April 02, 2008

{The Canadian Boy is Out Of His Mind.......Again}

I'm a sucker for the old Winooski HG from '98 to '04 but the 'new' spot just amazes me on the quality of acts since day one. There is literally a great act a week minimum that I would love to attend and sometimes do when living on the east coast of Can. Maybe I like the old spot so much because the owner would sell me yearly passes. (expensive but worth it, I saw over 200 shows at the Winooski spot alone, including most soundchecks)Oh, and a lot of free posters and the occasional free fries.

{{ 'No matter where this journey takes me, This place will always be my home' }}

You don't miss a Biscuits HG show. That's the bottom line. I believe other that The Ogden, The Electric, the Fox Boulder,9:30 & The Cap in modern times. Higher Ground is another home where they do so well. Always 2-3 shows runs. Thank you Trey-in-law. ps- rumor!!: the city will shortly vote on building a covered amphitheatre on the outskirts of town. Man, I hope so. No more fields, or down near the marina or other shitty sounding places.

note on the NUGS copy...the bass is a tad oversaturated at some spots. still a solid recording.

[C pile] ok to good) 7-11(2), Little Lai, Floodlights

[B pile] very good to near excellence) Caves, HDPF(3), 7-11(1), Sven

[A pile] fantastic / monumental / on another level) House Dog Party Favor ~> Air Song(both) ~> House Dog Party Favor ~> Spacebirdmatingcall ~> ____________ / The City, Astronaut.

Firstly, Future Rock can PLAY! nice surprise. But the thousands of setbreak DJ's across the years? In all honesty, no, didn't care for it. Unless you're on the rail, that's "smoke 'em if you got 'em time" I do appreciate how they brought all of the artists to the masses though. That's pretty kind and a hassle they did not need to take but did anyway. Props!

While the 2nd set has fantastic moments the 7-11 jam > as well as Little Lai ending ~> Caves of the East. Marc & Allen's playing=A+ in the above mentioned tunes. This 'Caves' is nice and patient, reminding me a lot of another great version of April 25 2009 in Asheville which just oozes into an all-timer HAB. This one is a little creepier until the second half on the song where Barber's ever so nimble fingers play beautifully. We must give it up for not mailing it in for the encore. It's an excellent "Astronaut" with a decent SITA jam...nothing like the Dec.14th one a few months later, which is one of my favorites, but a great encore nonetheless. Another feel good combo with good content and less untzin' around and around is ''City~>Air Song" 'The City' and 'Humu' are 2 Marc tunes that really are so fun live. Feel good smoke rings in the sky. The second half of this "City" is interesting. Stop-n-Go backing while Barber lays down some tasty licks. I kinda wished this section to stretch a little more but it does kinda run it's course after all. The 'Air Song" has an excellent jam with Jon & Mr. Mags really working well with each other, it's a huge jam imo. I would like to give the night's MVP and a coupon for 5$ off any bucket of KFC original recipe to Mr. Magner, who is definitely not on testosterone replacement therapy :)

But the 1st set!!?? That where serene yet cosmic playing reaches great levels. It's a solid triple just short of a home run. There is a wonderful section from the weird and crazy ending of 'Airsong' (of hell of a version and near the top of 2.0 versions imo) through 'House Dog' (that post 'Sanitarium' jam is the tops) then squeaking into Spacebird which can be seen coming a mile away but not as a negative. Allen is simply ridiculous here. He uses all parts of the kit with ease-->> go to HDPF(2of3) for the last 3 minutes and through 'Spacebird' insanity. I am 100% certain you have ALL watched a chunk of time at a show just staring at the red haired alien drummer for an extended period of time, in awe, not believing the ease, perfect timing and ability to revive a tune at any time. It's something I will never get bored of. Besides '71 to '74 Kreutzmann, Bernard Purdie & David Garibaldi he's the best drummer ever. The familiar opening chords that "officially" call in the 'Bird' is at around 3 minutes in and it is accompanied by some great Barber playing. Mags has the signal to drop in and it's a nice one. I have to mention Brownie's playing pre-"Now I'm at ease deflating on a whim..." is fantastic and seemingly outside of the normalcy if you will.

If you have the opportunity to get a hold of some 'YODA OG' cannabis medicine, please do so. If you need rest because you just are not getting enough sleep or are felling too heady because of life's pressures, this OG will open the door to rejuvenation of the highest standard. It's also great for pain. It does wonders to my sick digestive systems. Be aware. It's strong. Like, "Yes I would like delivered 4 pints of ice cream and a jumbo box of double fudge soft cookies please" type strong.

If life was like a musical, people start dancing and singing out of nowhere, what would you do? <

peace.

The HDPF jam does very little for me, and the transition to Air Song is obvious for several minutes before they finally segue. That said, the reversed audio sound that Magner uses during the beginning of Air Song is very, very cool. This gets used a bunch at the beginning of the Air Song jam as well. This gives such a cool, unique, psychedelic feel to the jam, and I don’t know that Magner has ever used it before or since. Not sure why he wouldn’t incorporate this at some point again given how ridiculously cool it is. This eventually gives way to a sweeping lead that drives an increase in tempo. Allen is all over e-drums throughout this jam, and overall they craft a really interesting piece of music prior to going back to HDPF. As they return to HDPF Magner has some intense sound effects he launches on top of the jam that are pretty neat. The jam out of the middle of House Dog has some cool lead lines from Magner, but they never really capitalize on this. There’s a section near the end of this jam where they land on a VI-VII-I progression. This part is certainly neat and develops nicely into the beginning of Spacebird. The HDPF ending jam is pretty obvious coming out of Spacebird, but that doesn’t stop this from being a great rendition. Magner is the all-star here with some absolutely awesome leads using a combined synth/piano patch. He and Barber harmonize really well during this peak, and it leads to some great stuff.

7-11 to begin the second set starts with a “towel” jam that slowly evolves into Floodlights. This wasn’t interesting at all, nor was the jam out of Floodlights into Svenghali ending. The City has a short intro vamp jam. This isn’t really a full jam, and just last a minute or two. This version of The City is the first time they use the line, “15 miles above the city,” so that’s neat. During the first couple of minutes in this jam, Barber teases “Sanford and Son.” Okay then. This jam doesn’t really go anywhere for most of it, and this feels like a lot of water treading up to the Air Song return. However, as they get closer to Air Song, I like the piano-heavy theme that Magner plays. This warrants a small highlight. The jam out of Lai is just a little too short for me to really latch on to it, however, the couple minutes before the drop into Caves of the East are pretty neat with a great syncopated feel to them. The jam into Caves is extremely aimless, and each member of the band is sort of just doing their own thing. This was unpleasant for me to listen to. They eventually get to the ending of 7-11, though notably they never played the second portion of the cauliflower dreams section of 7-11 (which leads into the usual trance jam). This is an interesting breakup of the song, as it’s technically beginning only in the beginning of the set and ending only in the ending of the set. Interesting stuff. The SITA jam is pretty straightforward and forgettable. The main jam begins with a great groove right out of the gate, with some cool hits from Magner and minimal, restrained guitar work from Barber. Magner develops a phased synth lead that has an almost hypnotic quality to it as they vamp for a bit. This is cool, but they never really develop this very much before heading into the ascent to the Astronaut ending section.

Highlights: HDPF (1), Air Song*, Spacebird, The City, Astronaut (2)