When I woke up, the local cable had an Indian station that was playing Bollywood songs, so I sort of just laid in bed for a coupla hours watching that before heading back over the Red Barn for day two of the Gladtree Festival.
And what a beautiful day it was for day two! The weather could not have been better…upper 50’s and sunny…everyone was hanging around outside between the bands (although they were amazingly quick with the band turnaround, there were still good delays where one could get a bit of nature in, or head down the road to get some munchies). When the bands were playing, the large windows behind them gave us all the best light show we could ask for…beautiful blue skies, mountains, and clouds rolling lazily by…Yay!!!
BORN HELLER
The show was supposed to start at noon, but probably started closer to 1ish as the organizers were holding off ‘til more people showed up. The Saturday festival started off with a folk duo that blew everybody away to start off with called “Born Heller”. The woman singer had SUCH an angelic voice…Many times her voice sent me during their set. Her partner was on upright bass & occasional vocals…he really pulled some extreme sounds out of that bass! Also cool was the fact that they used no amplification…everyone surrounded them in a circle, and it was so quiet you could hear the proverbial pin drop…Such a pretty sound…a super way to start day two!
SON OF EARTH
The second band of the day, was called “Son of Earth”. An ambient electronic trio, they created a very tripped, but MELLOW, sound, and put the theta waves to work in my head. It’s weird, because I don’t remember their set too well, as I think I was pretty tranced out by their set…very enjoyable. The clouds behind them in the big windows certainly added to the whole effect (although didn't help much for picture taking as seen above & below!!!).
THE CHERRY BLOSSOMS
Next were “The Cherry Blossoms”. Wow! What a fun band! The lead woman singer was fantastic, and seemed so happy & into the sounds she & her band were making. What a great voice! The rest of the band was interesting also, a fellow on guitar that sang & was on most songs, a pretty bizarre drummer, and a guitarist on the left who I don’t think was miked, because I never heard him! But, the band was super…fun folk with a cracked edge…Everybody (myself included) enjoyed the heck out of them. I bought one of their elaborately packaged CD’s at the table later (had a torn piece of paper for a label…pretty funny!).
IFCO
The “Idea Fire Company” or "IFCO" were the fourth band of the day. There were three women & one guy on a batch of electronic noisemakers. They put forth a pretty cool noise (I think the first sample they played to was from David Lynch). The sound really pulled you in…Analog sounds mixed together into a happy wall of noise...They were plenty cool (I picked up their LP from a coupla years back, and it’s also quite good…).
CERBERUS SHOAL
From Portland, Maine, came the next band “Cerberus Shoal”. I saw them last year, and as much as I liked them that time, they were even better here at Gladtree. Super tight, but experimental at the same time…(not many bands can pull that off!). The amount of different sounds they play is astounding…as I mentioned in the REVIEW of the last time I saw them, they get the weirdest groove going, and truly don’t sound like anyone else! They were a lot of fun. (As a side note, some Shoal members were here for the whole festival, and a happier bunch of fans of cool soundz you couldn’t hope to find…they were a blast during the “Sun City Girls”!!!).
MV & EE MEDICINE SHOW
The last band before the dinner break were the “MV & EE Medicine Show”, Matt Valentine & Erika Elders. I’ve had the privilege of seeing them a couple of times last year, so I was looking forward to their set. And what a set! They truly took the audience into the outer stratosphere…beautiful folk music with some extreme avant-garde soundz happening all around it…MV was a blast with his giant banjo, and EE’s accents & FX added greatly to the ambience…Fantastic!
Then it was dinner break time…someone told me that up the road was a store with sushi, so up the road I went…and yes, they had sushi! Yum! Good way to recharge up for the final chunk of the festival…six more bands to go!!! I also did my final walk of the weekend behind the Red Barn and on the path…it was SO beautiful weather-wise, I wanted to drink as much as I could in. Read on to check out part three of Perky's adventure at Gladtree!!!
BACK TO PART ONE ON TO PART THREE
Originally published 4/22/2004