Photo Credit - Robb Cohen
Intrepid Cold Turkey Podcasters and Relix Reporters Mike Greenhaus
and Benjy Eisen Rough It On the High Seas, Where They Encounter Mad
Pirates, Musical Mayhem and Magical Hijinks.
Day 1
New years are for new beginnings and, likewise, new beginnings are born
from new years. Sure, clocks and calendars are arbitrary measures of
time, but cycles are real—and thus, every 12 months we give ourselves a
new start, a new beginning, a new year. And what better way to start
the New Year than by sailing the high seas with a pocketful of high
jinks and a head full of resolutions.
The very idea of Jam Cruise—a weeklong adventure on a
cruise ship with dozens of the world’s best live bands—is clutch enough
in itself. But schedule it for the first week of the year, and you’ve
got yourself a voyage that could actually mean something as well. Now,
what it means exactly and what you choose to do with it is up to each
individual passenger. But the cards are all out on the table
And so, after a four-night run with the Disco Biscuits that
culminated in an all-night New Year’s Eve celebration at the Tweeter
Center in Camden, NJ, a portion of the Relix Magazine crew sat
bleary-eyed and exhausted at the Philadelphia International Airport en
route to Florida. Fort Lauderdale has become an unlikely mecca for live
music fans, but sure enough, dedicated jamband fans have become well
acquainted with it, thanks to both Jam Cruise and the Langerado Music Festival (which takes place in March).
Photo Credit - David Vann
  
When we left Philadelphia, we were just another bunch of weary
travelers in a busy airport on one of the busiest travel days of the
year. Members of various bands—including Tea Leaf Green
and the Disco Biscuits—were on our flights. And by the time we touched
down in Fort Lauderdale, we were undeniably back in IT, the first wave
of passengers arriving for Jam Cruise.
We finally got the first hours of shut-eye in more than 48 hours at a
hotel on the beach. We’re not going to sleep for another week. Now
we’re sitting in port, waiting for customs to give us the all-clear.
And then we’re off!
It’s warm out. There are palm trees. It’s the first day of 2007. We’re
about to sail the South Pacific with bands, booze, islands, pools,
dance parties, and undetermined revelry. But clearly there are no
passengers on this boat — only explorers.
Day 2: Somewhere Between Pie and Infinity
I was born at precisely 1:09AM and have strictly adhered to a nocturnal
sleep schedule ever since. Add to that a winter trip overseas, some New
Year’s Eve jet leg, and a not-so-heady Atlantic Ocean time change and
the line between day and night has blurred to the point where eggs only
taste good at night and, for some reason, pizza sounds good for
breakfast. Which makes Jam Cruise the ideal place to vacation since, no
matter what time of day or night it is, you can stumble out of bed and
into a game of poker, a guest-laden performance or, yes, a slice of
pizza. And, if the sun never set on the British Empire, the show is
certainly never over for Funk Nation, which sent a number of
able-bodied representatives on Jam Cruise to answer the age-old
algebraic question: How many ways can you add up the Dirty Dozen Brass
Band, The Meters, the Neville Family, the Greyboy Allstars and
Galactic, divide by Skerik, and get a supergroup which has never played
before.
As it turns out the, answer is, luckily, somewhere between pie and
infinity and Jam Cruise has been able to produce a number of jazz/funk,
or really slightly jazzy, really funky, supergroups the likes of which
have never been seen. Want to hear Meters bassist George Porter Jr. jam
with the Dirty Dozen horns? We got that covered in the Jam Room on deck
six! Want to see what he sounds like when placed next to some of Jerry
Garcia’s favorite psychedelic musicians (rolled into a new version of
the proto-jamband Zero)? Just walk down the hall and hear him play bass
with Steve Kimock! Want to hear him with the current kings of New
Orleans funk, Galactic? Well, while you went to the bathroom he rode
the elevator upstairs and is playing with them right now on the Pool
Deck. Oh, and while you were scoring big at poker (just kidding, alas)
or watching Allman Brothers Derek Trucks and Oteil Burbridge in Jam
Cruise’s Mass wedding (no, seriously!), Karl Denson and Skerik staged a
not-so-hostile takeover of both Dumpstaphunk’s set in the Caruso Lounge
and Galactic’s abovementioned poolside set. Oh, and even though I’d
never really expect Berklee guitar master Eric Krasno to be a fan of
the Band, he’s also tearing it up on a cover of “The Weight” with Derek
Trucks and his wife Susan Tedeschi (who scored Trucks’ plus one on the
boat and has remained busy onstage for a girl on vacation).
But the best part of Jam Cruise is that it takes that blurry-eyed New
Orleans Jazz Fest enthusiasm and resets it in guitar fantasy camp. For
instance, what better way to bond with Disco Biscuits’ Jon Gutwillig
than by stealing his earning from a near sold-out show at Camden, NJ’s
Tweeter Center in a game of poker (just ask my podcast co-host, Benjy,
when he gets back from filming an episode of Wookies Gone Wild on the
beach) or watch the Deep Banana Blackout/Rolls couple Fuzz and Carrie
weigh the pros-and-cons post-jam poolside at the bar (which, by the
way, has been stocked with some heady beer thanks to Starr Hill). And,
is it the Starr Hill talking, or is that kid Avi G who spent a night
sleeping at the foot of the Relix tent at All Good onstage with Kimock
and that dude from P-Groove in the Jam Room? And holding his own at
that!?
Photo Credit - David Vann
Not that Day 2 is only about jazz and funk. For urbanites like me who
miss their Blackberries, the Drive-By Truckers’ Patterson Hood filled
his solo set with the type of hipster heartache that made you feel like
you walked out of the pool and into New York’s East Village (and what a
damn good feeling it is at that!). Plus, Burning Spear proved to a
generation of jam kids that, yes indeed, great music existed before
Jerry.
I’m going to go get in line for some pizza now because, according to my
clock, it is somewhere around 10AM and last night’s eggs have finally
digested. I think when I get back Cold Turkey is going on a diet. I
definitely quit my beer-and-veggie burrito-on-lot meal plan for this
festival-like adventure, but we’re already signed up for next year!
Day 3
“Always knew my home was in paradise” – Disco Biscuits
According to schoolyard rules, Wednesday is hump day but in
international waters, rules need not apply. Today, Jam Cruise came in
like a lion and went out like a whale. It was a day at sea. A cruise
ship sailing down the Atlantic Ocean. No civilization for miles around,
either on or off the boat. And the boat was indeed a-rockin’.
This isn’t hyperbole, my friends. After ten years on the festival
circuit, I’ve found a festival that is not only the greatest jamband
festival of all time, but also paradise found, Shangri La, the pearly
gates.
There’s a famous line from Moby Dick that goes something like, “Water,
water, everywhere and not a drop to drink.” And yet, if Moby Dick had
beached himself on the MSC Opera, surely he’d agree that in fact
there’s music, music everywhere and oh so much to drink.
In the early afternoon hours, Mike Greenhaus and I recorded a few
episodes of Cold Turkey, setting up camp at the artist lounge and
snagging talk time with Derek Trucks (who admitted that he’s bailing
from Eric Clapton tour this spring in order to make the Allman
Brothers’ recently announced Beacon run), Luther Dickinson (who
admitted that he used to take acid and see Aquarium Rescue Unit “all
the time”), and Karl Denson (who finally admitted that the Greyboy
Allstars are, indeed, officially reunited). Jeff Austin played us some
sea shanties on his mandolin before bailing to take a nap.
Photo Credit - David Vann
On Tuesday night, in the casino, I won some serious drinking money
playing roulette. And while the official Texas Hold ‘Em tournament that
took place this afternoon was bustling with wannabe Amarillo Slims, I
joined a late-night private game with Jon Gutwillig (Disco Biscuits)
and some members of the Railroad Earth crew. I lost. Shrug. I’ll win it
back tomorrow against Gutwillig and new addition Brendan Bayliss
(Umphrey’s McGee).
On the pool deck, ALO performed during daylight hours and although I
only stayed for a slice (before working on future episodes of Cold
Turkey), it drove home the point that Jam Cruise makes about music at
large — that is, good music drives everything.
I’ll explain but first let me change the scene to nightfall. It’s
nearly a full moon. If you look off the side of the boat, all you see
are waves. Water and waves. Open ocean and open sky. The light of a
very nearly full moon. These are the symbols of life itself. The ocean,
of course, representing everything from menstrual cycles to sexuality
to the great Tabula Rasa of truth (ask the ocean anything and it will
answer you honestly—with silence).
The moon, of course, is both feminine and cyclical. It’s a messianic
figure of regeneration, birth and rebirth, death and reincarnation.
Every month the moon dies so that there can be a new moon. Like the
seasons. It was appropriate, then, that the moon was full for when we
set sail yesterday from Fort Lauderdale; life aboard this ship seemed
beyond full — it was overflowing. “Jamband fan overboard.” This feeling
is contagious and yet springs from within. There is electricity in the
air.
Now, if I may turn your attention back to the stage — as you turn your
back on the ocean view, and look down at the pool deck, you’ll see
Galactic tearing it up with special guest JJ Grey and hundreds of
smiling fans all getting down until four in the morning. Downstairs,
Dumpstafunk and Zero are doing the same thing. There is plenty of music
here. And yet, it is hard even for a music nut like myself to pay it my
full attention at all times. Even sitting at the outdoor bar seems like
a monumental activity. Earlier I saw a spun kid at the rail face
painting the bartenders. They were good sports and played along.
Everybody is a good sport. Everybody is playing along.
Sometime just before dawn I went up to the very top deck, by myself,
and sat against the bow. The wind was intense. The feeling, beyond
words. This is only the first full day of the cruise and already it is
the greatest music event I have ever attended. And most of the music
hasn’t even happened yet.
I never want to go home. For us, on this boat, in the here and now —
this feels like home. In a couple hours, we’ll arrive at Turks and
Caicos, where artists and fans alike will swim in the ocean, relax on
the beach, and explore the island. I’ll leave the boat for that. But
they’re going to need a crane to get me to leave this fucking ship come
Sunday.
Day 4: Waving the Tie-Die Flag
Photo Credit - David Vann
Not since the days of Tupac and Biggie has there been an East
Coast/West Coast rivalry as heated as Jam Cruise’s Presidential Debate.
In the weeks leading up to our departure, HeadCount organized Jam
Cruise’s first presidential debate, kicking off over 20 grassroots
campaigns throughout the nation’s various local music scenes.
Candidates made friends, created witty MySpace pages, and added those
new friends to their carefully crafted, witty MySpace pages, setting
the stage for the biggest day at the polls since last year’s Jammys.
And, since arriving on the MSC Opera Tuesday, two one-name candidates
have emerged as frontrunners from the pack of luggage-clad wooks: “Lot
Dog” and “Adam.
Lot Dog is a San Francisco scenester with ties to Jambase and the
public support of Bay Area upstarts ALO. His onboard friends are known
to wear sparkly animal costumes and
his secret weapon is a suitcase full of promotional slap-on bracelets
(remember those?). Adam is a New York-based Relix staffer with the
support of Northeast jam titans the Disco Biscuits (minus Marc
Brownstein, whose HeadCount ties prevent him from participating in the
election). His onboard friends walk the tight (pants) rope between
hippie and hipster and his secret weapon is a stack of promotional
fliers recounting a recent trip to a Manhattan strip club. Both
candidates have received onstage support from their hometown heroes and
the race is neck-and-neck (or at least Berk-and-Berk) on the eve of
election night. At press time, both candidates are preparing for this
evening’s Presidential Debate, where Brownstein is expected to ask “the
tough” questions, like how many times have you posted Trey’s mug shot
on someone else’s MySpace page today, what’s the difference between a
> and -> on a setlist, and does freedom of speech truly exist on
PT?
And, while we’re pretty confident tomorrow’s election will end better
than Tupac and Biggie’s longstanding feud, Jam Cruise’s heated race has
brought to light two distinct hippie-rock approved music scenes. Last
night, while Adam and Lot Dog discussed strategy with some of jam
nation’s best spin doctors (Chris Baron is not onboard, alas), the
Disco Biscuits went head-to-head with an all-star San Francisco
Grateful Dead tribute. And, with a few exceptions, fans lined up along
party lines, with West Coasters paying tribute to their roots on the
sixth floor and East Coasters vacating the casino for the first time in
days to see the Disco Biscuit’s fan-selected “ocean set” by the pool (a
few muckrakers have already begun looking into instances of possible
schedule gerrymandering). Lucky for Chicago-based Umphrey’s McGee and
the boat’s New Orleans contingent, everyone seems to be down with
Middle America and the Big Easy, though we hear rumors that Adam is
going to snag Brendan Bayliss as a running mate and Lot Dog will add a
Neville to his ticket at the eleventh hour.
Photo Credit - David Vann
But perhaps when Jam Cruise returns, jam nation is in need of some
good, old-fashioned carpetbagging. For instance, what if a handful of
Bisco Kidz migrated west or some of ALO’s posse were liberated east?
Either way, one of the best things about a destination event like Jam
Cruise is that it places fans from all over the country on the same,
12-story ship. While festivals like High Sierra and Gathering of the
Vibes often draw regional followings (understandable given their
location), Jam Cruise entices fans from all over the country (including
Alaska, which went without jam music for a good 15 years between the
Grateful Dead and String Cheese). For an East Coaster like myself, its
nice to know that the hula-hoop is alive and well in other parts of the
country and, for West Coasters, I’m sure its comforting to know that
Philly kids still wear their hats at inappropriate angles. Indeed, all
jamband fans are created equally.
Day 5: All Night Long
Friday started out the way any Friday should start—by
putting an end to Thursday. And so the
midnight to 4:15 AM Disco Biscuits set gave way to late-night jam sessions,
gave way to pre-dawn on the pool deck, gave way to sunrise on the bow, gave way
to the first breakfast I’ve ever eaten while enjoying a view of the Dominican
Republic. Friday was the second of the
two island days, Cayo Levantado, and so after staying up all night long, we
went down to the tenders which were lowered into the ocean to transport us
to-and-fro from the shore.
Unlike yesterday’s island excursion on the Grand Turks, this
island was a private oasis owned by the cruise line. A Dominican rhythm band greeted us on the
shore, along with a street bazaar along the path to the beach. Hot Buttered Rum String band set up on a
stage around a thatch-roofed bar and pina collatas served in pineapples seemed
to be the drink of the day. As for me, I
headed straight for the luminescent water and then spread out in the sun to buy
a sunburn for free while other passengers shelled out money for massages and
local goods. From the beach, I could still hear Hot Buttered while I drank a
rum drink.
Photo Credit - David Vann
Back on the boat, Mike Greenhaus and I participated in a
panel on rock verses rock journalism.
The panel also featured Patterson Hood (Drive-By Truckers) and Burning
Spear. I sat next to Patterson and
played with his little daughter while answering questions about writing about
music. “It’s like dancing to architecture,”
I said, quoting Kurt Vonnegut, Frank Zappa, or Miles Davis, depending on who
you ask.
Last night was a theme night—70’s Disco—and most on board
got in the spirit by dressing as purple pimp daddies or disco stu’s. Deep Banana led an all-star funk revue on the
pool deck and while Garage A Benevento was obviously top-loaded on talent,
perhaps the true jamband award goes to Perpetual Groove for raging the Caruso
Lounge so freakin’ hard it was sometimes hard to tell if the boat was rocking
from the waves or from the mass of thrashing bodies on the dance floor.
Another late-night cutting butts on decks, throwing dice in
the casino, and talking trash (and trashed) to the various artists on board the
ship who have been mixing and mingling with just about everyone.
Tomorrow is our last day at sea. It will be a sad farewell but nothing
lasts. Tomorrow is also pirate day. Arrrr.
For now, it’s off to get some scurvy and spend another all-nighter spent
looking at nothing but open water.
Day
6: The Festival of the Future
I hate goodbyes, but fondly remember the final night of
summer camp. There is something in
the air, a nervous excitement, as campers simultaneously pack their bags and
prepare for one final party. It is a night to reflect on missed opportunities
and ponder the future, especially, how to spin those missed opportunities into
stories of success. To slightly miss quote The Slip, who I strongly urge the
good folks at Cloud 9 to book on Jam Cruise 6, “it’s the day before the rest of
your life,” and suddenly time is calculated in hours, not days. Since the music
industry takes a few extra weeks to recover from New Year’s Eve (either that or
is really bad about turning off its
out of the office auto replies), Jam Cruise and fellow destination packages
like Ski Jam and moe.cruise have blossomed into the ideal Indian summer for twenty/thirty
somethings who like live music. And, thus, Jam Cruise’s final night felt like
the final night of summer camp, only instead of exchanging pen pal addresses
and phone numbers, we swapped screen names and message board handles, figuring
out creative ways to download a week’s worth of shows and explain to our
friends that they “really had to be there” to understand.
As passengers prepared to hastily pack their luggage, or at
least to cash in their final tokens at the canteen, Railroad Earth opened
Saturday’s festivities, dubbed, arrr, “Pirate Night” with an energetic pool
side set. Brock Butler, perhaps Jam Cruise’s breakout performer,
followed with a cover-heavy acoustic set featuring both the post-jam space-rock
of the Secret Machines and the proto-jam space-rock of Pink Floyd (very inverted!)
Afternoon highlights included a jazzy funk-jam led by Karl Denson, a funky-jazz
set by Garage a Benevento,
and a purebred jazz/funk set by Galactic (who invited Luther Dickinson, Jen
Durkin and Mike Dillon onstage during its set). Yet Umphrey’s McGee earned the
weekend’s true sit-in award, opting for the one-to-three knock out of Luther Dickinson,
Burning Spear and a Triscuit of Disco Biscuits. The Deep Banana Blackout horns
also enhanced Umphrey’s McGee’s frat-jam (did I just coin a genre?) version of
the SNL skit “Dick in a Box,” which
was truly poetic in that American Pie kind
of way.
But, like the weekend in general, the final night of Jam
Cruise wasn’t so much about the music, as it was the experience (hyperbole
justified), like the cruise ending Award Ceremony. I genuinely believe that
life is full of two types of people: those who win awards and those who make
sarcastic comments to mask some secret insecurity while award winners pick up
their trophies. With the exception of a few awards for most embarrassing typos,
I’ve always fallen squarely in the latter category and Jam Cruise was no
exception. My roommate, however, is a bit different and managed to score the dubious
distinction as the passenger who lost the most money at the casino (perhaps the
weekend’s Best Supporting Actor Oscar). He swears he won the money back in cash
(the award was measured in credit), but I’m just thankful he paid for his half
of the room earlier in the night.
Unfortunately, my co-worker “Adam” lost out to “Lot Dawg” in
the week’s heated Presidential Race. After consulting the exit polls, I’m not
really sure what happened, but I have a sneaking suspicion that either Lot
Dawg’s brother had something to do with the count or that a last minute write
in (who encouraged passengers to sign a portion of her body I wasn’t born
with), offset the margin like Ross Perot in ’92. Either way, I’m proud of Adam’s
campaign and hope he heeds these words of advice: you may have lost the battle,
but at least you won an asterisk on PT Bisco (see Day 4).
As President Elect, Lot Dawg prepared for his first dance
to, um, the Disco Biscuits’ “The Very Moon,” we witnessed the public engagement
of Annabel Lukins and Peter Stelling. As
both Jam Cruise’s head counselor and most enthusiastic camper, Annabel has come
to embody Jam Cruise for most passengers and I think I speak for everyone
onboard when I say it was truly special for us to watch her engagement. When/if
I ever muster up enough courage to tell a girl I love her like a “Ghost from
‘97” I hope its in as cool a setting as Jam Cruise, but, knowing my luck, I’ll
end up losing the ring in my luggage I’ll be forced to ask my intended “to be
my +1 for eternity” on the way home from
some festival.
As someone who grew up reading online jam ‘zines and combing
message boards for B+Ps it is generally
moving for me to watch people come of age on the festival circuit. In the
future, I think I might even organize my own Post-jam cruise (patent pending),
which takes post-jambands from Williamsburg, Brooklyn up the east river to
Astoria, Queens with a quick day stop in Long Island City along the way. Jam
Cruise really is the festival of the future, even if my bar tab made me regret
a chunk of my past.
I ended the night at Garage a Benevento (who broke out a cool version of
Trey Anastasio’s “Plasma” which makes me wish G.RA.B. had lasted longer). After
the show, I decided to call it a night and retired to bed “early.” As I slowly
entered a deep sleep, dreaming of an empty inbox and filtered spam folder, my
roommate busted through the door, rapping about some special jam session with
Steve Kimock and Brock Butler. He kept talking and his words slowly soaked
into my scull as I entered a state of R.E.M., like Jam Cruise in general, a blurry
stage where dreams became reality.
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