All Good Music Festival 2010 Recap 

I’m back physically but am still mentally exhausted after this years All Good music festival in Masontown, WV.

This was the 14th year of the fest, the 10th in WV, and it brought your usual crowd of hipsters, blipsters, wooks, and hetty brahs.

Thursday July 8, 2010 was the start of the fest for those who purchased 4 day passes or an individual pass to the “Thursday Throwdown” and this is absolutely the way to go.  Not only do you get an extra dose of music, but you get first dibs on parking/camping locale.  This being our first time, we ended up picking a pretty awful spot as far as getting to the stage goes.  With an estimated 40,000 people there is an endless amount of land to choose from and establish your new home.  Ours unfortunately involved about a mile walk to the stage and a hill that still has my calves burning today.

There was plenty of space that night to toss around the ‘bee though and we did for about 2 hours underneath the moonlight. A glorious feeling after being cramped in a car for 10 hours (…that’s 7 hours of driving from NY and 3 hours of waiting in a car line that seemed to move 10ft. every 20 minutes.)

On line for All Good

The long car line to get into All Good

More cars

The non-stop farms and silos did nothing to calm my anticipation for some late night DSO! HURRY UP!

That night we caught Dark Star Orchestra who played a satisfying set that included a Scarlet Begonias, Fire on the Mountain and a predictable China Cat Sunflower -> I Know You Rider -> Eyes of the World.

2am arrived and already the stage hillside was packed in for a late night New Deal and MAN O MAN did they provide some heat.  Having been my first live Deal experience, I was amped to hear some great jams and see some great lighting.

Youtuber yoniohyoni took this great video below of their Ray Parker Jr. Suite:

Friday July 9th brought more people to the farm and alas, that beautiful space for Frisbee was quickly overtaken by tents and cars. For the better I suppose since Friday also saw the only performances of the weekend on the Grassroots stage, a smaller stage not within the confines of the main stage (aka – you can bring your own beer, coolers, etc.)  This is where we caught Green Sky Blue Grass as well as Rochester, NY’s favorite white boy reggae Giant Panda Guerilla Dub Squad.  Both spread some great morning vibes.

My main stage shows this day were Old Crow Medicine Show, Dr. Didg, and Furthur…with a late night Bassnectar & Lotus performances.  Did I see either of those late night sets?  Maybe, I’m not exactly sure :)

Thankfully dambrosiomario did…and it was EPIC to say the least:

Alas, I awoke Saturday morning and decided to try starting my car…no luck.  Either my trunk was open, a light was left on, or something but my battery was completely drained.  Matt was able to jump it but a few minutes later…dead again.  ”Ah well” I thought and headed down to kickoff my musical evening with Railroad Earth, an incredible Rex Jam led by Matt Butler, and my favorite show of the night George Clinton & Parliament Funkadelic. Words can’t describe the energy they brought and in what seemed like an unexpected encore for the band, a group of people in alien and dog costumes came out on stage and got mad crunchy to the closing ‘Atomic Dog’.

Back to camp quickly for a few beers and then back to the lawn for Widespread Panic who brought the house down.  Between sets there was an incredibly inspiring tribute with these floating lanterns.  Honestly one of the coolest things to witness and now you can thanks to this great video by tconnarn:

Yonder closed the night out with a bang that included a stop mid-jam where they gave a nod to the ‘Giant Double Rainbow’ meme quickly spreading around the internet as I type this.

Alas, I found myself at 4am in a folding chair outside…I had to make the 7 hr trip back home the next morning so I quickly saddled up in my tent and left promptly at 10am the next morning unfortunately missing the final acts…of which I really just wanted to see some Keller who performed with both the Keels and “The Added Bonus.”  Hopefully some of the footage from these sets will hit the YouTube soon.  If you find it, post it in the comments so we can see it!

Anyways, it was absolutely a great time, with great people, and innumerable great memories.  While Mountain Jam in Hunter, NY is more my cup of tea (both for it’s size and 1.5 hr distance from my home) All Good is the premiere festival to get to just behind Bonnaroo.  In fact, if you like jam acts, it might be THE festy considering the ‘Roo has been focusing on mainstream bands as of late.

Anyways, that’s my story of the All Good weekend…oh wait…so Sunday morning we jumped my car again.  Afraid of turning it off at any point during the trip home, we left it on the whole way (Refilled gas with it on, stopped at McDonalds with it on, and made 2 Dunkin Donuts stops for caffeine with it on.)  When I finally got home, I decided to shut it off and try turning it back on again.  This was after 7 hours of straight driving which I was always told helps recharge the battery.  Turned it off…waited a second…turned the key…and it didn’t start. In other words it’s a minor miracle we made it home and that I’m here telling you this story Monday evening.

Classic memories for my own sake:

  • The neighbor Jesse
  • Jesse’s “Boy Toy” asking my friend Miles, “How is your dad?” having never met…ever.
  • My buddy Isaac dancing to P-Funk that involved stopping to a complete standstill, spitting on his arm for no reason, rubbing it in and continuing.