Rothbury 2008 (or These Rothburys Taste Like Rothburys): Friday

I woke up Friday morning around 9:00 a.m. to find out that one of my business partners, let's call him Einstein, had not yet sold a single smoothie despite having been open for two hours. Apparently, the ice truck that he went to in the morning didn't have any ice and so rather than going to one of the other 10 ice trucks or the general store or getting in the car and driving .2 miles to the Rothbury Gas Station, Einstein thought that it would be better if he just turned away all of the customers until the magic ice ferry suddenly appeared.

We let our old friend Jumbie, who makes all sorts of trippy show posters, sell some of his art under the table at the booth. Not only did we make a couple of extra bucks on the posters, but we got a ton of people to stop by, look at our menu, and order stuff just because the art caught their eye. It also helped that whatever combination of drugs the guy was on made him a great salesman. Unfortunately, that same combination later inspired him to give away the vast majority of his posters for free at one of the late night shows. Hopefully he gets his shit together and puts up a website one of these days, because these posters of his really are spectacular.


The booth was pretty busy all morning and I basically worked until Tea Leaf Green. I was excited to see this band after enjoying the hell out of them at Summer Camp, and was even more psyched when I saw that Reed Mathis was on the bass, because he definitely brings this group to a whole other level. Unfortunately for some reason it was a pretty weak set overall. There were some moments, but it just seemed like a really slow, uninspired performance. In general it seemed that there was too much soft piano and not enough guitar. Maybe my expectations were so high that they were bound to disappoint, maybe they were just tired. Either way, one lackluster performance has not reduced my opinion of this band, especially if Reed Mathis sticks around. His bass playing was definitely the highlight of the set for me.

We caught Yonder Mountain with Fishman next and this was an absolutely perfect daytime show. Everyone was dancing, the hippies were twirling, and the hula-hoopers were hooping. Although I wanted Fishman to be center-stage whaling out some sort of Moby Dick action, I realized that this was Yonder with Fishman and not Fishman with Yonder. Although YMSB's music doesn't exactly highlight Fishman's strengths as a drummer (it seems like most of their music has very simple, basic rhythms), that's not to say that he didn't add anything to the mix. You could tell how excited these guys were to have Jon Fucking Fishman playing with them, and it definitely translated to a great, high-energy set, if only to impress the drummer. I'm not familiar enough with YMSB's catalog to really give a song-by-song breakdown, but "Two Hits and the Joint Turned Brown" was definitely the highlight of the set for me.


Two Hits and the Joint Turned Brown:





Unfortunately, between all of the work, walking back and forth, and lack of sleep, I was too exhausted to make much music on Friday night. We sat around listened to Widespread Panic from the booth and watched the fireworks before packing it in early. I'd have to say that one of the biggest disappointments for me this weekend, surprisingly enough, was missing Widespread Panic. Not because I'm a huge WSP fan or anything, but because Ann Marie Calhoun (of fiddle "Stash" and "Ripple" fame) sat in for a decent chunk of the show. Although I was disappointed, I knew that sleep Friday night would mean energy for Sound Tribe on Saturday night, which was more important to me anyway. Besides, I was scheduled to open the booth at 7:00 a.m. on Saturday, so the sleep was totally necessary.