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Another Successful Rothbury.  

Rothbury 2009 was another big hit.
Lots of music, more organized staff, better flow of traffic, and most importantly an overall awesome festival. I don't think that anyone who was there would disagree that Madison House knows how to throw a PARTY!!! Rothbury has now twice been the Best festival of the year! Here is my top ten list of what happened at Rothbury. (Please note, due to personal and family business, I left the festival on Sunday at 2 pm... so I missed Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan, Matisyahu, Yonder, and a few other things that I may have otherwise included on this list).  

10) The Wood burning Pizza  Vendor who made the best festival Pizza I have ever had
9) Meeting Jason Hann (percussionist for SCI)
8) The Disco Biscuits Late night set
7) Sherwood Forest (Nuff Said... pics and video to come) 
6) The FANTASTIC SCI Set, with lots of visual affects to go with the music (like the huge red balloon)
5) checking out the LEBO Live Painting show, and getting him to sign one of his prints... ( i love the guy... what can I say)
4) The Dead playing my first Loose Lucy!!!
3) Brett Dennen Set (including the Billy Gene cover, and then meeting him) (video and pics coming)
2) The Saturday night Umphrey's McGee set (i was 4th row from the front) (pics to come)
1) Seeing the String Cheese Incident Sound check on Thursday with another 50 or so lucky people (pics and video coming)
 

Here are a few things I think Rothbury could improve for next Year...   Water stations that don't taste like dirty laundry water Not Charging $125 for the posters ( the $85 last year really pissed me off, but this was outrageous) Having moe. at Rothbury Building a Rothbury Blackberry Application (i was so jealous of people with iPhones)   Over All its clear that Rothbury is the overwhelming AWESOME festival right now. I am already looking forward to next year. Over the next few days I am going to post Video and pictures of some of the things that happened. So stay tuned, and here are a few things to wet you appetite! Enjoy

Have I mentioned I love the Rothbury festival lately?

You need to check out their website. There are contests to help make Rothbury a more enjoyable experience as a festival goer, as well as fantastic prizes.

The line-up is insane!!! The Dead, Dylan , Willie, Bisco, Cheese, Les, STS9, Macpodz (from Michigan), Brett Dennen, and so many more.

Check out my Rothbury page to see links, news, and more of what is to come.

Searching for the sound, Living with the dead, and The Illustrated Dead are probably the most well known Grateful Dead books out there. I have two copies of Searching for the Sound (one I bought and one was a gift).  But to get through those books you pretty much need to be a Deadhead. No one who isn’t really into the band and loves the music would sit through hundreds of pages of rambling about a band they don’t like.

Even as a deadhead it takes me time to get through a book like The Illustrated Trip or as I like to call the book “a PhD in GD”.

 

Along comes Michelle Hollow and she writes a book called “Grateful Dead, What a Long, Strange Trip Its Been”, intended to introduce young people and teens to the music and the people of the Dead. In 88 pages Michelle give newcomers a full history lesson, including references to all the members in all the different years of the dead, things as obvious in a Dead Biography as Hunter, Dylan, Gans, Kesey, and Kerouac; to obscure things like New Riders of the Purple Sage, Mother McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions, and influence of Miles Davis and John Coltrane on the band.


I am glad that my job is not editing Michelle’s book. Her ability to condense over forty years of music into this book is incredible. With everything I know about the Dead I didn’t feel like it was missing anything. When I asked a friend to read, she read it in one night, and had a good understanding of the dead. This is a great gift for the person you have been telling for years that they need the Dead in their lives, but have never understood what you were talking about. Or for the teenager who wants to understand what Mom and Dad have ranting about for all these years. This book is a perfect intro to a band that will suck you in and make you want to get the PhD. 

Last night I was at a hockey game with my wife and a bunch of friends (it was a red wings alumni game). After which we were going to go out and have dinner. One of my friends said hey it’s Saturday night. “Let’s go party!!!” Well apparently I am getting old, I found a grey beard-hair this week, and Saturday night fun includes pizza, Saturday night live, and looking forward to getting work done early on Sunday morning.  To which my friend replied… people still watch Saturday Night Live???

Yes the last few seasons have been really good for SNL, I actually Tivo it.

Here is a great clip of them ripping on Michael Phelps haters, and giving a shout out to the Phishheads!!! 

Growing up in the scene where Phish became the king of the jambands, and other bands were who I went to see when Phish wasn’t on tour. I forgot what a personal relationship with a band meant. Don’t get me wrong, back in the day Phish was a family band; from chess games, to the secret language, to Big Ball Jams, to 100K plus attendees at festivals.  Phish slowly moved from very personal relationship with their fans to more than arms lengths away from the fans. Part of this is because as fans we have extremely high demands from our bands, we want access, information, and we want what we want, when we want it.  This is very possibly part of the stress level that led to the bands hiatus numbers one and two. 

I think a lot of today touring bands are somewhere in-between. The Disco Biscuits, moe.Umphreys McGee, and the rest of the community have evolved into hybrid. With taping allowed at the shows, you can still do the trading and or download your music. And there are all sorts of websites to go to get your information. Like Jambase.com, Jambands.com, Home Grown Music Network, Archive.org, and many other resources. What you would have needed insider information yesterday to get. Today it’s easily accessible with the technology.

But there are a few bands that are taking the extra step to get back in touch with the fans.
Using today’s technology to keep that personal relationship with their fans. First off check out Ben Kweller, he is not a traditional Jamband icon, but he is loved by many, myself included. His new CD Changing Horses is coming out on February 12th. He has been using Twitter and other social media to drive people to a video of himself describing the new CD, and telling them about a contest that is coming up that each CD pre-order comes with an opportunity to go to dinner with him. It’s not so much the dinner. But the video is engaging, and it makes you want to know Ben. 

Umphreys Mcgee’s new album Mantis came out last week. And they put control of the bonus material back in the hands of the fans. They said “the more people pre-order the album, the more bonus material comes with it.” I actually got a phone call from a friend telling me it was my responsibility to buy the album so we could all get more material. 


The Disco Biscuits, Dave Matthews, Umphreys, Tea Leaf Green, Ben Kweller and even Jambase have all set up Twitter accounts and regularly let their fans know what’s up, occasional pictures, and some personal information. These bands are using what the fans use, to give them exactly what they want. Call it Brilliant marketing, call it a relationship. Either way, kudos boys: This is how we the fans want to build the relationship.

This summer at the Rothbury Festival in Rothbury Mi. everyone got startling news LeRoi Moore an original member and saxophonist for the Dave Matthews Band had been in an ATV accident just a few days before the show and that Jeff Coffin of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones was going to sit in for him temporarily. 

Being in the media tent at the moment Jeff came in, I got about 4 minuets with him. I learned more about humility, kindness, respect and the love of an instrument in those 4 minuets than I have learned in a very long time. 

Jeff is a Grammy winning saxophone player, with musical influences ranging from the obvious Miles Davis and Ornette Coleman to Radiohead and Allan Lomax (who was better known as a recording artist rather than musician).  Listening to Jeff talk about music is almost as enjoyable as listening to his music. One of the highlights of Rothbury for me was hearing Jeff say “I play music of necessity, stuff that needs to be played”.  Coffin’s talent and skill is unmatched, he takes chances and plays in styles and combinations that other people don’t. His mix of “New Orleans second line, African music, Indian Ragas, folk songs, Alan Lomax field recordings, jazz, or funk," is distinguishable to anyone who knows what a saxophone sounds like. 

On August 19 2008 just 7 weeks after this interview we lost our friend LeRoi Moore due to complications from the accident. He was 46 years old. His band mates, his family, his fans and his music all miss him dearly. Our hearts and prayers are with those who were close to LeRoi.  A fund has been created in honor of LeRoi in support of charities that reflect both his spirit and passion. 

Jeff finished the DMB 2008 tour and has since announced that he accepted a permanent place with the band. Best of Luck Jeff…

Here is a recording of our conversation.