Last night I dusted off some XLII and rocked out to my tape deck. While listening to the show (
SCI, 1999-05-21) a smile grew on my face as I thought of all the good times I had when I started following bands around the country. Being as this show was from the first festival I ever attended I figured I would start a thread to see how others were exposed to the festival scene.
It was May, 1999 and I was a senior in high school. My friend and I (touring buddy) were trying to figure out what to do on our senior skip day, which fell on that Friday. A month earlier we saw String Cheese Incident for the first time at a small bar (Styleene\'s Rhythm Palace) in downtown Syracuse. It turned out they were playing a festival in Brandywine, MD called All Good. Also on the bill was moe., the Disco Biscuits, Sector 9, Karl Denson\'s Tiny Universe, Deep Banana Blackout and ViperHouse. Tickets were only $40. It was Thursday after school and we were discussing how we could pull off this trip with our limited funds when another friend of ours (he was a Junior) overheard our conversation. He was a big SCI fan and said he was in! Now we had enough money to get down there and back. My friend\'s dad said we could use his car. We packed it up early Friday morning and hit the road.
The ride down changed me forever. It wasn\'t the nice weather or the beautiful scenery, but it was the freedom of being on the open road with my friends. We had the tunes cranking (early 90s rap and a James Brown boxed set) and were just 3 young kids enjoying life. This is when I fell in love with \'touring\'. I knew this weekend was going to be an eye-opener for all three of us and I couldn\'t have been more excited.
The line to get in to the festival was short and quickly flowing. We set up our tents and strolled over to the main stage just in time for ViperHouse. This band opened for SCI at Styleene\'s. I was a big fan of them and really enjoyed their set. Later on in the afternoon I hung out with the violin and one of the horn players for a while and told them how we all came down from Syracuse for the festival. One of them bought me a beer and the whole band (9 or so of them) signed a big festival program for me. I don\'t recall the order of the bands after that but I do remember SCI was closing out the night. They absolutely killed their set and left a buzz over the crowd for the rest of the night. It\'s hard to gauge the size of the crowd but I would say roughly 400-500 people were there, at most.
The next morning we checked out Sector 9, who kicked off the day, and were blown away. Their percussionist sat in for a song with SCI the night before. I definitely preferred Sector 9 in their original format, as more of a jamband instead of all untz-untzy. A couple bands later Deep Banana Blackout took the stage as the clouds were rolling in. Their lead singer was taunting the storm to do its worst. Bad idea. It didn\'t look too pretty out so I headed back to the tent, which was only a couple hundred yards from the stage, to close all the windows. On my way back everyone was heading my way. Apparently the stage blew over, almost taking out the drummer. They needed to suspend the playing until the stage was fixed.
After the storm quickly passed everyone gathered in the main stage area. A HUGE drum circle formed while a bunch of frisbees were being thrown in the adjacent grass, where I was. I remember at one point all the drums suddenly hitting the \'Not Fade Away\' rhythm simultaneously which resulted in a roar from the crowd. Even though no bands were on stage everyone there was happy just hanging out together enjoying the vibe.
Just before the sun went down Karl Denson\'s Tiny Universe took the stage. Unfortunately, the Disco Biscuits set was canceled due to the stage repair time. Right before they kicked off their set I look to my right and I see Michael Kang standing right next to me (SCI violin/mandolin player). He starts chatting it up with Denson and yells a couple requests. During the show Kang is rocking out to the band as me and my buddy stand there with perma-grins on our faces. This is what we came down here for! I chatted with Kang a little after the Denson set but another storm rolled in, this time a huge downpour, and everyone retreated to their tents.
Our tent took a brutal beating from the rain and basically left us sleeping in the car. Somehow I lost my shoes and was forced to walk around barefoot the rest of the night. As we finally get to the car I heard a roar from the main stage. My friends declined to come but I high tailed it to the stage to see what was going on. Turns out moe. was playing an acoustic set without only a couple speakers. They ripped through a bunch of covers and originals to the applause of the 40-50 people hanging around the stage. Though the storm trashed the stage and canceled some of the shows from happening,
this set was a real treat and almost made it all worth it.
The next morning we packed up our gear and hit the road back to Syracuse. We were tired, wet, hungry and had just enough money to pay for gas but none of that mattered. Our eyes had been opened to a new world that we couldn\'t wait to get back to.
