic tables and enjoyed our meal as the Biscuits played.

After we ate, we decided to head back to the Sherwood Court stage to hear a little of the Railroad Earth set but then, once we were there, we realized we were totally bushed and should head back to camp. After a few nights of little sleep and everything we had to do to get ready to go (as well as me getting ready to be unemployed and then employed again), we needed to get a good night in before the sun warmed the tent too much to sleep anymore.

So we ended up back at the camp a little early that night – about 1am. With the campsite so close to the festival grounds, we were rocked to sleep by the remaining Disco Biscuits set.

The next day, Friday, Independence Day, we woke up and joined the Georgia Boys for some early morning beers and conversation. Rothbury and its temporary citizens enjoyed a virtually cloudless sky all weekend so we lathered on the sunscreen and trekked to the first gig of the day at The Establishment, the colorful tent near the main entrance. They were broadcasting a weekly radio show called eTown on NPR from the tent that day with musical guest Michael Franti & Spearhead. We weren’t able to be there for long, though; the floor of the tent was covered in hay and Jason’s allergies began attacking almost immediately. Once the host requested that everyone turn off their cell phones and anything else that might make interruptive noise, we realized that Jason’s sneezing might be too invasive for the live taping.

We walked back to the campsite for a brief visit but then headed back in to the Ranch Arena stage to catch the Tea Leaf Green set that was about to start. I have been grooving on TLG for a couple of years now and am always psyched to see them play – they were a must-catch-set for me and they did not disappoint.

We left the TLG show a little early to head over to The Odeum, the largest of all the main stages where the biggest shows would occur. We wanted to catch some of The Wailers and get decent seating for the Snoop Dog set, sure to pack the field. The walk between the Ranch Arena and The Odeum is a solid fifteen minute hike through Sherwood Forest and beyond. Over the course of the exciting long weekend, we put some serious mileage on our feet.

I enjoy The Wailers very much; I think Bob Marley’s music is some of the very best music there is, and the legacy he left behind in his children and their love for his music is a gift to all the rest of us. When they began playing those first notes to “Three Little Birds”, the first song played after our Jamaican wedding ceremony, I couldn’t help but to tear up while looking over at my handsome husband. Never fails.

We waited through the 45 minute changeover from The Wailers to Snoop, watching as the largest field began to actually fill up. Snoop drew one of the largest crowds the entire weekend and no surprise: Gin ‘n Juice and Lodi Dodi off the Doggystyle album are mainstays in so many different collections. While we waited, the video camera on a large, rotating boom kept focusing on shoulder-riding girls with flimsy tops who didn’t even think twice before baring their breasts on the large screens to either side of the stage. Meh, different strokes for different folks. The next day, the camera found a couple shoulder-riders who politely refused to show their breasts to a bunch of strangers so, thankfully, not every shoulder-rider is a Girls Gone Wild wannabe.

Snoop arrived onstage right about 4:20 riding a totally tricked-out, adult-sized tricycle. His set was as bawdy as it could be and he pulled out a really nice Gin ‘n Juice early on. Three songs in (around 4:30) he called out for an onstage 4:20 break at which point, he took an onstage 4:20 break. He pulled out some new tunes which were a little too R & B for me but it was cool, he can sing too.

We left a few minutes before Snoop’s set ended and headed up to the Tripolee Domes at the other end of the festival grounds to catch a band we knew from Chicago that had won their spot on the Rothbury lineup. Casting Spells consists of a bass and guitar player and the music was pretty good although I miss a drumbeat. The bass player is a friend of a friend that we had met on a few occasions but we barely recognized him since he chopped off his long hair. We did a little catching up afterwards and he gave Jason a poster that he’d brought, hoping we’d be there.

As we were already in the neighborhood, we took the opportunity to head over to the General Store and pick up some necessities and not-so-necessities to take back to the campsite. We hadn’t brought a whole bunch of food since I had been at a loss as to what to bring without having a method to cook. Of course, once there, I recalled all the good things you can bring to camp that don’t require cooking but I didn’t remember any of them when it counted: before we left. So we picked up some snack-y type food at the General Store so we could nosh at home and not have to pay for every bite to eat.

When we got back to the campsite, we met up with the Georgia Boys who were getting ready to leave but had something for us: a steak and marinated, grilled peppers. The steak was delicious but the peppers were something completely out of this world. They gave me the recipe: equal parts vinegar, jerk sauce and evoo, marinade the peppers for 3 days and then grill them till they char. Oh hell yes I will! Gotta love the Georgia Boys.

We didn’t spend too much time back at camp; Jon Fishman was sitting in with Yonder Mountain String Band and we didn’t want to miss the first Phish sighting of the weekend!

I will admit, I do like me some bluegrass music. Perhaps it stems from my father’s love of torturing me with country music in the pre-Walkman days or maybe I just started liking it when I started seeing Leftover Salmon but either way, I was almost as excited for YMSB as I was to see Fishman for the first time since Coventry, if I remember correctly.

Unfortunately, we didn’t catch a whole lot of YMSB, having spent too much time gorging ourselves on steak and peppers. Once we got there, we thread out way through the crowd so we could get close enough to see Jon behind his kit. It was nice to see him again.

After YMSB gave their final bows, we joined the crowd heading from the Ranch Arena stage into Sherwood Forest on the way to the Odeum stage for the two Widespread Panic sets. Our friends were taping this show too, so we headed immediately up to the sound booth to meet up with them.

I don’t usually go crazy for Widespread … I’ve send them several times at several festivals (only once or twice on their own) and they just don’t do it for me. I think they’re talented and I know they have a million fans who adore them but I can’t ever remember a single song of theirs like I can with so many other bands. Nothing gets stuck going round and round in my head. The same could be said for this show. I enjoyed myself while there, danced a lot and had a great time but please don’t ask me what they played or even to hum a little bit because I can’t remember. Nothing got stuck.

Between sets, we headed back to the Ranch Arena stage to catch a little bit of the Of Montreal set because Jason had heard a little bit by them and wanted to check them out. We weren’t there very long – turns out he didn’t really like their music like he thought he would although I was kind of digging on it – but I clearly remember a strange stage show with kids dressed up in strange costumes flitting all about the stage. After a couple songs we headed back to the Odeum to catch the second set of Widespread.

As Widespread left the stage after the second set, we saw the first fireworks pop overhead. Rothbury put on a decent fireworks show – not nearly as great as July 3^rd, Taste of Chicago fireworks but pretty good. I saw some new spectacles in the sky that night – amazing how fireworks can assume familiar shapes when the wind is low. I bet the Chinese never envisioned that level of progress to their invention.

Once the fireworks were through, we headed over to the Sherwood Court to catch a little of Thievery Corporation. I saw them at Lollapalooza 2006 and really enjoy their music so I was happy to make a stop to see them here for a little bit. I was pretty tired so while I liked the little bit of Thievery Corporation that we saw, I was ready to head up to the Ranch Arena stage and catch the much-anticipated Primus set.

Primus is one of those bands that likes to add a lot of spectacle to their shows, often in the form of large balloon-like figures on the stage as they play. At Rothbury, they played an amazing set in front of two gigantic, inflatable astronauts. I love Les Claypool on bass; while I think Mike Gordon of Phish is an incredible bass player, Les Claypool sounds like no other bassist and gives Primus a unique twang that people love so much.

Eventually, it was time to head home and get some sleep. We did not get to go to sleep to the strains of Primus that night as they ended their set before our heads hit the pillows.

The next day, Saturday the 5^th, was a day we planned to explore and enjoy the non-musical elements of Rothbury. There weren’t many bands playing that day that thrilled us and we felt there was so much of Rothbury we still hadn’t seen.

We put on our bathing suits and headed out to Big Wildcat Lake, just beyond the Ranch Arena stage area. The weather was hot and humid so we thought it would be phenomenal to cool off in a lake. And it would have been … if the lake hadn’t been half mud and entirely too gross to swim in (which didn’t stop me from swimming in it for a little while.) The problem was that the line for the shower afterward was very long and getting longer with all the line-cutters. We didn’t have the time to stand there all day for me to wash off the mud that was lining the inside of my bathing suit so I had to wash off with wet wipes later at the camp and deal with being a little dirty for the remainder of the festival.

After cleaning off back at the campsite and sitting around a little while enjoying the sun (which I enjoyed far too much according to my lobster-tinged skin), we headed out first to the Ranch Arena stage to catch the last few songs of Gomez (introduced to them by The O.C. … what hasn’t that show taught me??) and then to the Sherwood Court stage to catch Medeski, Martin & Wood before heading back to the campsite to wait out the Dave Matthews set. We still ended up hearing it from our campsite and that was fine, but neither of us really wanted to brave the crowds to listen. We even had the time to grab a nap since we knew we wanted to stay up super late.After the naps, we re-entered the festival grounds and stopped by the Ranch Arena to check out the Sound Tribe Sector Nine set. I had never been a very big Sound Tribe fan; I saw them last summer at Camp Bisco in Mariaville, NY and I left their set unimpressed but I knew so many people who thought they were the greatest band since Phish so I keep giving them chances. And this time it caught. I don’t know why I never really liked them, this time I really liked them.

After a few songs, we decided to head down the to Sherwood Court stage to see The Crystal Method which was the reason we took our naps in the first place. I knew nothing about this band so imagine my surprise when I realized it wasn’t a band, but rather a set of DJs. They spun hardcore techno music in combination with a crazy light show – it was the perfect late-night party.

After awhile, we decided it was time to head back to the Sound Tribe show and get some food and then head back to camp. On the way back to camp, we detoured slightly and headed over to see the Flying Monkeys, an art installation named Homouroboros, at night. When we saw them during the day, it was merely a static sculpture, strange to be sure but the point was hard to make without the motion. So we went back this night to see it in action and it was amazing. The amount of thought that went into that piece – let’s not even discuss the architecture and process – is mind-boggling. Jason has great pictures both static and in action as well as an excellent description on his page of the meaning and action into it; check out Jason's post

Once back at camp, we ran into one-half of the Georgia Boys sitting around and enjoying the late night so we joined them. The other half came back within an hour with 2 girls in tow and the group of us pretty much stayed up till sunrise.

The Final Day.

Sunday was Trey Day, as far as I was concerned. I was unconcerned with any music until 4:15, which was Trey’s starting slot. We started out the day lazing around and then we decided to make a decision about whether we would leave that night or the next morning and that decision-making process took awhile and then we made the decision we would leave that night so the rest of the afternoon we had to kill was devoted to packing up. In the end, this turned out to be an excellent decision as the very first rain on Rothbury fell that night after we left and according to some people, it was pretty violent and made for a muddy pack-up the next day.

So, fully packed and ready to rock the hell out before rocking the hell back home, we walked into the festival grounds for the last time and headed to the very end, the Odeum stage.

Our friends were set up in front of the sound booth so we laid down an extra blanket with them and watched the end of the set before Trey: Rodrigo y Gabriela. Amazing … Phenomenal guitarists. No other instruments, just their two guitars and if you remember, I’m the person that needs a drumbeat? Well they played the drumbeat on the face of their guitars. Fantastic, I would definitely see them again! Got me right into the mood and anxious for Trey’s acoustic set.

So Trey comes out, he’s looking so healthy and happy. Watery blue eyes, face that should be under a hat brim in that sun and a smile as wide as they come. Of course, I instantly start tearing up. I had hoped that his legal troubles would put a fear of something in him and maybe they have because he seems not only on top of his game, but so happy to be playing in the first place. I will say that I wasn’t over-the-top impressed with his set but I was happy with it and when he brought Mike out (Mr. Purple Pants, himself – dude, you’re a guy … no purple pants, no), I was very happy and when he introduced a new song and followed up the introduction with “If only we could find a drummer and keyboard player. But it’s got to start with the songs, so you can be our test audience.” … oh yea, I was over-the-moon ecstatic. He ended it and he wants it to start back up. Hells yea!

The first new PHISH song was a nice little piece called “Backwards Down the Number Line”; I liked it, Mike seemed to enjoy playing it (Mr. Purple Pants and his boppy head). Tom Marshall wrote it and sent it to Trey for his birthday, I thought it was a lovely present.

The second new PHISH song was called “Alaska”. Catchy, will get caught in people’s heads, was okay – if it gets Phish back together I’ll even say it was amazing, best song ever, but in reality, it was okay. I liked it enough.

The sent ended with a nice little acoustic version of “Chalkdust Torture” – with a similar sentiment to “Backwards Down the Number Line” (Can't this wait till I'm old? Can't I live while I'm young?) at which point, Trey encouraged the audience to head over to the Sherwood Court to catch Mike’s set next and then to come back to the Odeum stage afterwards to see Gov’t Mule. So, we dutifully joined the herd and headed over to the Sherwood Court.

One thing stands out in my mind for the Mike set – as much as I love him, he’s a little too country for me, but there was one little, teeny tiny moment that kinda made me stand up and notice: When Trey AND Fishman joined him onstage for the last song. Okay, yea, it wasn’t a Phish song despite the fact that it was a THREE-QUARTER PHISH REUNION but it was fine because it was a Beatles song and I like them as much as I like Phish so if THREE-QUARTERS of PHISH wants to play a Beatles song instead of a Phish song, that’s fine. My only suggestion is to find that keyboard player and put him to work – I think you might have something then.

To wind this up, after Mike, we headed back over to the Odeum stage for the last 2 shows: Gov’t Mule and Phil Lesh. We ended up catching the last couple of Gov’t Mule songs and then only the first set of Phil before we decided we should get on out so we could make it home before 3am. I very much enjoyed Phil’s first set and would have liked to catch the second and had we not packed that day to leave, I definitely would have finished out Rothbury there but I started a new job a day later and needed the time to recuperate before getting back in the real world.

I had the time of my life at Rothbury: heard some great music, met some wonderful people, got my hopes up for a reunion and came out feeling totally invigorated from the whole experience. The organizers clearly put their best feet forward on this festival and accomplished some amazing things. Things that I’ll take away from the festival:

• The green can is for compost, the orange can is for landfill and if you’re not sure, ask the person wearing the pink ONE shirt next to the cans
• You can dance to music or you can hula hoop to music or you can do both and look really, really, really cool
• Marinated, grilled peppers are my new favorite veggie
• A case of Bud Light should NOT cost $35
• Don’t swim in Big Wildcat Lake. Just don’t.
• Bring shade, shade is good
• Get into the festival grounds when they open and grab the hammock and don’t let go until the day is done. Everyone else is and when in Rothbury…Buy tickets early next year because you are definitely going!

For amazing pictures and videos of the festival, visit Jason’s page