Vegoose

[Drunk Monk]

Once more, into the fray. After the Exotic Erotic last Saturday, Stacy went to Esalen this week for a workshop, so I'm a single dad. My boss was in China most of this month. She returned this week right when we lost our website and email because we are hosted in FL and Wilma knocked out power. Still cleaning up after that.

Tomorrow, I drop Tara off at school early in costume for their Halloween parade then hop an airplane to Vegas for http://www.vegoose.com. It's the first time I've been hired to go on the road in 5 years or so - I think the last time was Phish. So I'm pretty excited about that, but pretty stressed because work has been murder and being a single dad is so exhausting. It's also a bit of a sketchy deal - we've never worked with these promoters before. They do Bonnaroo in TN, from which I hear good things, but they've housed us at Boulder Station, which is a casino/hotel way off the strip, not even walking distance (or in my case, stumbling distance). We're not even sure what kind of access we'll get, like if we get access to the aftershows. I have a handful or promises and an email with flight codes to get there and back again. For those of you who know the Rock Med road crew - we're all coming in from different directions and at different times this time. I'm going in with Joel.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Is that one of those Eastern Eurpean countires that was formed after the break up of the Soviet Bloc?

[The Queen]

I'm flying to Vegas in the morning, should I look for him???

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Check under the craps tables. That's the usual place. Careful, he could be weeping and that's never a pretty sight.

Or he could just have abandoned the forum because he has fallen so far behind and can't catch up.

[Drunk Monk]

What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas, except for that ass-kicker mofo of all hangovers. Vegoose was great but I lost all my lunch money; it's cheese sammiches until the next payday. Never go to Vegas after payday.

I'll give a full report as soon as I get the chance...

[Drunk Monk]

Our director put it succintly at the get go "There's no crying in Vegas. You just take it like the man or woman you are and move on." Truer words have never been spoken in Sin City.

We were housed at Boulder Station, which is about 10-15 minutes from the Sam Boyd Sivler Bowl and about half an hour from the strip. That means it's way out in the desert. It was one of those local & retiree casino hotels, country western/train themed, where Star Search winners sing. Penny, nickle, dime slots - all the quarters were vidoe poker - and the raped me. I thought I'd last longer playing dimes - there was an Alien machine, a Star Wars machine, an I Dream of Jeannie machine that kept saying "yes master!" - that's why I'm eating cheese sammiches this week. My gambling catch, plus more, was gone in the first evening. The high point of the hotel was the cafe menu's special Healthy Food section (as opposed to the Unhealthy food in the rest of the menu) - listed there was a meat & cheese omelet, a bacon double cheeseburger, and a cheese topped top sirlion. I was sure I would fall off my recent 'no land meat' wagon on this trip, but I didn't. Had some fine fish tho - in the desert. The desert that is Babylon. We went to the Wynn for drunch - I had the salmon. Very tasty. That would be the only time spent on the 'strip'. Then we went back to Boulder Station, where I lost all my cash. Now, the wise thing to do would have been to get a good night's sleep before the long day ahead. But no, another dime, another pull, another enthusiastic 'yes master' from a Barbara Eden impersonator voice, another shot of jd/goldschlager/beer/glen morangie (port wood aged 12 years)...

Viva Las Vegas!

[The Queen]

Nickel machines aren't nickle machines any more; nor are quarter machines. It's impossible to play 1 game at a time; you're playing 3 or 5 or 10 hands at once, or up to 15 lines on the electronic slots and betting 5 "credits" on each.... so you're betting about $3-5 each time! Remember when you could entertain yourself for at least 10 minutes for $20? And what happened to carrying around those cups of quarters and cashing them in? No cups anymore -- just a voucher printout.

Scuse me, I have two hours to kill until my first meeting. I'm going to see if I can find a $5 craps table.

[Drunk Monk]

I miss the coins too. Remember that weird metallic grunge you'd get on your fingers? I miss that. It tasted pretty good.

We arrived on site early, as always, which meant we all had about three hours of sleep tops. We had 'artists' laminates, which meant we could go anywhere, even on stage, except for this special VIP area for people who bought the most expensive packages, however we quickly hustled up some wristbands and the kingdom was ours. Food wasn't bad - they took decent care of us. Backstage had a lounge put on by Red Bull with sofas, snacks, video, mixed drinks and cocktails. We even got free shoes from Crocs. AMR was very open to us and we were well situated in the back of their west med.

The show had four stages - a main stage in the stadium, two side stages and one stage tent. There was also a circus tent, an impersonators bar, a wedding chapel, copius vendors and food. They had planned to shut down the lots, but 65 security people failed to show, so there was an ample lot scene. All in all, quite a party. They expected 55,000 but got only about 40,000.

We wound up working a fair amount but it didn't hit us until Saturday night. We were only there for IPRs - AMR had all the medical. There were six of us, plus an extra pinch hitter. There were rumors of 800 mic doses (standard does is 75-100 mics for you uninitated) and a sighting of a liter size bottle of liquid - that's a lot - usually it comes in visine bottles - a liter could do up the whole Vegas strip. All in all, it we weren't overwhelmed, but there were some extraordinary patients. We definitely earned our keep that weekend.

Next - the band reviews.

[Drunk Monk]

The first day started slow.

Caught a little of Slightly Stoopid, who I've never liked. They had a nice groove going for one song, then descended into their standard stuff, which sucks.

Blackalicious rocked so hard that they literally tore the house down. They were in this tent and there were 3X as many people outside so they had to take down the walls as the show was going. It was crazy. But they had the beat and everyone was shaking. Very impressive. I've always liked them. Not a CD band - a live band. Like a lot of funk/hip hop, you got to see it live to even begin to get a sense of what they do.

Gov't Mule was ok. I like Warren Haynes as a guitar hero, his work with the Dead has been satisfactory, but they went into some Bob Marley song and failed to hold my interest. Gov't Mule is a bit too much screaming guitar riffs for me, despite Warren's technical excellence.

Phil Lesh and Friends had Joan Osborne sit in as a friend. They sounded great. But as with anything Dead oriented, that's when it hit the fan for our crew. Suddenly, I was running back and forth, all over this freakin' concert, catching trippers and taking them down. Good set tho.

[The Queen]

I miss the coins too. Remember that weird metallic grunge you'd get on your fingers? I miss that. It tasted pretty good.

After playing the Star Wars penny machine, I changed my mind about the appeal of those tickets they spit out. Let's just put it this way -- I'm not restricted to cheese sammiches this week. :-D

[Drunk Monk]

...it wasn't with me. not gambling, at least.

Anyway, After Phil, things got blurry. I caught a shred of Beck as I was running from patient to patient. It sounded good, a lot like you might expect, but I didn' have the luxury to really tune in, as much as I would have liked to...

Dave Matthews had Trey Anastasio sit in and that was the pick of the litter. I caught their cover of Rocky Mountain Way and I'm still humming it. They also did Cripple Creek, and some other great songs. I'm not a big DMB fan. I loved Phish and respect Trey, but he needs someone like Matthews to play off of. Matthews needs someone to bend his sound out of pop into something more interesting. It was a great fusion and my favorite musical part of day one.

That night we got into the aftershow with String Cheese Incident and they blew me away. I've never really liked SCI. I love their crowd but their music was always flat. I really wanted to support Michael Kang, the most prominent Asian in the jam band scene, but I never got SCI. Not until this. SCI blew me away - with a cover of Thriller no less! I'm totally coverted now. They took that song places I never could have imagined, not only musically, but with stage dancers, stilt walkers, and tissue performers. The energy was extraordinary; something I used to experience a lot with the Dead but seldom after. What a show stopper for Halloween! It gave me hope. I'm still inspired by it, and still muttering that Thriller beat under my breath.

[Drunk Monk]

They've posted pics http://www.vegoose.com/VegooseGallery05/

Sunday started slow since everyone was partying their asses off Saturday night. Sunday was sluggish and my memory is rather blurry.

Caught some of Umphree's Magee from next to stage. I like them.

The big moment was when the original Meters, Trey and Flaming Lips all went on at the same time. Caught a little of the Meters, got a call, got busy, then caught a bit of Flaming Lips since ED recomended them. They failed to impress and I even caught Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. The lead singer kept trying to get everyone to sing along but only the first row was playing. Everyone else started to walk away. He also kept playing with this nun puppet which seemed a bit contrived. Anyway, I had to catch it on the fly between calls, so perhaps I missed something. ED's taste and mine can be very different.

Widespread Panic closed with Warren Haynes sitting in and it was great. We actually got out of there at a reasonable hour. We thought we had an 'in' for the hardest ticket of the vegoose - Phil at the Hard Rock. WE got there and found it was not to be. Rock Med was shut out. It was a bumpin' scene tho, just amazing. We were all pretty bummed, and sulked back to the hotel, where I cuaght a few hours sleep before having to get up and fly home.

It was a great show. We did some solid work - plenty of trippers. I hope they do it again next year...

[El Dingo]

Too bad The Lips did not impress.

The only reason I can think of is that they are not a 'Vegas' act. 'Yoshimi' is not one of their best live songs. Generally they open with "Race for the Prize" and have their contingent of a dozen or so furry-suited stage-mates shining spotligts around the crowd, then Wayne puts on his Hulk-Hands and launches into 'Fight Test' (for which they were sued by Cat Stevens for ripping off 'Father and Son'). Then it's off to "She Don't Use Jelly" or some other early number and I just sit there in a happy daze.

At All Tomorrow's Parties he did a vicious monologue against the Bush administrationt and did a brilliant cover of Sabbath's 'War Pigs'.

Check out
The Fearless Freaks for some insight into the band. It's sort of like 'Crumb' for pop music.

The show sounds like it was more oriented towards a groove-rock/hip-hop/Funk/Reggae audience than an art-rock/prog/experimental audience. Maybe that was an issue. The Flaming Lips are great but not great for dancing.

[Drunk Monk]

People wanted to dance and be stoned to groovy jams. They didn't want to sing along or watch artsy stuff. There was a circus troupe from Burning Man for that, plus every one was in costume. The lead made some comment about being louder than Metallica in Australia, which hit me as rather conceited and misplaced. Metallica is freakin' loud. I'll report on them next week.

[El Dingo]

That mus have been a contributor then.

No one would accuse The Flaming Lips of being a dance band.

They evolved out of the early 90s noise-punk movement and evolved into an art-rock band (like Mercury Rev).

Oh well. Guess I'll have to make a Flaming Lips comp for you guys and force you into submision