My roadie and I embarked toward Pittsburgh on Thursday morning, and thanks to his driving stamina (over five hours straight on that particular drive), we made it to my sister's house in a mere eight hours. We had a lovely time with Karen, Matt, Tom, Patti, and little Claire. After the latter three went to bed, we played an intense four-person game of Ticket to Ride (the American version), which was so fun that upon arriving home, I went out and purchased it for a friend's birthday, and Kevin went out and bought it for himself.
After the game, Kevin and I sat down for some quality reading time, as all English teachers do on summer nights:
Kevin and I rose and shone early the next morning so that we could make it to Wassaic, NY in time to set up our tent before dark. Along our route -- a string of highways that featured mostly gentlemen's clubs and adult super-stores -- this is one of the more wholesome (albeit puzzling) things we saw: an inflatable "Hamstar."
Below is a photo I took on William Penn Highway while Kevin was receiving a speeding citation (read: downhill speed trap for out-of-state drivers) from Pennsylvania Commonwealth Trooper Alberts. Commonwealth Trooper Alberts was kind enough to print out the citation on a piece of paper whose physical length resembled that of a scroll. He then invited Kevin to attend the hearing in a Pennsylvania courtroom. If he chose not to attend, he'd have to notify the magistrate of his plea via snail mail.
Suddenly, Pennsylvania seemed like an overwhelmingly pretentious place. "Commonwealth?" Citations on scrolls? "Magistrate?" C'mon, Trooper Alberts! Who are you trying to fool? The highway you were patrolling (which happens to be named after the same guy your state was named after) is lined with places called the Beehive Showbar, the Pumptown Tavern, and Club Coconuts. Let's just agree to call a state a state and a judge a judge from now on, okay?
Moving right along, here are a couple of Pennsylvania towns for television fans:
We arrived in the hamlet of Wassaic well before sundown and with plenty of time to set up our tent, which was lent to us kindly by a South Dakotan we both happen to know.
If you're wondering what a hamlet is (aside from being a despairing young Prince) you'll be happy to know that Kevin looked it up. According to dictionary.com, the British definition of a hamlet is "a village without a church of its own, belonging to the parish of another village or town." I happen to know that Wassaic has its own small church, though, since I performed right next to it (unless they stole that church from another town and transplanted it within the boundaries of their hamlet). So I suppose "hamlet" is just another name for a small village.
Church or no church, Wassaic is famous for being the place where condensed milk visionary Gail Borden opened a factory in 1861 to pursue his noble cause: the production of milk that would not need refrigeration.
Ever since 1861, it doesn't seem like much has happened in Wassaic to contribute to the grand scheme of things. But a group of artists -- with help from the Wassaic community -- has been working to change that. The Wassaic Project's mission, according to their website, is to be "an artist-run sustainable, multidisciplinary arts organization that focuses on community engagement and facilitates artists and participants to exhibit, discuss, and connect with art, each other, our unique site, and the surrounding area." Pretty cool, huh?
The poster on the telephone pole below is strangely fitting for a place like Wassaic, which a number of folks described as being "economically depressed" for as long as anyone could remember.
It's so awesome to me that the members of a struggling town could come together to support and find inspiration in an artistic community like the one that's been taking root in Wassaic over the course of the last five years.
On or near the festival grounds, the community was a visible, active part of the event: townspeople (hamletspeople?) sold goods at a barn sale, local restaurant employees stood at small stands hawking their food, and the volunteer fire department hosted a pancake breakfast. And the art itself? Displayed in the refurbished 7-story mill at the center of the village (apparently, the mill is a site for artist residencies throughout the entire year), most of it was arguably better (perhaps "more engaging" is a better way of phrasing it) than what you'd see in many wings of the Art Institute of Chicago.
I just remembered -- I haven't really talked about the music yet, have I? On Friday night, Kevin and I saw most of the bands that performed behind the Luther Barn, including a dance-pop band called Free Blood whose lead singer looked like a thinner, trench coat-wearing version of Brett Favre. We also saw an experimental rock band in the barn's auction house, which used to be an actual auction area for cattle. After roughly ten minutes of bickering about the lighting situation, an audience of intoxicated, light bulb-removing twenty-somethings (and a grizzled old man) staggered into position in the wooden bleachers, the balconies on either side of the floor, and behind the cattle gates, ready to cheer on the noise they were about to encounter. It was an interesting experience that left us both eager for sleep.
The next afternoon, upon exiting the mill's art gallery, Kevin and I caught the end of Caitlin Canty's set on the stage outside. I honestly don't remember too much about it other than that it was very good. (I still must've had the art on my mind.) Kevin ended up creating a Caitlin Canty Pandora station and purchasing two of her CDs.
Here's me in a porta-john that happened to have an art installation inside.
A four-piece folk/bluegrass outfit called Thomas Wesley Stern:
Some guy making bubbles:
Me launching a slingshot:
Some guy playing music on the Maxon Mills stage:
After my set, Kevin and I stumbled upon a screening of four short films in the auction ring. I was a bit skeptical about the quality of the films going in (I guess I was expecting camcorder-wielding hacks presenting movies that were eerily similar to, but somehow even far less coherent than Pi), but they ended up being fantastic. Little Horses, a humorous but poignant short film directed, written, and edited by Levi Abrino, was co-written by the guy who won last year's Oscar for short live-action film. The Substitute, an Israeli film about women in the military, has received so many honors and awards I won't name them here. And 'The Strange Ones,' which was filmed in a location somewhat near Wassaic, was a selection at this year's Sundance Festival. Awards and honors aside, these were great films coming from talented young filmmakers. I wouldn't be surprised to see them making feature-length films for a wider audience sometime in the future. [Unfortunately, I don't remember the name of the fourth film, but I do remember it being my least favorite of the three (by a smidgeon). I should also mention that two of the films were introduced by their directors; they didn't say much, but it was cool nonetheless.]
Later that night, it rained and poured, so Kevin and I ended up hitting the tent early after helping a couple bands load gear into their trucks. (Due to the weather, the organizers decided to move the live music to a local bar, and an intern named Jacqui mistakenly thought I had muscles with which to move the gear.) I really wanted to see a couple of the bands that night, but we ended up favoring the dry confines of our tent when the rain refused to let up. We even missed out on a midnight showing of the widely-banned 1988 Todd Haynes film Superstar, in which Barbies are used as "actors" in telling the Karen Carpenter story. I'm pretty sure the opportunity to see that particular film in an old cattle auction facility won't come around again any time soon, so I'm a little bummed...
Thanks so much to Scott for inviting me to play the festival, as well as to everyone else involved in putting it on. We had a great time, and it was an honor to be the musician who traveled the furthest to play there.
So there you have it - the end of the tour for Tricia and me. We drove over 10,000 miles for 17 shows, thankfully with no accidents and no tickets (except for Kevin's). It wasn't exactly the most financially viable trip, but we looked at it as more of a cheap vacation anyway. On the upside, we saw some wonderful things we've been meaning to see for awhile, and we had the opportunity to play music with and for some pretty cool people. You couldn't really ask for much more than that.
Except a band. And Tricia and I are already working on that.
Thanks to everyone for supporting us this summer (in so many ways), and thank you for reading and making these blog posts worthwhile.
-Carl
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