2011 The Year in Review

2011
The Year in Music
Mixed Bags and a Dormant Passion

The music scene in the Great Lakes Bay Region is struggling. Live original music is surviving and occasionally thriving in small pockets as clubs, theatres and bars struggle to stay afloat. It’s like a 9 moving rapidly to a 3 and then jumping back to a 10 - unpredictable. It appears that the shared experiences of venue owners and music fans are held in one symbolic memory. We are all feeling the pull of ennui and confusion sensing that we are living in a state of deficiency that is waiting to be saved. Music and the arts are like a child that’s not really valued and grows up with an innate association to…nothing? It brings us to that part of us that is small and frail. It is the doorway into passion, a sacred place where love and truth are possible. This is our musical vision quest, an integration of mind, body and spirit into a cohesive narrative of the here and now.
That said - 2011 was a great year for music in our local scene!
Andy Reed achieved astonishing success touring as a full-fledged member of the seminal alt-rock band The Verve Pipe. He recorded and toured the USA and Europe with the band and experienced the life of a middle-class rock and roll musician – few make it to that pinnacle of success. Reed was flying higher than eagles fly, drifting toward the canyons of greatness. He was also busy with Reed Recording Studio producing CD’s for such great acts as The Tosspints, Arthur Autumn and his own band American Underdog. The results were spectacular! This trifecta of superbly crafted music led the charge in the Great Lakes Bay region. Reed also helped with Bryan Rombalski’s Two Steps Closer to Zen, a more complicated musical format that incorporated West African, Brazilian, and Indian rhythmic structures. Reed has proved to be a musical chameleon that can bring the best in the artists allowing form to follow spontaneous expression. He records in analogue and produces rich warm sounds. The Tosspints loved the sound so much they released their masterpiece Cenosillicaphobia on vinyl – it’s like sipping on a cup of white chocolate mocha at the Red Eye on a cold winter’s day. Delicious.
Tim Avram released his iconoclastic roots inspired, autobiographical journey into a core wound and an existential reality. In Era of the angry Young Man, Avram opens himself up and welcomes in his own emotional experiences – even if it’s painful. He conveys a sense of “I don’t know who I am.” The songs sound like they were created in a time before the rot set in, a time when people cared about Danny O’ Dell, Avram’s alter ego and the protagonist in this remarkable disc. This is simply the best piece of music released in Mid-Michigan in 2011. It deserves a wider audience.
2011 brought an eagerly anticipated reunion of sixties Michigan rockers The Scott Richards Case (SRC). In the mid to late sixties they were wooed by the Who’s leader Pete Townsend to sign with London’s Track Records. Instead they signed with Capitol Records (home of The Beatles) and released three highly regarded LP’s but never achieved mass popularity. For better or worse SRC wore the mantel as the nation’s first psychedelic band. They performed an outdoor show this past summer and re-created their intricate sound. The sellout crowd roared their approval despite leader Scott Richardson’s diminished vocal power. SRC performed songs from their entire catalog including Black Sheep, Hall of The Mountain King/Bolero, and Checkmate. It was a glorious experience.
November brought the legendary Dick Wagner back to Saginaw after a long absence. He struggled with health problems and was unable to sing or play his guitar for over five years due to the damaging effects of several heart attacks and strokes. We all wondered how Wagner was going to pull it off…but he did – magnificently. The set list spanned his career and included Baby Boy (Bossmen), Sweet Jenny Lee/ Black As Night (Frost), Darkest Hour (Ursa Major), Sweet Jane (Lou Reed), and Only Women Bleed/ Welcome to My Nightmare (Alice Cooper). Wagner was in great voice. He hit the high notes and joked around with the crowd. It was the most significant musical moment in the Great Lakes Bay region in 2011.
Sometimes anatomy does not equal destiny as evidenced by wildly popular bands fronted by talented women; Melissa May/Thunderchickens; Shar Molina/Banana Convention; Calista Hecht/Vagabond Wheels; Ruthy Kwiatkowski/Temporary Limbs. These women lead the pack. Despite the phallocentricity of our society, these talented and daring women have succeeded to make brilliant music. There is no Cinderella Complex limiting their perspective only a coherent view of femininity. A woman who leads a rock & roll band is metaphorically preserving an ancient ritual by means of couvade, the custom whereby the male takes to his bed when the women is having a baby – daddy stays at home while mama rocks.
Local venues such as Bemos, The Vault, Spencers, White’s Bar and the Hamilton Street Pub deserve kudos for keeping music alive. The Red Eye Cafe and Dawning of a New Day also contribute mightily to the cause.
The Great Lakes Bay Region is home to several other great bands that create incredible and original music. Kudos to The Honky Tonk Zeros, Kyle Mayer/Thick as Thieves, Brett Mitchell, Tension Head, Silverspork , Sprout, Brody & the Busch Road Trio, Severe Head Drama, Round & a Distant Few , Laurie Middlebrook, Mandi Layne, Neighborhood Muscle, All For the Cause and Rustbucket. Thank you all for keeping music alive and following your creative impulses!

The National picture is much bleaker for reasons that are at least partially due to ascendance of technology, mass preference for downloading music and the decline and fall of rock radio. Sure the Foo Fighters are keeping the music alive in 2011 with a hard rockin’ disc entitled Wasting Light as well as a retrospective documentary of the band’s illustrious career. Grohl will forever be linked to his former Nirvana band mate Kurt Cobain – a welcome presence as we come to terms with the end of rock & roll as a popular idiom.
REM just released Part Lies Part Truth Part Garbage 1982-2011, an anthology that represents a coda to their career. It is magnificent. The highlights are all there; Man on the Moon, Everybody Hurts, Stand, Losing My Religion just to name a few. They also included three new songs that blend perfectly with the songs on Anthology: We All Go Back to Where We Belong; A Month of Saturdays; and Hallelujah. I remember taking my son and a few of his friends to see REM in Ann Arbor about 15 years ago. Patti Smith made a cameo appearance and danced her ass off. Radiohead opened and they were simply breathtaking. But REM was on top of their game and pulled of a coup d’état despite the brilliance of their supporting cast. I will miss them
Mirror Traffic is the most recent release by Steven Malkmus and the Jinks. It’s a must for any music fan who enjoys literate yet obscure lyrical references The former front man for Pavement has a brand new lease on life with this brilliant, caustic, and hybrid blend of rootsy yet progressive Americana. Beck produced this LP and created a soundscape that is easy to digest with the sing-a-long melodies but is equally frustrating (or compelling) is Malkmus’ tendency to change chord progressions, keys and tempo. I love it. Malkmus has a facility for composing ironic lyrics that reveal everything by saying very little - as in the song Senator in which he combines dioxin poisoning with entitlement:
I know what the senator wants
What the Senator wants is a blow job

Tom Waits released Bad As Me in 2011. It was his first studio album of new music since 2004. About time. Waits is in fine form, his voice is raggedy strong and soulful. He growls, moans, slurs and spits out lyrics like a demented Captain Beefheart. Waits has concocted his most accessible LP to date. The songs are mean and lean and contain a joyousness that comes from creating music with a perspective of a deep soulful truth, even if the songs are melancholy. As Waits tells it, “I’m a sticks and wires guy.” On this LP he does an edgy Eddie Cochran on “Get Lost” and croons like Sinatra on “Downbound Train.” Waits even brought in Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards to sing harmony on “Last Leaf” and play guitar (5 string with open tuning) on a blues rocker entitled “Satisfied.” This disc is a MUST!

Foster the People, an obscure Indie band from Los Angeles, have reached the stratosphere by concocting the biggest hit on the planet, Pumped Up Kicks. It was written and recorded by Mark Foster while working as a jingle writer at Mophonics Studio. The song sounds like a jingle. It has a metronome beat, a catchy upbeat rhythm and a heavy bass line. The sing song singing belie a more ominous meaning to the lyrics. Foster says, “It’s an FU to the hipsters.” Like it or not this is one of the biggest songs of 2011. It is almost irresistible. Take a peek at the lyrics.
Robert’s got a quick hand/He looks around the room/He won’t tell you his plan
He’s got a rolled cigarette/He’s a cowboy kid
Yeah he found a six-shooter gun in his dad’s closet/In the box of fun things
Don’t even know what/but he’s coming for you/Yeah he’s coming for you

All the other kids with the pumped up kicks
Run, better run, out run my gun
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks
You better run, better run, faster than my bullet


There were several notable (and expensive) deluxe editions from various rock legends. The Kinks re-released a deluxe edition of Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire). It was expanded from one to two discs with the addition of several obscure period 45’s. Arthur enjoyed almost unanimous acclaim upon its release in 1969 and became the Kinks calling card back to America. It was initially conceived as a soundtrack to a Granada Television play developed by Julian Mitchell. Alas, the project was never completed so leader Ray Davies simply released it as the next Kinks LP. Rolling stone raved that Arthur was the Kinks finest hour. Another reviewer claimed it was the best British LP of 1969. Unfortunately, Kinks music could never live up to such heavy praise despite its musical integrity. The Kinks were always outrageous, sloppy and spontaneous.

Then Beach Boys released a huge deluxe reissue of lost but not forgotten tapes of the legendary Smile LP - Brian Wilson’s psychedelic masterpiece. Many of the unissued versions of released songs (Good Vibrations, Heroes and Villains, Surfs Up) have been circulating in bootleg circles for the past thirty years or so. It includes vinyl, CD and video as well as a sixty page booklet. It is expensive. I’d love to spend some time with it but I’m convinced I would tire after listening to the 33rd take of Heroes and Villains or the 24th version of Good Vibrations. I might be tempted to do an Elvis all over it. Despite the herculean effort and the loving care of the Beach Boys archivists, it does not uncover the masterpiece amongst the roughage. This is only for the completest.

Bob Seger just released 2-disc retrospective entitled Ultimate Hits. Well, it’s not exactly… ultimate - but it does pack 26 songs on two discs. It touches on Seger’s mega hits from the seventies and eighties including such homegrown anthems as Night Moves, Rock & Roll Never Forgets and Mainstreet. He even included the original 1968 version of Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man. Sweet Justice Jesus. A complete Seger anthology should also include early gems such a Heavy Music, East Side Story,2+2=, Ivory, Lucifer, Back in 72, Rosalie, and Looking Back. This is for the casual fan.

Peace
Bo White

Dick Wagner Live in Saginaw

Dick Wagner
Live @ White’s Bar
November 19th, 2011

It seems that Dick Wagner is a cat with nine lives. He’s a rock & roll Stallone. Just about the time he’s down for the count, he lifts himself up, dusts himself off and puts his dukes up for another around. I hadn’t seen Dick for about 6 years or so and I was struck by his presence. He was confident but self-deprecating, and …well, funny. It was as if he underwent a magical transformation, a rebirthing of his original joy about the world, letting go of a lifetime of being pushed, pinched and driven…dissatisfied. Nowadays, Wagner seems to have accepted his true nature, warts and all. His flaws reveal his divine imperfection and he can now perceive the grace and beauty in the faces of family, friends and fans. Finally, the mystery man can face his demons and remain comfortable in his own skin Wagner’s newfound serenity has given him a true clearness of vision regarding his craft. His music has evolved. It is both grounded and spacious. In this concert performance Wagner casts fate to the wind and trusts his own natural gifts. He let go of his tattered mystery man image and restored himself through the music he created and then altered. The constriction gushed out and energy and harmony returned. Wagner is BACK!
The show started with a few squeals and squawks from an overburdened PA protesting the second night of hard rocking sounds from the exquisite band assembled by the maestro . Wagner was in no hurry and he seemed to enjoy the opportunity to goof around with the crowd and tell stories. A nearby fan was rabidly clicking off photos when Wagner turned around, lifted his lip into crooked Elvis smile and scolded, “You’re stealing my soul; it’s being sucked into the lens of your camera.” The hapless fan was stunned speechless for a brief moment, turned red as a beet, and then laughed, realizing Wagner was yanking his chain.
Wagner has noticeably aged. His hair is pure white and combed back elegantly. He has trimmed down a bit and moves minimally about the small stage. He raps about writing a song with Alice Cooper, sipping sweet nectar on a veranda overlooking a golden beach and the magnificent white-water swell of the ocean. Wagner said it best, “We just hung out on the beach, played golf every morning, and ate steamed clams in the afternoon. It was a stressful life.” He then introduced I Never Cry, “This is a song I wrote with Alice Cooper. It was our biggest hit.” This is spare rendition with just Dick’s voice and guitar. Wagner’s vocal is raspy and strained but he somehow reaches the notes; it is a voice of the ages. He is like Santiago in the Old Man & the Sea, a man who possesses an earthy but dignified wisdom and understands that there is honor in struggle. Wagner’s rugged intonation of the lyrics gives them poignancy, a deeper meaning informed by the years. He is more assured yet achingly vulnerable. Wagner found his voice:
Take away. Take away my eyes
Sometimes I’d rather be blind
Break a heart
Break a Heart of Stone
Open it up
But don’t you leave it alone
Sweet Jenny Lee is a rearranged version of the old Frost chestnut Sweet Jenny Lee that is also re-birthed as a heavy rocker, with a complex chord structure, tempo changes and masterful solos by Wagner and axe man Ray Goodman (SRC, Mitch Ryder). They play off each other like radar, expert timing with just enough space between the lead and the back-fills. This would fit nicely on the brilliant but obscure Ursa Major LP. This is a pop song re-imagined by the maestro as a truly dark, harder edged rocker about a woman that has no conscience. It is slowed down with a syncopated drum riff that drives home the anger that is folded into the lyrics.
Wagner introduced the band - a great band with some real history behind it. Wagner has known guitarist extraordinaire Ray Goodman since their Grande Ballroom days. Prakash John (Parliament/Funkadelics) was Wagner’s bass player on Lou Reed’s Live Animals and Alice Cooper’s Welcome to my Nightmare. Brian Bennett (Cherry Slush) and Al Bodnar have played piano and organ with Wagner for years. Jordan John (Prakash’s son) played drums and Robert Wagner (Dick’s son) sang lead and harmony parts.
It was a family affair.
Dick introduced Black As Night as “a Frost song – one of my favorite Frost songs. This is another re-conceived blast from the past. It follows the original chord structure but the tempo is slowed down and it rocked harder. The heavier arrangement mirrors the despair in the lyrics:
Cold as ice
Looking deep in to your soul
Wonder why we never made the grade
Something always standing in the way
Wagner and Goodman created a space for each other as they penetrate the dharma and build the architecture of the sound. They traded off guitar lines so comfortably, as if they are one unified mind. Wagner recreated the Hey Jude inspired ending of the original 1970 Frost version from the great but underrated LP Through the Eyes of Love.
Back to the Land is a heavy hitter from the Ursa Major catalog. Dick opened it up with a soft guitar line. Robert Wagner took over the lead vocal. His strong emotive tenor is the perfect vehicle to deliver the apocalyptic vision of the lyrics. The images are startling - soldiers fighting, dust settling and cities on fire. This is a heavy metal anti-war anthem that resonates to this day. As war decimates the cities, it is time to get back to the land. Wagner is on top of his game here. He’s playing big notes and fluid runs with perfect tone and execution. The song is complex with abrupt tempo changes, quiet and loud segments that take you around the block. This song is visionary and ahead of its time. It is a tribute to our veterans but was originally conceived as an ode to the Universal Soldier cloaked in respect for our soldiers sacrifice Its an obscure masterpiece. The clear-eyed lyrics tell the story
I Found an answer
I know we can journey from Darkness
Back to the land
Somewhere in the distant mountains
Men died for freedom; died for you and me
Soldiers of fortune empty your hands
Carry your families back to the land

Wagner offered up Sweet Jane, the Rock & Roll Animal” version from his days with Lou Reed. Wagner and Goodman re-created the Wagner/Hunter collaboration with incredible skill, producing majestic full-bodied notes and cascading runs. The band is in the pocket and tight as a sailor’s knot that holds strong and let’s go easy. The incredible tandem guitar opening and superb harmonics introduce the melody line and Robert Wagner’s hip-talking bluesy Lou Reed vocal. Ray Goodman contributed some tasty funky guitar bits - he’s always been a soulful player. Wagner tore it up on the coda to a wildly ecstatic response. It took us back to 1973
Wagner introduced the next song as a “story about growing up in Detroit.” Motor City Showdown is taken from Wagner’s 1978 solo album on Atlantic Records. The LP was an underappreciated gem that was capsized by a meager budget and poor promotion. Wagner’s iconic guitar work is all over this deep-end song like a long dormant passion that is suddenly awakened. It’s a song about violence in the big city. Wagner’s fiery solos scaffold the restlessness and fear in the lyrics. But in the coda, Wagner’s playing is more contemplative and hopeful. His majestic major chord statements suggest that a better world is possible. Wagner is on fire!
The crowd begins chanting Wagner’s name as former Ursa Major bassist Grant West climbed up on the stage. West played with Wagner in the last year of Ursa Major’s reign when they toured the southern regions of the USA. Dick played the intro - that familiar melody line in My Darkest Hour. This is a ballad for the ages with universal themes that speak to our primal need to merge with others. It goes beyond love and loss to a deep existential need. It’s a struggle between hope and despair and a realization that emotions can signal something. Robert Wagner sang the lyrics like a prayer. Dick took the vocal on the second verse
I spend my nights sleeping in your arms
I’ll spend my days dreaming of your charms
You set my soul on Fire
Grant West adds a prolonged bass solo during an extended jam in which all the players get a chance to flex their musical might. Wagner takes up the vocal line, returning to the first verse and ending with an almost shouted erotic plea
Lady Lady you’re my hearts desire
Lady Lady you set my soul on fire
Wagner ends the show with Rock & Roll Music. Wagner intro…”I’m thinking, I’m thinking, I better stop thinking.” Jordan John recreates that simple but insistent 4/4 beat. Dick sings lead with Robert filling in the cracks and singing harmony. This is a concise literal reading of the original Frost version without any frills, jams or lyrical twists. It was perfect.
“Rock & Roll Music is all that you need to be free” – Dick Wagner 1969
Wagner created a perfect Trifecta of brilliant songs for an extended encore. Wagner is in a talkative mood and he introduces Only Women Bleed with another revealing Wagner rap.
“This was written by Alice Cooper and myself – based on music I wrote in 1968 for the Frost. But we didn’t record it…’cos the lyrics just didn’t make it. So, I presented it to Alice in 1975. He loved the music but hated the lyrics. It took about half an hour to write the song”
Dick began softly playing that famous guitar intro, then the keyboard came in and the cymbals swooned. Dick began singing…
Man's got his woman to take his seed
He's got the power - oh
She's got the need
She spends her life through pleasing up her man
She feeds him dinner or anything she can
She cries alone at night too often
He smokes and drinks and don't come home at all
Only women bleed
Wagner’s vocal is spare and a bit ragged. There is a sadness in his voice that comes from living, losing and letting go. He is no longer a thief of hearts nor is he life’s mistake. He has achieved hard-fought wisdom through surviving all the brutality that life and the music industry sent his way. This is what makes this particular version so powerful especially without the frills or pretension of the hit version. It is a stone masterpiece
Welcome To My Nightmare comes next. It is a brilliant rendition with the added punch of Tony High (T-Bone), an extraordinary musician. He blows a hot trombone on this jazzed up and funky remake. T-Bone’s incredible trombone solo was one of the musical highlights of the evening. He was blowing some serious jams when the music abrupt stopped; an air-tight pocket of silence signaled the music to start back up. T-Bone took it back for another go around – it was the most melodic trombone notations I’ve ever heard. He’s got the good Juju. And he had everyone under his spell.
The show ended with a rousing version of the Bossmen’s 1966 hit Baby Boy. It is a phenomenal version with the original drummer Pete (I love you man; I love you too, man) Woodman pounding the drums like a prize fighter and perfectly re-creating that incredible 8 beat/2 measure drum roll that connected the bridge to the next verse. Wagner changed the chorus in a small way to “Don’t cry so long (too hard) baby boy.” Robert sings the lead with Dick assisting on the chorus. The song holds up well 45 years after it was initially released. It was the Bossmen’s last and most popular 45 rpm. It was a perfect closer and a personal favorite of mine

“That’s the end of our show tonight. I love you”
- Dick Wagner

November 19th, 2011

Donny & Marie -Christmas in Detroit

Donny & Marie
Christmas in Detroit
Live @ The Fox Theatre
12/3/2011

Donny & Marie Osmond has been a fixture in our collective unconscious for over five decades now. They grew up in the biz. This is what they know; it is what they do. Without performance and applause, they would be left alone without honor or purpose. It would be like trying to breathe without air. They recently released an album that made a big splash in the country chart, reaching #7, while simultaneously charting #30 in the pop chart and #1 on the folk chart. It’s the highest charting album of their entire career. Currently Donny is busy working on his 60th album while Marie charted in 2010 with an inspirational album entitled I Can Do This. Lately Donny & Marie have experienced a renaissance that is in part a measure of their unflappable nature as well as a tribute to their undeniable deep pocket talent.

The Donny & Marie – Christmas in Detroit is as slick as skid marks on an icy road. Every quip is well rehearsed, every smile is practiced to perfection and the show must go on. Because…well, it HAS to, otherwise Donny & Marie would cease to exist except for the celluloid memories of when they were young and Andy Williams put Marie on his lap and she won our hearts, forever. Now Donny & Marie are middle aged. They have grandchildren and have experienced losses and regrets and the tyranny of a fan base that wants them to be forever young. As incredible as it sounds Donny & Marie ARE ageless. They are trim and athletic. They are beautiful…even still. They sing with voices pure and true and dance backing it up like Beyonce celebrating motherhood.

The 2 hour show is well conceived. There is a decorated Christmas tree stage left, wrapped gifts, dancing and caroling. Besides our heroes onstage, there are eight dancers who know how to shake their groove thing and nine professional musicians who never missed a beat or a cue. It’s peculiar to me that they all seemed to be having fun. I recall a trip to the New Grand Old Opry in Nashville back in 1976. Those Nashville cats sure knew how to make it sing and moan and the drummer kept the tempo like a heartbeat - but they looked so bored - uncomfortably numb - same old crap; just another day. Three massive video screens were mounted up on the stage that served up a tasty treat of past photo and video clips from the Osmond archives. It was like home movies that were really fun. It helped us remember a not so distant past when television was free and we invited our heroes into our living room by just a flick of a dial. In some odd way, I felt like I was growing up with them and as each year passed and the hair and clothing styles changed. I could see Donny & Marie reflecting those changes back to me as I continued my journey to the other side.

Donny & Marie are seasoned professionals that are as sleek and polished as a new Corvette. They know how to play and audience and they roamed the main floor of the Fox like the Calvary looking for Buffalo. They shook hands, patted backs and smooched just about everyone within the reach of their protruding lips. I got close to Donny as he sang and schmoosed his way back to the stage. When he turned the other way I spanked him hard, square on the ass and when he turned around his smile became a grimace. There was hate in his eyes. I just looked innocent, shrugged my shoulders, lifted my eyebrows and tilted my head to the woman standing next to me….well, that was my fantasy anyway. The show was a stoned immaculate Las Vegas Revue that covered Christmas songs, country hits, show tunes and even a bit of Motown soul. I don’t think Stevie would mind. The video screens were an integral part of the overall presentation. Donny & Marie excavated archival footage from each era from their television performances. Donny did “YoYo” as he and his onstage dancers mimicked each movement that his 1970-era brothers did on film. Very cool.
They did their old hits – Paper Roses, Go Away Little Girl, Puppy Love. It was a tongue in cheek yet an affectionate reading, poking fun at their long ago selves and hoping not to embarrass them. They sang along with their video images. It was a highlight out of many highlights during the show.
Donny poked fun at his teeny bopper image, pointing out that he had THAT haircut before Justin Bieber. He also tagged the early career comparisons between the Osmond Brothers and the Jackson 5. At one point Donny introduced “my” brothers – Tito, Marlin, Jackie, and Jermaine. The crowd got it immediately. A highlight included Donny singing liv with his brothers singing harmony via the magic of a well synchronized videotape.

The duo harmonized perfectly on their latest (and greatest) countrified single The Good Life and did a rocking Christmas medley that included “Little Saint Nick” and “What Christmas Means to Me. Marie did several show tunes from her Broadway days including Climb Every Mountain from The Sound of Music and Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Pie Jesu – a vehicle that revealed Marie’s tremendous four octave range as a vocalist. She did a rousing version of “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy and Donny countered with a high energy reading of Rock This Town by the Stray Cats. They sang Remember When as photos and video images of the famous artists they’ve worked with through the years including Andy Williams, Dean Martin, Bob Hope and others. It was an incredibly moving trip down memory lane.

The Donny & Marie - Christmas in Detroit was a touching remembrance of a time and place, a cultural zeitgeist that will be forever etched in the archives of the baby boomer generation. Our heroes may be just a musical footnote in the history of pop music but they sure made a splash during their triumphant residence in Detroit.

Peace
Bo White

The Tosspints Take it All

The Tosspints

An Irish Red Ruckus
&
The Fear Of An Empty Glass

It isn’t everyday that one band emerges out of the pack to lead a cultural change that is as astonishing as it is necessary. The Tosspints have been an integral part of the water clock bringing ancient sounds and stories back to the future in perfect calibration with our innate need to hear music and feel rhythm. The Tosspints create music of beauty and discord; love and pain. It is real like a punch in the face or a deep shudder in your solar plexus after chugging a pint of Guinness. It hurts but you like it. Their current disc Cenosillicaphobia is being released on CD and vinyl! Retro is now and vinyl LPs are making a comeback. Thank god we came back to our senses and returned to the sound of music - analog rules! We found out that CD’s don’t have the rich warm sound of vinyl nor do they hold up very well. This time around the Tosspints do not hold back anything,. The medium is the message and punk has a way of cutting to the chase whether is love and infidelity or death and despair. The anti-war sentiments fashioned by Don Zuzula are brutally honest. Zuzula served in the military and he knows only too well the costs of conflict. He was stationed in Iraq and he saw it all. War is hell and war is horrifying and it seems that his sense of humor kept him balanced between stillness and action. It was a form of Zuzula’s alternate rebellion when he painted “No Fat Girls” on his truck when the rest of the caravan painted slogans like “Death to Saddam” or “Kill Al Quaeda.” It was genius threefold. It was a way to survive, to find meaning in suffering.

The first track Drunken Ramblings of a Jealous Man grabs you right at the start with a galloping beat and a cracked whiskey voice. It’s almost as if Zuzula is talking with you at the kitchen table - only the pain is too big and the words are unspoken. He sings about life on the road - drinking himself to sleep and performing to crowds that don’t always get it. He gets by with “bloodstains on my fingers; teardrops from my eyes. This is a song of infidelity and an impulse to murder. The despair is indelibly stamped and there is no satisfying conclusion to the betrayal. Zuzula ends the song with a powerful accapella reading

Whiskey Be My Savior is outrageous high energy rock that owes as much to the Sex Pistols as it does to the Dropkick Murphys. The influences converge to create a perfect storm of combustible booze-filled Punk. It is a Dionysian dream of excess and consumption. In this bleary vision Zuzula is suckling from a toxic breast. He sings, “the only time I feel death is when my bottle’s empty.” It is sung as a mantra for numbness. It is a dissociative response to a life dissolved by pain and self-destruction. Many of us have been there. Zuzula is standing outside the pain and observing his own mastery over it

The third track, Don’t Cry at My Funeral, has an honest unflinching fatalism. It’s an existential horror to discover that your life did not matter. This is a punked up working man’s blues that evokes visions of filthy back breaking and mind numbing work for paltry wages. It can kill your soul. You work for the man and die quietly without fanfare. There is nothing to mourn. The speeded up breakneck tempo mirrors the workaday bustle that robs you of all the sparkle life can offer. The insurance man talks you into a policy and in the heaviness of an unrelenting ennui you realize your passion and taste for life are gone. Suddenly a thought intrudes -I’m worth more dead than alive.

Underclass Zero is a breakup song. Joseph Heller once said, “I only got married to find out what divorce is like.” It isn’t that simple or that cavalier. Heller was out of his mind. In any failing love relationship, a once enduring bond becomes a nightmare of hopelessness and regret. And you may dwell on what you could have done differently. If only…
Zuzula sings,
I think of myself as a working class hero
You think of me as an underclass zero
You threw me away
Zuzula almost chokes on the words as he spits them out with a mix of pain and anger;
You tell me I gotta go
I got to leave my home

Brothers Lament is an incendiary rocker with a million dollar riff. The Tosspints perform it at frantic breakneck speed. This is a “Johnny Piss-off” song about a roller coaster ride that is coming off the tracks – it’s a song about addiction and the despair of the people who love and care about the addict. The Fugs couldn’t do it any better than this. The lyrics are straightforward and righteously angry:
I don’t know what I’m doing here
You look me in the eyes
And mine deflect and look right into the floor
I can’t take it no more


Save Us is classic punk – speeded up, loud and straight to the point. The lyrics are filled up with tales of drunkenness and despair but the underlying message is all about feisty resilience and a big FU to anyone who can’t see that the ship is sinking. The singer sings about an empty life and an empty bottle of gin but he’s just being actively passive and more than a little rhetorical. When he sings, “Who the fuck is gonna save us from our goddam self, he already knows the answer. He must save himself.

Johnny Johnson opens One Last Shot with a dynamic syncopated drum pattern. Johnson is one of the most solid powerhouse drummers on the scene today and he snaps off a beat like he’s part of the drum kit. He is the beat. Zuzula adds in a few minimalist melodic guitar tones that speak volumes. The song shifts from quiet to loud and it takes off like a rocket. Prime Cobain. This is a song about war in a foreign land. It evokes an existential dilemma about right and wrong and explores our worst fears about our soldier boy – a fear that he will never go back home. It is what we might imagine to be a Soldier’s song – cacophonous and quiet; brave and afraid.

Johnson is once again front and center on You Shouldn’t Do This Alone. He changes up the rhythm with a variation of the Bo Diddley beat with an oddly compelling Dick Dale surf guitar. This is solemn goodbye with a hint of longing and regret. It contains the ancient wisdom of our forefathers that acknowledges melancholia as the natural state for a thoughtful person. The lyrics speak of unconscionable loss and forgiveness. It is the voice of a spirit.
I promise I’m not that mad
You are the best friend I’ve ever had
We’ll meet again someday

It is another master stroke creation from the heart and minds of Don, Zak and Johnny.
A perfect closer.

Epilogue: In the past few months, The Tosspints have participated in George Killian’s Irish Red Ruckus Sweepstakes, a promotional contest created by the company to highlight its support of cutting edge music. Killian's has been scouring clubs and concert halls around the country to invite bands for a chance to perform at the Irish Red Ruckus. Bands have been enlisting their fans, friends and family to vote for them to get to the Ruckus. Four finalists were determined by getting the most votes received in Colorado, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. The winner will open for the Dropkick Murpheys on November 17th, 2011. And the winner is…The Tosspints! Congratulations Guys!!!


Peace
Bo White

Andy Reed & American Underdog

Pop Factory Records Presents
The Debut
of
An American Underdog

Andy Reed is an integral part of the Great Lakes Bay music scene. It’s not easy being a major player when the economy has tanked and our society is unhealthy. It requires a balance of our mind, body and spirit and some heavy acceptance to remain sane in our insane world. I suppose there are multiple and competing truths no matter how we slice it especially when you’re a working musician.
Music and Art are the engines of truth and allows us a means of expression - an alternate rebellion that is quiet and thoughtful. No middle finger is extended. Reed is the olive branch that offers sustenance for the soul through rich and layered melodies and soaring harmony. It is manna from heaven. Reed has expanded his musical reach as a member of the seminal the turn of the century rockers Verve Pipe. Indeed, the Verve Pipe is a fine tuned engine that can rock with the best of ‘em and yet create beautiful music for children – a loving and childlike quality of rock & roll that was mined by Lennon and McCartney as well as the Small Faces and the Beach Boys. This is the hopeful side of rock & roll that represents a deeper longing, a return to the nest. Reed’s overarching achievement just may be the success of Reed Recording Studio and his ascendance as a highly regarded producer. He brings out the best in whomever he records whether it is Mandi Layne, Brett Mitchell, The Tosspints or Arthur Autumn. Reed can jump genres, intuit themes, conceive structural solutions and expand upon an artist’s vision to produce a warm and richly cascading sound.

In a recent development Reed joined forces with Shawn McDonald to form Pop Factory Records, a full service one stop record label and recording studio with a marketing and design department. Reed does the music; McDonald handles the art work and graphic design. Time has come today.

Reed and his friend and compatriot Donny Brown conceived American Underdog as a full band project. It’s only been ten years since Reed’s alter ego The Haskels blasted onto the scene and kicked it out with the most melodic and hard rocking music since the MC5 released Back in the USA in 1970 (despite producer Jon Landau’s compressed sound and muffled production). American Underdog just completed the production of their debut CD Always on the Run - and it is a complete package. The cover is a throwback to the days and times when album art mattered. Reed conveys colorful images with an eye for detail like the vertical stripe on the left side of the cover – a replica of how LP covers looked like during the rock & roll era of the fifties and sixties The music is even better…

Your Reign is Over is a majestic opener, orchestral with wordless soaring harmonies that changes directions with a pounding 4/4 beat like the Dave Clark 5 on steroids. Reed’s smooth as silk tenor soars over the big beat and then a sweet four note guitar riff introduces the verses. The lyrics betray considerable umbrage that is almost hidden behind Reed’s strong vocals.

Drawn into a place you must create all on your own
As the king and queen are overthrown

You are drawn into a part you never practiced for
But she’ll still get you, leaving you wanting more

Talks in tongues about a crown you may never see
And you’re the one who knows what to believe

Your reign is over
Nice to know you

Reed switches gears in Portland, a wistful song infused with an island-girl feel that is helped along with what sounds like a flamenco guitar. The longing and loneliness is palpable:

You try to be happy – drove you out to sea
As you wear your heart on your sleeve
When your own day dreams become reality
And create your own history

And I’m packing up for Portland, a place I visit often
And I never have to leave my rocking chair
When you play along and sing soft spoken
To the words you can’t repeat, “It isn’t fair”


Beautiful Dreamer opens with and echoed piano riff and a strummed acoustic. The vocals are run through a vocoder plug-in or a filter further accentuates the dreamlike quality of the music. Reed is singing in an inner voice creating a dialogue with memories of core wounds from a difficult past. Reed’s lyrics create an internal landscape that is both painful and liberating:

He waits alone in his chair
Clutching a paper he left folded
In the home he made for her so long ago

It’s hard now to see her
You stumble around
Tryin to walk a straight line

It’s a love undefined
It’s a love undefined


A quiet but insistent piano trill sets the mood for Always on the Run. It ambles along quite nicely but then a minimalist guitar comes up front and center and hits you like a punch. This is a song about friendship, the slippery elusive kind like a fan to a musician

Take a walk outside
Yes we could be good friends
But you are always on the run

You push me out
Can’t you see the best intent


The Day the World Was Lost opens with a galloping percussive tempo. The Spartan arrangement helps create a sense of ambivalence:

The day the world was lost it all went up in flames
Had I reached all the roads I crossed
‘Cos they all just look the same

When I need you don’t forget my name, don’t wear it out
‘Cos you’re the reason I’m competing in this game

So don’t ever change
Will we ever be the same
When I leave you, don’t forget my name


Nothing I Can Do is a flat out rock engine the stomps and moans like Jerry Lee Lewis beating up his piano and setting it on fire. It has a funky guitar line that would make Steve Cropper proud. I love the simplicity of a common drum break – the music stops and the drummer just keeps that funky beat - no rolls or syncopation just that magical 2/4 beat. This is foot stomping music of the highest pedigree and a tongue-in-cheek tour de force. Dig the lyric:

I wanna play guitar in my own symphony
And write a melody
Join a travelling show for all the world to see

Sorry if I’m not your style
Put me in a back-up file
I guess there is nothing I can do
…for you


Put Out the Fire is a mid-tempo ballad with Brian Wilson charm and Beach Boys harmonies. Reed‘s vocal range is impressive and his use of falsetto is imaginative yet economical. The Penny Lane trumpet arpeggio is a tip of then hat to the Beatles undiminished influence over popular music. It’s a spectacular performance.

I’ll Miss You Girl is a goodtime romp back to Chicago’s Vee Jay label. It has a rock solid backbeat with an old fashioned thump and whack that recalls the most charming tendencies of British “Beat Music” in the sixties.” This tune would fit nicely along side Please Please Me, an early hit from 1963 that found its way to the Introducing the Beatles album – the very first Beatles LP in America, released on January 10th 1964!

The sixties references are appealing and tactful. Reed skillfully sidesteps the retro label by making his own kind of music. He doesn’t really sound like the Beatles, Oasis or Big Star. He creates a synthesis of all his various influences that provides the scaffolding for well written pop music that tells stories within a concise framework. This is testimony to his genius. He just may be a modern Burt Bacharach!

Parades a mid temp ballad with great lyrics, sophisticated vocal arrangement and a compelling background of breathy ahhs and oohs sung in perfect harmony. A five note piano trill introduces each verse. This is a song about Reed’s career – his stubborn solo achievements that were more satisfying but paid less than his sideman role as a Jedi master. It’s not always good trip. The lyrics tell the story…

I used to be the one that they all looked to
I used to be the one who wrote all the rules
That’s why I try to listen carefully as parades go by

I used to be then one who walked on his own
I used to be the one whose punches were all thrown
That’s why I try to listen carefully as parades go by

I used to be the one who wore the same clothes
I used to be the one who loved rock & roll
That’s why that I’ve tried to listen carefully as parade go by


World of Make Believe is another slight of hand with Queen guitars and Beach Boys harmonies without ever sounding like either group. Paying homage to one’s influences is a double-edged sword. Through emulation you may discover your own true musical nature or you may simply become an imitator. The limitations of power pop bands such as the Raspberries or Badfinger is that no matter how hard they tried they were not the Beatles. Big Star fits the above category but actually transcended the pop tag through innovation and some pretty heavy themes. Andy Reed is on that journey now. World of Make Believe is a lucid take on the decline and fall of the music business – loud digital production, vocodors, samples, and disposable product. The rot has set in…

But they get just what they ask for
Am I the only one who wants more?

Why can’t you see this world of make believe?
And the ever changing sad song

So listen to me don’t turn the other cheek
There are better things
Try one

Train – a perfect metaphor for loneliness, desire, danger and a million other things. Reed is holding a royal flush but he’s not revealing his hand. The song opens with the chug-chug/click-clack sound of the train on the tracks, coming home. Reed’s slide sounds like a pedal steel and segues to a nuanced and plaintive vocal. The interplay between the guitar and synthesizer colors the music in sepia tones. Reed just may have created a classic with timeless music and a deeply felt sense of love and longing that’s wrapped around childhood memories. Man’s best friend

That old fashioned sound
When you buy another round
You know I’ll always love you
I know you’ll always come through

When I was a boy
You were my favorite toy
Now I’m a man and I easily understand

Train, Train
You know I’ll always love you

Peace
Bo White

Tesco Vee & The Meatmen Live @ White's

Tesco Vee
Cascading Episodes of Punked Up Instability
&
The Psychology of Suck

Tesco Vee originally formed the Meatmen in 1980, shortly after graduating from Michigan State University. School was cool but Vee wanted more from life than the 9-5soul killing, mid-management, grey business suit ethos promised by his Bachelor’s of Science Degree. As an astute English major who had a way with words and a sense for the absurd, Vee began writing the most profoundly foul satiric music since Captain Beefheart did the low yo-yo stuff and Zappa ate yellow snow. The Meatmen found a niche and made it their own. They would write such over-the-top and in-your-face songs like Tooling For Anus, The Suck Trilogy (French People Suck, Crippled Children Suck, Camel Jockeys Suck), and 1 Down, 3 to Go (a reference to former Beatle John Lennon’s murder). Politically correct they’re NOT. For sure. Yet behind the rude remarks and blue language is Tesco Vee’s keen grasp of social issues and the erosion of independent and original thinking. In 1979, Vee launched Touch & Go Fanzine with compatriot Dave Stimson in order to lampoon, chastise and even praise musical culture in Lansing and around the globe. They issued 22 stellar editions of the Fanzine before calling it quits. Anyone who has read Touch & Go will no doubt vouch for Vee’s purity of vision. The latest Meatmen CD Cover the Earth was released in 2009 and they continue to record with a new lineup consisting of guitarist Leighton Mann, bassist Dan Gillies and drummer John Lehl of the Detroit based rock band Chapstick.

The Meatmen will perform Friday @ White’s Bar as the headlining act for this year’s Crispy Fest. Tension Head will headline on Saturday. Tickets are $5 each night. 22 bands will perform during this outdoor extravaganza. Doors open @2pm


By anyone’s standards you’ve had a long career in an industry filled up with disposable artists, one hit wonders and so. You have never had mainstream success. Why do you keep resurrecting the Meatmen? What’s in it for you?
Great question. It ain’t the money! I thought I was done at 40, who wants to see a 40 year old Punk rocker...then at 50 something I’m back hoppin’ around like a Tallahassee fairy in a devil suit having a blast. Its fun is the short answer! I’ll be pumping out ‘Tooling For Anus’ in the Holiday In Lounge when I’m 70.as long as the loyalist punters still fork over a sawbuck to see me! My business model is simple. Play the hits with flair and panache, thrill the masses with between song witticisms and scatological profundities, and don’t suck!


In you bio/history it states that you bristle at the joke band tag? What’s upsetting about that tag?
It just seems dismissive, and my undercurrent of humor runs deep. Lumping me in with (much as I loved him!) Neanderthal lunkheads like El Duce are fine, but I have a college sheepskin and like to keep ‘em guessing, and off balance....’is he serious? He can’t be serious?? I think he’s serious!!!! My heroes Frank Zappa, and The Fugs inspired me with knee splitting hits...I knew in the late 70’s I wanted to start a punk band, but things were way too serious in 1979 , so it was my purpose on the planet to get a reaction outta people be it with mirth, or vitriol..


How does humor drive the hell bound train? Is this a form of what Mose Allison calls “kidding on the square” in which humor usually contains a much deeper message?
Yes! I jumped this question in the last one. The Meatmen are kind of like Larry David in Curb Your Enthusiasm to a catchy hardcore beat, saying things people don’t say, in these overly PC times, and damn the consequences..My lyrics are wittier than most but still under-appreciated. Someday when I’m tats up with Lilly taking a dirt nap in a horizontal phone booth people will realize…that guy was genius!



Does the profanity serve as a vehicle to deliver the message? That anger and humor are fated to be inextricably linked?
But of Course…my college roommates girlfriend was listening to me rant back in the 70’s and she said with great earnestness ‘You curse better than anyone I’ve ever heard’ I took that as a high compliment. Some say foul language is a sign of ignorance, but I disagree…when woven into the semantic fabric with proper timing and aplomb, a potty mouth rant can be quite illuminative and entertaining. Plus I have invented or co-opted various euphemisms and framed and shamed them in many of my songs about boners and poop.



Do French People really suck?
Oh yeah…they are the worst humans on the planet bar none.



Doug Wood implied that the return of the Meatmen is also the rebirth of “Hate Rock” – is that a misnomer? Can hate and humor co-exist?
Sure they can…Hate Rock kind of sounds like its going to be off the chain racist or homophobic but that ain’t my definition. People who label me that don’t get it. You either get it or you don’t. In reality I am a free thinking left wing nut job who just loves to push buttons…but I wont play the race card overtly – OK, I may have used a few ethnic slurs along the road to punk rock infamy but only out of necessity..Hate and Love and Laugher and Despair all ride the same tightrope and they overlap. Are there goons out there who take the hate too seriously? Sure…but you cant fix stupid nor should I change the way I ride this happy freight of hardcore transients currently gracing a stage in human form as The Meatmen



Can you describe your music – would you call it hard core metal, punk, hard rock? Or are you simply eclectic, incorporating diverse elements into a hard rocking format?
I have always been a passionate fan of music...Hard Rock/Punk Rock/Metal...I love the fact that I don’t have to conform to any genre. I threw some of my old school fans for a loop when ‘War of the Superbikes’ came out in 1985 but won over still more. I’m all over the place and hard to pin down…it varies from platter to platter, keep em guessing …what will he do next? I had great fun with my all cover record ‘Cover the Earth’ Who else could have Jimmy Dean’s ‘Big Bad John’ alongside GG Allin, 10CC, and the greatest group ever in the history of pop music ABBA.


Your music has topical themes politics and the Pope. Do you have a message? Or is the message nihilistic, that no values exist? e.g., the lyric “I’d rather drink than screw”, not much leeway for peace and love with that statement
If I have a message its fuck convention and established morays and live your own life, try and have an original thought for gods sake. Organized Religion is the root of all evil...If I had one message that doesn’t involve my tongue in my cheek that is it. The fact that there are websites for www.churchrealestate.com means that people are wising up and not giving all of their money to these corrupt and anachronistic institutions.




Why did you get into the music biz? Were you originally a college band from MSU poking fun at middle class pretensions?
I was writing a fanzine Touch and Go and reviewing hundreds of records and thought ‘wait! I can do this too…the beauty of punk as it manifested itself stateside with what some have deemed as American hardcore. It really set off and inspired me to have a band…


Your song College Radio Loser is a hilarious put down of those musical elitists who like those “ultra hip” bands? Great song! Was this inspired by the local music scene and university culture?
Yes, we spent years trying to get played on college radio with mixed results, pre-internet so I was making fun of them. We mailed unsolicited copies to many stations and got some real huffy responses from the snobby elite - mission accomplished!


Did you attend MSU?
Yes I graduated in 1978 and am a proud Spartan! I earned a Bachelor of Science English major. It really prepared me for this crazy world. I used to be petrified of public speaking…maybe I was just stoned. I became serious about college when I got to MSU from community college and laid off the ganja - loved my time at MSU, beautiful campus, beautiful girls...not that I scored any!


Your cover of Deep Purple’s Space Truckin’ with your own incredible lyrics is outstanding, as is your version of Green Acres – this is perfect rock and roll parody? Do you enjoy incorporating parody into your act?
Oh yeah, I have lampooned the best - imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. In R&R Juggernaut we were making fun of hard rock and metal tinged with adoration of same...Making fun of anything and everything is what makes me wanna keep keepin on! I ain’t done yet so stay tuned weenbags!

Any last comments?
Go to my website and buy something! Trust me, this ain’t no tired comeback crap…this line up is firing on all 12 cylinders and I will pit these cats against any Meaty assemblage I have put together in the last 3 decades...our show is like a raging bash in Hades so check it out heathens!

www.tescovee.com
www.twitter.com/tescovee666
www.facebook.com/themeatmen

SRC Live @ White's Bar Jiuly 30th, 2011

Live @ White’s Bar
Looking Back in the Rear-View Mirror
Letting Go of the Past


An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress
- W.B. Yeats

Three hundred fans can’t be wrong. SRC’s 40 year Reunion Concert was a transcendent masterpiece. Not that it was a perfect performance - far from it - but just the sight of our former heroes, now draped in the age of time, reached us in a deep soulful way. It’s hard to explain to the uninitiated, someone who wasn’t there in 1969 and never heard the music in its raw youthful glory. SRC represents a marker of time when music was warmed up over an analogue fire. It was more than notes; it was all about sound, awareness, and the potential of the human spirit to love. We were soul-deep into the message. We wanted to express ourselves in a different way - through creative living and experimentation, expanding the boundaries of our minds and bodies through music, poetry, dance, and literature. We embraced the arts as a means to create our own generation of scholars, lovers and outcasts. SRC were part of a psychedelic network that included some of the greatest and most influential misfits in Michigan history – politicos such as John Sinclair and Pun Plamondon; tribal managers like Jeep Holland, Russ Gibb; our beloved and lionized musicians - Iggy Pop, Rob Tyner, Scott Morgan, Bob Seger; and poster artists Gary Grimshaw and Carl Lundgren. These young radicalized insurgents offered themselves up as our counter cultural heroes, hoping to remake our decaying society through the promotion of peace, love and human rights. As their hair grew longer and their clothes became more colorful, our sixties icons freed themselves from the unseen shackles that paralyzed our elders and narrowed their perspective. It was their doorway into passion. SRC were our contemporary druids, lifting the veil of hypocrisy and creating their very own Stonehenge with enduring works of art and music.
SRC took the stage a little after 8pm, looking more like founding members of AARP than the Dionysian gods they once resembled. Gone is the long hair and lean physiques. They used to be beautiful in androgynous way, now they have big bellies, spindly legs, and receding hairlines. These old geezers are more pug dog grumpy than pop star pretty. But beauty is only skin deep.

A slight rain delayed the show and as it subsided a multi-colored rainbow appeared behind the stage - a strange and wonderful sign. It was time…

SRC opened the show with the funky rock & roll of Badazz, a great instrumental in which the Quackenbush brothers – Gary on guitar and Glen on keyboards – flexed their musical muscle memory, trading off licks like swatting a fly. Pete Woodman the legendary and ageless drummer (formerly of the Bossmen with Dick Wagner and Popcorn Blizzard with Meatloaf) pounded those skins like a 15 year old boy fantasizing about his best friend’s girlfriend. WICKED.
The second tune Checkmate is a love song from their superb LP Milestones. The Lyrics reveal more than a little of Richardson’s sexual frustration using a game of chess as the metaphor. Great tune.
The old Motown chestnut Heatwave got the SRC treatment.- screaming organ and economical guitar. What it lacks in soul is made up by a gritty performance and vocal help from Steve Lyman
The next song I’m So Glad was SRC’s 1967 version of Cream’s version of an old Skip James blues song. The first time I heard it played on WKNX, the DJ was doing a giveaway contest. The listener who could identify the actual number of times Scott Richardson sang the word “Glad” won tickets to a concert. I’m So Glad was one of SRC’s earliest recordings and it was a minor hit in Saginaw. Richardson and the band nailed it good!
Glad’s B-side Who is that Girl followed. It’s a decent hook-laden rocker that initiated a trifecta of early pop songs that also included Get the Picture and After Your Heart. The music combined Richardson’s poetry and streamlined playing that nonetheless allowed guitarist Gary Quackenbush to tear it up in the intro and again at the coda. Once again Lyman provided excellent vocal support to Richardson’s unsteady pitch.
Onesimpletask from the LP SRC is a musically complex monolithic dirge that is difficult to sing and contains obscure lyrics. There are several tempo changes that are quite daunting but the band manages it all with good humor and aplomb. Gary Quackenbush’s phenomenal guitar work with the use of feedback, sustain and tremolo and brother Glen’s solid organ trills saves this brontosaurus from a dishonorable discharge.
Pete Woodman’s powerful Bo Diddley beat opens Eye of the Storm. Quakenbush’s guitar is prominent on the bridge and helps cover Richardson’s off pitch notes and allows Lyman to assist with vocal harmonies. Even with the vocal snafus this song is still a winner.
The next song Up All Night has always been a sexy fan favorite with many a nubile young lass dreaming to be up all night and doing it with SRC. Richardson hits his stride with this song. It rocks and rolls and recalls a time when we stayed out late and discovered a different world filled with shadowed night people. It was breathtaking and exciting; beckoning and foreboding. Life was filled with new and exciting highs. SRC were one of those highs. Nowadays we are in bed by eight and asleep by nine, unless House is on the tube. Then we get up and go to work and something in the back of our mind recalls a time when we thought that automation would make the 40 hour work week obsolete and we would need to cultivate leisure activities. It was a lie, it always was a lie.
Midnight Fever from SRC’s last LP Travelers Tale makes a rare public performance. This is a funky soulful rocker with Motown bass and prominent organ accents that scream and moan in orgasmic spurts. This song has Ray Goodman’s stamp all over it, the economical use of notes, filling spaces and adding trills and runs – masterful, one of the best songs of the evening. But the night belonged to the back-to-back luster of SRC’s two totally realized songs. Black Sheep was written about and for all the outcasts and forgotten people who live a life of quiet desperation. The biblical reference to Ishmael gives the lyrics a deep spiritual foundation. This is one of the best coming of age songs ever written. It is a time when we discover that our parents are not perfect and all powerful and that people can be dishonest and hurtful. It is a time of discovery; a search for love and spiritual connection. Richardson’s masterpiece. He sings his ass off, obviously inspired by the truth of the song. It is ageless.
The Hall Of The Mountain King/Bolero was a centerpiece of their late sixties performances and it is tonight. Not too many bands were doing Grieg back then (or now). It starts out nice and slow…percolating that syncopated rhythm, setting up the tension between the percussive cymbals, bass, and prominent organ trills. The excitement mounts as the ancient familiar music slowly builds momentum. The sound is hot and loud and louder yet. The tempo picks up…then Richardson screams, creating a space that segues to Bolero. The guitars join in creating a wall of sound with Quackenbush’s guitar soaring over top of it all. A second scream prompts another shift in tempo that brings it all back around to the beginning of Grieg’s indelible musical statement.
SRC finished the night with a well deserved encore with Gypsy Eyes and Eliza Green (The Shimmie Queen), a fairly obscure yet delicious taste of the soulful pop/rock from the unfairly overlooked Lost Masters LP. It ended on a high note. Many of us smiled silently, inwardly - knowing that our heroes pulled it off. It was a glorious dream; a lesson in love. And in the aftermath of SRC’s luminous, loving show I’m flooded with all those sacred musical experiences from 1967 onward and I’m holding them gently in one symbolic memory.

For love…is the blood of life, the power of reunion in the separated
- Paul Tillich

Peace & Love
Bo White

SRC is…
Scott Richardson - singer/poet
Gary Quackenbush – guitar
Glen Quackenbush - keyboards
Steve Lyman – guitar/vocals
Ray Goodman – guitar
Pete Woodman – drums
Ralph McKee - bass

The Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival 2011

Bonnaroo 2011

Music and Arts Festival
Have A Nice Roo

As I prepare for this article I wonder if I’m pushing the vale, aging out and misunderstanding the new mores and customs of our young hedonist tribes. I’m like a ne’er do well, Ray Davies singing about preserving the old songs from obscurity and protecting the new music from being dismissed. I like modern music because it’s based in part by all those original rhythms and melodies that were emanating from Sea Shanties, Field Hollers, Celtic folk, Anglo Broadside ballads and Negro spirituals. It can be argued that there is no musical form or expression that is completely original - it’s borrowed, co-opted, and recycled. So what am I doing here? It’s not a question, it’s a statement of my own quest to cheat time. But I realize that I’m trapped inside this body - a slave to time. And the clock is ticking

What can be said of Bonnaro - good intentions and high commerce: $250 general admission tickets; $5 lemonade; Ts for $25; Water plentiful but lines are long. It’s a simmering 95 degree day, cloudy from the circling dust and debris. Thousands are covering their mouths and nostrils with handkerchiefs. Girls are in skimpy bikini bottoms without tops; their breasts are perky and painted.
The air is hot and cheap. We are breathing it in and breathing it out yet the sand and dirt clogs our sinuses. This is like the Oklahoma Dust Bowl of the 30’s except we choose to be here. We are silly and wise, contributing to our own toxic waste yet recycling plastic bottles.
The press tent is a microcosm of the Bonnaroo Experience. Everything started out fine, but as the time drew close and press meeting convened, journalists began piling in and squeezing into small spaces. By and large they are all relatively young – twenty or thirty somethings. I’m one of the oldest. Hell, I actually know who Buffalo Springfield is… The moderator is from Esquire and he does a pretty good job describing the “New Stuff” @ Bonnaroo, including an immense water slide, additional water stations and trees (thank God) and a video screen at the Which Stage. Not too shabby.

The Comedy Tent was cool and delicious, with giant anaconda-like tunnels providing the duct work that funneled the sweet blessed cool air into the auditorium. That alone was worth the price of admission - about 1500 fans stood in the long and winding ticket line for several hours as furnace level heat melted faces and sapped energy. Cheech Marin hosted the Comedy Show and he’s so cool he’s stoned cold. He’s the only Mexican that ever got detained for sneaking OUT of the country. But that was in his draft dodging days. He recalled a time when his partner Tommy Chong was in prison on drug charges and Tommy’s wife had conjugal visits, only it was with Cheech! Drum roll please!

The Workaholics from Comedy Central were almost funny with their low ball drinking humor. It was loud and sassy and very musical. The adolescent humor wears a bit thin but then again the more cerebral stuff goes over my head and my wife wasn’t there to explain it to me. At the end of their shtick they really got down…
“This is EFFIN’ Bonnaroo - Let’s get EFFIN’ crazy!!!!”
I thought, “Ok, I get it boys, now STOP IT and get the eff off the stage”

Thank god for Cheech Marin. He jumped back onstage and sang a lovely song about Mexican-Americans and white girls named Debbie.
There were several great lines in the song e.g., Mexican-Americans who take Spanish in night school and get a “B” and Mexican-Americans who have a son-in-law named Jeff. Hmm
Jay Pharoah, a cast member of Saturday Night Live is a stellar standup comedian and impressionist (I dig his Denzel). He speaks uncomfortable truths and pokes fun at stupid white people – like the majority of Bonnaroo attendees living outside in tents, “waiting for Lil Wayne to perform”.
The humor is radical and right on the mark, sometimes in a white vs. black vein that exposes our shared hubris and how we’re all doing the same thing – just trying to make it. He turns a microscopic eye on our idiosyncratic behaviors e.g., “I love all you white people and the three black people who came to the show”
“Lil Wayne. I think he’s gay. He reminds me of Kanye (this gets boos) - so fruity that when he farts, it smells like potpourri.”

Cheech Marin finally introduced the headliner Ralphie May and the big man sauntered onto the stage like he owned it. He’s man-mountain weighing in at about 350 – easy. In a rapid fire delivery May gets down and gets it…
“It’s so hot it feels like a dog breathing on you, I have so much powder on my crotch it looks like I’ve molested a baby.”
“No one’s talking about weed - LITE UP. I’m funny as shit when you’re high”,
He’s lightning quick with his story lines…
“I most want to smoke weed with Jesus Christ. What would I say to Jesus…Tell your daddy he’s doing a great job”…”Did you write Footprints in the Sand?”
May pokes fun of stereotypes and uptight people. Asian men who have tiny emaciated members and black men with such huge penises that during intercourse they still have a full five inches that’s dry. His caveat; don’t have hang-ups; teach your girlfriend “the gurgle effect” and during oral sex “never ever look up.”


Friday 2 pm
Bela Fleck and the Flecktones
Fleck has been dishing out some of that tasty bayou-led roots music for 20+ years.
This is a reunion of sorts with his original band. It’s revealing that the modest Fleck supported the early career of Dave Mathews Band .They used to open up for him,
Now Fleck’s sax man Jeff Kaufman tours with Mathews. Fleck has honed a finely crafted music that is soft and intricate but doesn’t translate well in this big outdoor venue and the loud outdoor PA that brings out the bass guitar at the expense of the quieter instruments, especially Fleck’s banjo. It’s as if the sound guy is asleep in the back of the bus after smoking weed and pulling on a flask the best Tennessee moonshine since Jack Daniels went legal. It is a torrid day; the wind and heat team up to put considerable distance between the artist and the crowd.
Fleck does well in incorporating jazz, blues, ragtime piano, and country licks into something both original yet familiar. From Scratch & Sniff, Sherpa and Big Country to A Moment so Close and the rousing closer Hoe Down, Fleck proved to be on top of his game. The crowd is massive. The heat is on.

Friday 3:15pm
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals
Potter knows how to rock and roll. The band is tight as a vise with jangly guitars and an insistent locomotive beat. Here’s a blond beauty, a brick house who sings in a sultry voice that means business. She’s the beat of a heart and an unstoppable force of nature
Only there’s nothing original here. The riffs are borrowed and assimilated into a high energy form of country blues.
Only Love gets a rise out the captivated crowd. This is funked up rock & roll with creamy harmonies.
Potter has the range and motion of a tigress and the countrified sexual energy of Tina Turner with her very own Ike on guitar and harp.
The reggae influenced “Goodbye Kiss,” gets the crowd wound up followed by “Oasis” that segues into a bridge with a gentle slide workout and an extended instrumental piece that is a bluesy train wreck that’s about as interesting as Iron Butterfly doing In A Gadda Da Vida - the long version – with a 20 minute drum solo that is every bit as plodding and obnoxious as the song itself…but it’s psychedelic, baby, even though it’s 19 minutes too long. Sexy Hot Summer Night (when I’m next to you, baby) is the perfect song for the occasion. Grace takes off the top layer of clothing to reveal a low-cut, form-fitting summer dress, delicious! Hell, Potter can scream like a banshee in heat and look good doing it. Stop the Bus has a cool Zeppelin vibe and a Good Times and Bad Times, riff.
Toward the end Grace blurts out: “How the fuck did a little band from Vermont get here. You Go Girl!!

Friday 4:15pm
Warren Haynes Band
Haynes opens with The River’s Gonna Rise is a great song but it’s Haynes that drives the engine. He sings with a pure, strong tenor and his guitar work is simply stunning. He gets a big full sound outta that hollow-bodied guitar and he picks more notes than Albert Lee on speed... Haynes makes good use of sustaining notes and he hits the E string hard and he throws in a few simple effects just for good measure. Haynes’ music is hot and his truth is molten. The slide work is expressive, it sings and moans and takes you right to the pocket. His voice is similar to Neil Young’s and his lyrics capture his integrity and strong social consciousness especially on Invisible, a song about forgotten Americans, especially the kids. Singing an American song; righting an American wrong.
Haynes is one of the premier guitarists in the world. The band is excellent and the intuitive interplay between the members is impressive - keys/guitar, squealing sax, screaming organ, and solid drumming.
If You Need Me is a slow tempo blues ballad that showcases Haynes vocal range
Haynes drew a large crowd but its 95 degrees and they’re not sweating.
What’s up with that— are we amongst mutant aliens?
“I’ll Take A Bullet For You” is a mid-tempo blues with a funky back beat and throbbing bass line. Haynes soulful vocal is perfect. He closed his set with Soulshine, a Gov’t Mule chestnut of the first degree

FRIDAY 5:15pm
Atmosphere
Atmosphere practices a form of modern hip hop with more intricate guitar notations and a prominent bottom with synth accents that color the musical landscape. Three chords are all you need just chill and put a smile on your face, brother. They got the crowd going with a call/response arms waving in time with the beat. The team leaders, SluG (Sean Daley) and Ant (Anthony Davis) like to rap about the everyday trials and tribulations of life especially with women:

“You make me sick
Tonight we’ll be effin’
In your back seat’
You don’t really want me to
(That’s just for show) “

SluGs rhythms have a syncopated 2/4 beat that shifts to a reggae beat at times. It’s a combination that builds a throbbing sexual excitement. Girls in the audience are dancing the dirty dog, doin’ the pelvic thrust and backin’ it up.
Mercy… Slug is indeed a showman of the first degree. He’s got the tricks i.e., jump, put your arms up in the air – it pulls the crowd into the music and the message - guaranteed. This feel good music that orders on nihilism
“I really won’t lie to you
You smell
I’ll eff you backwards anyway”
(Can’t believe I’m saying that out loud)
Slug even pulls out the ancient yet effective call and response routine.

“Say Hell Yeah”
“Hell Yeah”
“Say Hell Yeah”
“Hell Yeah”

SluG tells a story about calling in sick from a massive hangover
This cat can use a simple piano notation, a nursery rhyme and give it a minor chord and suddenly the song is transformed into a sentimental homespun ballad
“BBQ in the backyard. Happy women riding a bike around the lake”
These are songs of celebration and struggle that are quieter and more reflective than typical hip hop and his use of metaphor help give the message more depth. Atmosphere’s music is like a Rockwell painting, colored in rich sepia tones and broad themes of kids and families and missing loved ones…“Keeping the coffee brewing in the kitchen-waiting for you on the corner of yesterday.”
Friday 6:30pm
Ray LaMontagne
This is super chill music. LaMantagne's scratchy tenor is reminiscent of Joe Crocker.
The music is country-ish and rootsy with acoustic pickin’ and sweaty muted drums and minor chords weeping that sad, sad song
LaMontagne has the expressive melancholy voice takes you to another place populated by old friends and slack-jawed fools and men that don’t want to be alone. In just a whisper he takes you back to a step in time where you have to beg, steal or borrow just to stay alive. LaMontagne’s hippie roots music incorporates blues, jazz and folk elements. He can do a straight 12 bar work out or shuffle incorporating syncopated beats and a prominent bottom line. This band doesn’t use volume to get the point across. I like their restraint and the use of musical spaces in between the notes. Highlights included a cover of Merle Haggard’s Mama Tried, God Willing & the Creek Don’t Rise, Repo Man and my favorite Like Rock & Roll Radio

Friday 7:15pm
NOFX
Southern Cal punkers NOFX were one of my favorite acts at Bonnaroo. These political punks are all about put-ons and put-downs and uncomfortable truths. They start out introducing themselves as a rock & roll band from Scotland. When they get down to it NOFX are a great Clash influenced band. Their radical political humor takes you right to the edge of the abyss. Leaving Jesus Land is a great song yet the message is heavy handed…
If you believe in God you’re an idiot
People care more about ranch-ranch dressing than Jesus
The Heartland will punch holes in the Bible Belt.

NOFX sings about the problems that emerge in the face of rabid nationalism and the possibility of fascism in a red, white, and blue America. The message is a clear caveat about our declining values such as respect and decency creating the conditions that lead to revolution. And they do it with savage over-the-top humor
I enjoyed The Lesbian Song – a real groaner that is guaranteed to disperse the crowd
They did great justice to Radio, a Rancid cover. The singer dude has an expressive voice similar to our very own Tim Avram. Besides great music NOFX had a knack for transforming what is crass into something hilarious i.e.

What do you get when you cross a Mexican and an octopus?
I don’t know, but he sure can pick lettuce.

Why did Hitler commit suicide?
Cos he got the gas bill

NOFX is one the more astute political bands at Bonnaroo. Their teetering on the edge off-color brand of topical humor reveals more truth than a Network News Broadcast. Scott Pelley needs to loosen up and start telling the real skinny about the world. He needs some NOFX. The people want to know!




Friday 8:30pm
My Morning Jacket
I don’t get it. Morning Jacket sucks yet that have immense popularity. Go figure.
The music meanders a bit and the off-key harmonies are like finger nails on a chalk board
The instrumental excursions don’t seem to go anywhere and don’t have a significant purpose. Morning Jacket is at their best when they are playing concise song, five minutes max! The twilight zone riffs and echoed electronic are colored by impassioned vocal arias, like a Gregorian chant - wordless ululations. Their brand of pop music is accessible if not very original. However they do make maximum use of a variety of instruments i.e., steel drum, sax, synth along with a basis set up of guitar, bass, drums
Riffs that are too familiar serve as an intro to a rather long work-out that was poorly conceived, too cumbersome and incredibly boring. They are quite capable of creating good pop music even if their lyrics are not always clear.
The lead singer’s stratospheric tenor shines on the country pop ballads. The addition of the pedal steel gives the music rich creamy tones - but the results are ultimately too cliché. They don’t utilize their soaring lush harmonies adequately. They could focus on this a bit more - add falsetto - and become a modern-day Tremeloes

Saturday 1:30am
Lil Wayne
Not a very big crowd –it’s getting too late at 1:30 am. People are leaving as we are arriving. Lil Wayne stalks the stage and he doesn’t take any prisoners. He gets into a stream of consciousness rap that’s a bit naughty…
”Same old shit, just a different day”.
“Put your hands up - say woo woo; say police in the hood”
“Tonight I’m willing to fuck all the ugly women.“
“Make noise for yourself ‘cos you’re beautiful - take it from behind.”

The band is excellent, the energy is good -synth, percussion, bass, drums, guitar.
There are at least three or more rappers onstage at all times as well as a beautiful sister who sings great
Oops here he goes again ...”I wish I could fuck every girl in the world dropping names like Angelina Jolie, Paris Hilton.
Lil Wayne was involved with Young Money in the recording of the monster hit BedRock and he sings it tonight to a massive crowd response
He states he was locked up a few months ago and segues to a brilliant sampling of Michael Jackson’s Love Machine.
Everything but the rap is canned or pre-recorded but the scantily clad dancers increase the heat. The sexual tension is palpable. This is the perfect music for hot young lovers.
Lil Wayne announces that he’ll have an LP coming out August 29. He performs a song from the LP: How to Love. It’s an incredible piece of music - acoustic guitar, syncopated beats; it’s a wistful rap ballad.
Lil Wayne asked no one in particular, “Are you alright, nigger?” I’m guessing he didn’t aim that one at me.

Saturday 2pm
Old Crow Medicine Show
This popular down-home cowboy band has all the chops of a traditional country roots band, all acoustic, no electric and definitely no synthesizers. These cats are purists and they sure can make it real whether it’s high energy country or nifty bluegrass pickin’. The leader…. sings and plays fiddle. The ancient rhythms are preserved and the harmonies are so tight that the Osborne Brother must be smiling’. They open with Hard to Love and go right into Down Home Girl.
The second lead singer is a first chair tenor who sings so high he sounds like Todd Rundgren on helium. The sounds is acoustic nirvana as the tight interplay between the fiddle, harp, acoustic guitars, banjo, mandolin, slide guitar, upright bass is simply breathtaking. There is never any overplaying – each instrument contributes to the song
Highlights include: I Hear Them All, Carry Me Back to Virginia, Alabama, High Test, Minglewood Blues and the exquisite Wagon Wheel.
The Old Crow Medicine Show are righteous in their mission, ferocious in their craft.
This is music for the faithful.

Press Conference Saturday 3:30pm
Kareem Abdul Jabar is promoting a movie based on a book he authored about the Harlem Wrens B-Ball team from the 1920s. It sounds fascinating.
Steven Stills and Richie Furay talk about the recent Buffalo Springfield Reunion and appear to have a lot of energy wrapped around it.
Stills looks like he’s been training for a 12 round bout with Muhammad Ali. He’s lost considerable weight since the 2006 CSN&Y Freedom of Speech Tour. Furay looks perpetually young. He’s trim version of his younger self with only his graying mane betraying his age

Saturday 4:15
Allison Krauss and Union Station
The music is soft, quiet with focus on vocals.
She opens with Paper Airplane followed by Dustbowl Children (an homage to Bonnaroo) but what blew me away was Krauss; generosity in sharing the limelight with her magnificent band. After several quite rootsy songs I heard a familiar riff, a soulful pop song…
“Baby Now That I Found You
I build my world around you
But you got to go
You don’t need me”
It’s an unexpected cover of the Foundations big hit of the 60s. Very Cool!

The band is exquisite - tight harmonies, virtuosity, and great songs. The versatile musicians play several different instruments to fill out the sound and give the music depth - acoustic slide, guitar, Allison’s fiddles, upright bass, banjo and dobro.
Krauss asked her guitarist “Are you too sweaty to bring it” ...but she was just flirting.
.Allison is not just a beautiful presence; she’s dead serious about her craft.
This is a cohesive set that doesn’t stray too fair from the tightly-formatted formula. Highlights include Wild bill Jones, Man of Constant Sorrow and Every Time You Say Goodbye.
Music this good may fade away and take a back seat in mass popularity or public consciousness, but it will never die. It’s the classical music of country/folk/blues movement, given birth at the turn of the century through the merging of blues and early country - Maybelle Carter meets Robert Johnson at the Crossroads

Saturday 6:15pm
Mumford and Son
Mumford & Son are HOT – they and up with at least double the turn-out for Lil Wayne on Friday night. A massive-crowd relentlessly squeezes into the Which Stage area. The physical discomfort is palpable...
The heat is an invincible volcano blast of molten lava that robs you of energy and comfort and melts your good will. The constant milling of the masses is like a scene from Night of the Living Dead. These craven creatures of the new age are rude without intention, filling small spaces and stepping on feet, talking loudly while I try to listen to the lyrics. The band is superb, too good for their own britches as they reproduce their magnificent LP-note-for-note without straying even a minor chord away from the formula
It’s hard to stretch out with quaint story songs that have a beginning, middle, and end and have a moral to tell, a lesson to learn. Highlights include the entire first LP, note for note, song to song. The encore was Amazing Grace with Jerry Douglas and a few Old Crow Medicines dudes guesting. As Mumford & Sons get a little savvier they will stretch out and stray from the formula…and enjoy it


Saturday 7pm
Loretta Lynn
This show is traditional Country updated by the shared vision of Loretta Lynn and Joel White. Loretta is loose and friendly and conversational. It’s like playing music in your kitchen, drinking coffee and having a family sings along. Lynn is in a good mood and her voice has aged well like a fine wine, her range and timber is spot on. She has a rapid fire delivery that keeps the show moving like a runaway freight train. Her vocals are mic’d perfectly. front and center. Not too hot, not muffled. Her set list is a treasure trove of great country music from the sixties, most of which she wrote, though she sings Patsy Cline songs – I Fall To Pieces, Walkin’ After Midnight and Crazy - as a tribute to her fallen comrade. But I was especially taken by her solid gold hits such as You Ain’t Woman Enough to Take My Man, One’s on the Way, Don’t Come Home-Drinking.
Loretta seems to enjoy herself onstage like she’s sittin’ back and havin’ a conversation with a neighbor. This set showcases Lynn’s best songs. She’s a songsmith of the first degree, a great storyteller song-a faded genre.
Loretta does a remake of Louisiana Woman/Mississippi Man, that she did with Conway Twitty in 1959. She even did the 1ST song she ever wrote Honky Tonk Girl. Very cool.
As an aside she mentions her collaboration with Jack White sating, “He Left Me High and Dry”. Then she does a White-produced song. She closes with her autobiographical song Coal Miner’s Daughter.

Saturday 9:30pm
Buffalo Springfield
Buffalo Springfield is truly a legendary band that recorded three albums in three years. From 1966 through 1968 the Rock Press labeled Springfield as the American Beatles – other groups such as the Byrds and the Rascals also received such a dubious distinction. It casts a weird voodoo that casts a spell over otherwise gifted bands that makes the myth larger than live, an edifice no one can climb. The Buffalo Springfield eventually collapsed by the weight of their own immense talent and the over-the-top press
I just missed them though I was aware of their music and their appearance on the almost avant garde Smother Brothers television show. This Bonnaroo appearance was my last chance in a lifetime to see this legendary band. The band walked onto the stage with a roar from the crowd then Neil Young stepped up to the mic and intoned “Hello, We’re Buffalo Springfield” – a magic moment and opened with an incredible On the Way Home They went deep into their catalog-‘cos they had to…
Rock & Roll Woman, Burned, A Child’s Claim to Fame, Do I Have to Come Right Out and Say It, Hot Dusty Roads got equal time with their more popular songs such as Kind Woman (Furay’s ode of love to his wife) and a few great Neil Young songs including Mr. Soul, Broken Arrow, and I Am a Child. Steven still looked great and sounded even better. He was trim and energetic and having a ball performing an early masterpiece Bluebird. It was a rare and precious treat. And he did a powerful rock & roll version of his very first masterpiece For What It’s Worth. A few Furay ballads were unfamiliar to me and seemed to slow down the energy. But the encore, well…it was a dream come true. Young and the band recreated an outstanding Rockin’ in The Free World with Stills getting the second verse.

Saturday Night 11pm
Eminem
Eminem hits the stage running. This is high energy music and Eminem is part of a proud lineage that starts with Jack Scott, who opened up the scene in Detroit to Mitch Ryder, Bob Seger, the Stooges and MC5, Kid Rock and Jack White. Eminem is that good. He is a gifted lyricist that can talk about child abuse, pain and suffering and universal love all in the same song. He goes deep and real on hits like Cleaning Out My Closet and Fast Lane and Lighters (with Royce da 5’ 9”). There are automobile parts onstage from the “This is Detroit” Super Bowl commercial. There are several highlights worth mentioning – the outstanding performance of Eminem’s masterpiece about the duality of love and hate and the incredible medley near the end of the show that merged My Name Is/The Real Slim Shady/Without Me. The encore was a kickin’ Lose Yourself

1:30 PM Sunday
Mavis Staples
Mavis Staples is a gospel blues institution and she’s so inspiring and her gospel is so powerful that she can convince a poor sinner man like me to follow her down to the Jordan River and wade in the water. Truth. She’s been there and she can talk about the 1962 Freedom Riders ‘cos she’s been there – from Selma to Montgomery.
Staples is a purveyor of funky gospel and ancient blues. These are modern spiritual from the bowels of hell to the big sky where love, peace float amongst the clouds
You can dance the Freak to the Gospel of Mavis Staples. This is soul food for the masses
Mavis told us all - I came here to have a good time and she proceed sto tear down the walls with You Are Not Alone, a song about pain and misery and how love can conquer all, even the effects of poverty, violence and racism. This becomes a hand-clapping, tambourine-shaking “good time” and an affirmation of human courage in the face of desperate circumstances. She does a masterful version of the Weight (the Band cover) and ended with March Up Freedom’s Highway and the blues chestnut I’ll Take You There. A great performance. Mavis still got the gris gris

3:30pm Sunday
Black Dub
Daniel Lanois and Black Dub is a great band, an unexpected pleasure. Lanois gained fame producing U2 and helping to shape a sound that took the world by storm.
Black Dub’s singer has a powerful voice like Big Mama Thorton yet she is a short-haired blond pip squeak that looks like Peter Pan.T he music is finely crafted magic, soulful and sophisticated with well-conceived songs and a great leader/guitarist. Lanois is in top form He knows about sound and it pays off in spades
The songs are mini-symphonies – Silverado, Last Time (I Don’t Know), and Surely,
Lanois is an inventive guitar player who makes good use of sustained notation and fluid leads - full-tone notes up and down the neck from the bass string to the E string.
I Believe In You is a crazy good jazzed up blues. They close the show with The Maker. Excellent.

Sunday 4:30 PM
Greg Allman Band
Greg Allman is a legendary rock n’ roll warrior wit, the southern variety. Allman is a stubborn survivor who refuses to let adversity push him too deeply into the abyss and just as you think he’s finished, Allman picks himself up and dusts himself off and says, “Is that all you got...it’s not a question; it’s a statement. The music is the message and it is through his songs that Allman is able to talk about those things that cannot be spoken He’s been up and down and all around the piss pot and though he’s sullied his reputation and sold his soul, Allman has persevered .Despite his years of addiction and other personal problems, Allman has emerged no worse for the wear with a few scars and a hard-earned wisdom. His new CD, Low Country Blues, is a winner. His first solo effort since the seventies is long overdue. In this marvelous set, Allman confirms his legendary status. He opens with “I’m No Angel,” a Billboard hit in 1986, peaking @ 49 on the charts. This concert version is slower, with a more laconic vocal presentation. Otherwise it doesn’t stray far from the recorded version.
Sound is bleeding in from a nearby stage, creating a cacophony of sound interference with Allman’s performance. This is a consistent problem at Bonnaroo as the promoters try to squeeze too many acts into small spaces that are too close to other stages.
Allman’s trademark Keep on Trying is a righteous 12 bar blues colored with saxophone flourishes, intricate piano arpeggios, and some great acoustic pickin’. This is followed by a great Allman Brothers song I Don’t Know. Allman’s incredible piano trills lead into an extended jam that takes down the road apiece
Allman dusts off Goin’ Back To Daytona and sings like he’s 19 years old again. He sure ‘enuf hits the pocket with his exuberant performance You can hear the smile in his voice as he sings. It’s an autobiographical tune about the Allman Brothers early days when they were starting to establish themselves as the Allman Joys. This is one of the best performances at Bonnaroo, marred only by PA problems and a non-stop cacophony of seeping sounds

Sunday 7pm
Robert Plant & Band of Joy
Robert Plant & Band of Joy presented a courageous show that in the end proved to be more than masterful. It was sublime. He honored his past by performing seven Led Zeppelin songs. His old mates would be proud, not that he tried capture the glory of the originals but that he recreated them in his own image, 42 years later.
Plant looked his age but he was fit and though his long curly locks had lost some luster and his scruffy beard betrayed a hint of gray, his energy was astounding. He was all over the stage. Despite all the obvious signs of aging, Plant is still a magnificent singer. His rich expressive tenor has dropped a few octaves but he can still sing with an impressive range and almost perfect pitch. He opened a slowed down country-blues version of Black Dog followed by Down to the Sea and a great Los Lobos cover Angel Dance. Plant performs several songs from his past, only the arrangements are based in acoustic folk and country blues. What Is and Should Never Be is reconfigured quite nicely and Plant’s voice is rich and expressive
In the middle of the show young folks are walking out in droves. This music doesn’t sound like Led Zeppelin… this is a country/blues band with a touch of rock. Those who expected Zep must have been terribly disappointed. But this is simply a function of not paying attention. Band of Joy is a great band
The songs, music and performances are masterful. This may be the best show I’ve seen at Bonnaroo. Plant dusts off the Zeppelin catalog and gives us House of the Holy, Black Country Woman, Misty Mountain Woman, Ramble On, and Gallows Pole (an encore) My favorite song was a Page/Plant collaboration a touching and sentimental Please Read My Letter. It was originally written for a Page and Plant Tour and then redone with Allison Krauss. It is beautiful. Now my life is complete

This 5600 word treatise on Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival comes straight from the heart. It is a labor of love. It is about as thorough as such reviews get. I did not gloss over the problems facing the corporate entity that produced this massive event. In some ways it’s too big. It seems that 700 acres is not quite enough space for a mid-sized Tent City of 80,000 souls. There was crime - thefts and drug deals and bootleg merchandise. Two people died. Inconvenience was the clarion call but it did not stop us from experiencing the beauty of live original music. There was something for everyone - rock & roll, folk, gospel, blues. rap, hip hop, roots, eletronica, trance and more. There was a comedy club, a movie theatre, yoga, tribal dance, and panel discussions Adult Swim was a way cool interactive game with winners that got t-shirts and other cool stuff. But for me the most unexpected pleasure at Bonnaroo was the Garnier Fructis Salon. I had one of the most sensuous and refreshing experience EVER when a beautiful yet exhausted (I was # 726) young staffer gave me a hair washing that tickled my toes, blew my mind, and made it move.
The Bonnaroo experience is a statement about how much we still crave the nourishment of music and the arts in a deep soul way. Have a Happy Roo!


Peace & Love
Bo White