Here comes the joker
with his silly grin
he carries a martini
made of bathtub gin
Wendy's on the windowsill
Waiting to be let in
And were all in the bathtub now
Making Bathtub Gin
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The Joker
is enjoying:
making bathtub gin:
the joker
31, Pisces
Denver, CO
Windowsill Wendy
is enjoying:
windowsill wendy
29, Capricorn
Denver, CO
"Music is a spiritual expression of what's in your heart. Music as a way of getting rich is a pretty new thing, and I often wonder if the mega-bucks glitzy atmosphere is making the quality of music suffer. You have to work really hard to get around that and remember why you're in it in the first place: because you have to be. It's like an addiction. You can't go a day without picking up your guitar. To me, the only commercial goals that are really valid are, 'Boy, I wish I didn't have to go to work. I wish I could do this all the time."
-Trey Anastasio
"Impose rules to make life simpler. Break them to make life more fun."
-Jon Fishman
Sunday, June 27, 2004
From the Road Update #4: Indianapolis, Deer Creek and Alpine Valley
posted 6:02 PM by the joker
All I can say is holy shit. A lot has happened, and this might be long. Sorry for misspellings or typo's, I didnt have a chance to proofread this and Im typing on wordpad instead of a program with spell check.
Tues 6/22
Pauly and I left Niagara and drove all day to Indianapolis, where we stayed with a friend of a friend. Our host, Sean, was a childhood friend of one of my best friends and we had never met before. When we got to his house in Indy, Sean was completely utterly stoned. It was really funny to meet this character. I would best describe him as a cross between Spicoli and Joey from friends. The guy was about 30 and still had college fraternity letters proubly displayed in his house. Good stuff. He was funny, and a little strange, but also really nice. Sean insisted on taking us on a driving tour of the "hot spots" and "whore bars" that he frequents in Indy (the hottest area in all of Indiana!) even though we were completely exhausted. I got a really good nights sleep, though, and I sure needed it.
Wed 6/23
The drive to Deer Creek from Indy is only about 30 minutes, so we got up early, got some supplies and headed to the campsites at Deer Creek. Deer Creek is now called Verizion Wireless blah blah blah but everyone still calls it Deer Creek. Its a great Amphatheater and has camping adjacent to the concert area, so everyone just parties all day and goes to the show, then parties all night in the campsites and lot after the show. The weather was beautiful and perfect once again- highs in about the 70's and it got down in the 50's at night- cool enough to wear a hoodie.
As we were driving into the campsites, I ran into a guy I met at Bonnaroo and he is friends with a band that was playing an afterparty in the campsites. He directed us to a awesome campsite that was close to shakedown street as well as close to the area the band was going to play later. That afternoon before the show Pauly and I just had a great time hanging out, meeting people, drinking some beers and enjoying the weather. Chris and Mer from Dallas came to meet us and we all went to the show together and sat in the Lawn. It was the only show of the tour that I sat in the lawn, but I enjoyed it and it was fun to have a bigger group at the show. The Setlist:
Setlist 6/23/04
Verizon Wireless Music Center, Noblesville, IN (a.k.a. Deer Creek), 7:43 PM
Set 1 Llama, Bouncing Around the Room, Bathtub Gin, Ya Mar, Pebbles and Marbles, Army of One, Split Open and Melt
Set 2 Halley's Comet -> Crosseyed and Painless -> Slave to the Traffic Light, Nothing -> 46 Days -> Scents and Subtle Sounds -> jam -> Brian and Robert, Limb By Limb, Cavern
Encore: Waste
I thought this was a great show, but looking back it might be my least favorite of the tour. But it had its moments. The Halley's Comet -> Crosseyed and Painless -> Slave to the Traffic Light was awesome. There was a huge glowstick war during Halley's. And I got my Bathtub Gin in the first set, so that was fun. Pauly isnt too fond of Waste as an Encore, so we left the show at the encore and beat everyone going out. We walked straight back to the campsites and the party was already going. The band was playing (they played all night) and there was also a balloon tank next to us. I sold a few bloody mary's and white russians, lit some candles, and watched the balloon suckers stumble forth into the night. It was a beautiful night and I passed out sometime in the early morning.
Thurs 6/24
Thursday morning I woke up kinda late (thank you Xanax!) around 11am. I picked up the camp a little bit, then set up the bloody mary show on shakedown and played some guitar. I had a great time selling and met a lot of cool people. I even traded a bloody mary for a breakfast a guy next to me was selling- scrambled eggs, sausage, and biscuts and gravy. Sometimes its the little things that make your day. That shit was better than waffle house.
Thurs afternoon we went down to the show a little early and got our seats. Pauly and I met up with Cory from Dallas and some of his crew. We had seats on mike side kinda behind the soundboard and at this show we probably had the coolest most enthusiastic group of people around us all tour (which is saying a lot!). The show Thurs night was one of my favorites all time. The setlist:
6.24.04 Verizon Wireless Music Center, Deer Creek, IN
Set I: Loving Cup, Cities, Back On The Train, Vultures, My Mind's Got a Mind of its Own, Down With Disease > Rock and Roll
Set II: Tube, Antelope, The Wedge, Timber Ho, Prince Caspian > Simple, Walls of the Cave
Encore: The Squirming Coil
This whole show was amazing start to finish. The Loving Cup opener had everyone singing along. Cities is probably my favorite Phish cover and I had been playing & singing it all afternoon on shakedown. The Down w/Disease>Rock and Roll segue was HUGE. I went to the bathroom at setbreak, passed out some prisim glasses, and then it seemed like time slipped through my hands a little bit and I heard the roar of the crowd while I was still in the lawn and Phish was coming on stage. I started moving toward my seat and then they opened with Tube, one of Pauly and I's favorties. Imagine a screaming maniac yelling YES! YES! TUBE! YES! running over people to get down into the pavillion...cause that was me. Antelope was huge also.Marco Esquandolas...OHHHHH to be Prince Caspian with stumps instead of feet...timber! woa timber! we've got it simple! cause we've got a band! It was all a big singalong and I loved it.
The party back at the camp was a little more chill than the night before, but EVERYONE was just fukked up. I mean, I had so many weird conversations with people and it was a lot of fun being wasted and talking to wasted people. I even met a woman that makes custom stickers- Including Aqua Teen Hungerforce. She had made little toys of Shake, Frylock, and Meatwad- we had a little show with the action figure toys she had made- I was the voice of meatwad. Maybe you had to be there and all that, but it was hilarious.
Fri 6/25
Friday was probably the toughest day of the whole tour so far. We left the Creek about 9:30, but didnt get to meet up with Jeff in Chicago until about 4:30 because of HORRIBLE traffic (it was supposed to be about a 3 hour drive to Chicago). I parted ways with Pauly in Chicago at a McDonalds and then rushed to Jeff's to shower and hit the road again to get up to Alpine Valley. It was friday afternoon, 5 pm. More traffic. We are rushing, rushing, rushing, and Jeff mentions a couple of times that his back feels weird. We finally get to Alpine Valley, meet up with Scott, and its 7:45. The band is going to take the stage any moment. Rush, rush rush. Then, something weird and scary happens. Jeff falls down. He cant walk. His back is messed up. We stumble to our seats in time for a great show, but Jeff's back problems where a concern. Anyway, Jeff is gonna be ok, but I had to take him back to Chicago after the show (which kinda sukked), but what do you do.
The shows at Alpine were kinda like the Greatest Hits of Phish shows. The setlist:
Setlist 6/25/04
Alpine Valley, East Troy, WI, 7:52 PM
Set 1 Julius, Roses Are Free -> AC/DC Bag, Glide, Anything But Me, David Bowie, Wolfman's Brother, Golgi Apparatus
Set 2 Seven Below -> Buffalo Bill -> Lawn Boy* -> Mike's Song -> I am Hydrogen -> Weekapaug Groove** You Enjoy Myself -> 2001 -> You Enjoy Myself (vocal jam)
EncoreSample In a Jar
Notes*Page takes time to sign autograph during Lawn Boy
**Seven Below tease
I loved getting to hear the Ween cover Roses Are Free in the first set. The Bowie and Wolfman's were great too. But the real fireworks were at the second set. By the way, we had the best seats I have ever had at a phish show that night, about 12 rows back. The whole second set is just classic phish. The YEM>2001>Yem Vocal jam is just sick and you have to listen to it. I would probably rank that as my favorite segue of the whole tour.
6/26- My most Epic day of the Tour.
I woke up around 11am back in Chicago and Jeff called some of his friends that were going to the show from chicago he knew from work. I met up with them, we got some groceries, and headed back up to Alpine Valley. I mad fast friends with the Chicago crew and we cooked out. It was a beautiful afternoon and I decided to go for a walk in the lot. When I came back, the guys parked next to us, also cooking out and doing the exact same thing as us, were busted for somking pot by undercover cops and each got a $460 fine! I couldnt believe it. That so could have been me. Luck prevails again.
The lot scene at Alpine can be summed up as this: Hot midwestern girls everywhere, everyone looking for drugs, and no one selling drugs. I was lucky and saw a guy I met in Saratoga and he hooked me up with a mushroom chocolate. This is important because it comes in big time later. Oh, and at some point in the lot I met Mike driving around on a golf cart. The nerdy bassist wouldnt sign my book, but he was nice about it. Cool to shake his hand- my hand is bigger than his, which surprised me for some reason.
The show was OFF THE HOOK. Here it is:
Setlist 6/26/04
by Carini, Alpine Valley, East Troy, WI, 7:48 PM
Set 1 Access Me*, Scents and Subtle Sounds, Stash**, The Moma Dance, The Divided Sky, Wilson -> Funky Bitch, Character Zero
Set 2 Boogie On Reggae Woman -> Ghost -> Free, Friday -> Piper -> Harry Hood
Encore Possum
Notes*First time played in concert.
**After Stash, Trey and Mike rearrange their mic stands in jest.
Im gonna go on the record and say that this Set I was my favorite Set I of the tour. Everything was great. I started tripping hard during Stash and by the time Divided Sky came around I was having a spiritual moment with the music. I also loved the Wilson -> Funky Bitch, Character Zero. Great stuff.
Ok, here is where things started getting really crazy. The crowd was HUGE that night, probably the biggest of the tour. The push to the restrooms at setbreak was practically unbearable. It took me about 20 minutes of being packed into a crowd moving so slightly until I finally got to the restrooms. Now I gotta tell you this was a scene. There is about 200 people crammed into the restrooms waiting to take a piss, there are guys and girls everywhere outside shouting, and people are pissing everywhere that there was a tree, bush, or corner. I just waited in line and took this crazy scene in. Then, security comes over and tries to get people to stop pissing in the trees and on the fence and everywhere else. Some people ran, others ignored them. What can 5 security guards do to 100 people pissing on a fence? Then, crazy shit really went down. I see people getting kicked out or escorted out. More shouting. Then someone turns and pisses on a security guard that was telling him to stop. Then, seizing the moment, 5 or 6 people crash the gate (the show was sold out) and run into the crowd. Most get away but one person got wrestled to the ground by 2 security guards. This is all happening while im tripping my balls off and standing in line, inching forward ever so slightly. I finally get to piss and get back to my seat, and about 5 minutes later the second set started.
Set 2 was just SICK! Ive never heard a better Boogie on and Jam. Ghost>Free was great, even Friday was good. Piper. Hood. Where do you go when the lights go out? Harry...HOOD! Harry...HOOD! Where do you go? This show had all the crowd interaction songs in it and the crowd was loud. A great great show.
After the show instead of going to my car, I walk to the hotel/resort that is behind Alpine Valley where the Dallas crew was staying and I was going to party & stay with them for the night. I got to the hotel and it is 100% people who had been at the show, and it is a 100% party. People dancing, drinking, running around, you name it, it was there. I find the dallas crew and hang out for a little bit to let the traffic die down until I thought it would be good to move my car from the main lot back to the hotel. It was supposed to be about a mile walk to my car from the resort- Doughboy offered to drive me but I said I wanted to walk because 1) it might sober me up a little bit and 2) it would be fun to go though the lots at my last normal Phish show. My reasoning ended up being correct, but I had NO idea what I was in for next.
I start out walking up this hill on a paved road. THe road seems to be going away from the lots. I can hear the people partying in the lots and see all the firewords that people are setting off. Im still kinda tripping and it really was a beautiful scene. Its really dark out, the half moon looked errie with a wisp of cloud around it, the stars are out, and i am completely by myself walking in the night. I decide that maybe the road will take me further out than I want to go, so I decide to take the most direct route to the fireworks, which appears to be just through some woods.
I push through the brush (which was pretty thick) and then all of a sudden, i am in a cornfield. Im talking like a Field of Dreams cornfield. It was the trippiest thing ever. I am sorta scared, sort of amazed, sort of thinking that this is just a special special moment. There is no one else around in this huge cornfield and the corn stalks are about waist high. I start making my way though the field, watching the fireworks, and tripping out at the fireflies that would buzz past me every once in a while, making me wonder if im losing it completely or not or if there is really a floating glowstick.
After being in the corn for about 10-15 minutes i see in the distance 2 figures. Im kinda scared that i might get shot at or arrested for tresspassing in a farmer's property. the figures get closer and I call out to them "Do you see me?" they reply relunctantly "Yes...Friend or Foe?" We figure out that we are all doing the same thing, all spun out phish kids lost in a cornfield trying to get back to our cars. Roddick and Bill from Indiana were my new companions in this adventure, and they had a bottle of Whiskey to keep us warm. By the time we get through the cornfield, out pants are completely soaked from all the water coming off the corn (I guess the crop had just been watered). Out of the cornfield, into more brush. We can see and hear the lots still, it seems like they are not very far away. Int othe brush and trees we go.
Now, imagine you are in brush so thick you cant move through it. And its so dark you cant see 1 foot in front of you. Blair Witch times ten. We move through the woods. Down a hill. Up a hill. More brush. We are in the brush for 30-45 minutes. Then our moment of Zen. we can see the parking lot. I can actually see my car. But there is one more thing- a chain link fence with slanted barb wire at the top. We try to climb over but cant. Nothing to do but to walk the fence line until we finally get out of the brush and into the parking lot. Celebration. Rejoicing. We all three hug and laugh and look at each other in the ligh for the first time. What a great experience- this is why I go to Phish shows. This is adventure. A little stupid maybe, but Im still alive and smiling.
So, after an hour and a half I get in my car, drive (on the road this time) to the resort (which was about a 5 minute drive). The party is still going, actually I think it was just getting started. We drink, we dance, we meet people from all over the country. I passed out on the floor of the Dallas Crew's room at about 5 am. What a night.
Now Im in Chicago, recovering...I think we are going to go see Dodgeball tonight and I think the next stop is Mt. Rushmore. Ill keep you posted.
I love Wisconsin corn farmers,
Neil
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