Roswell Festival Update

[Carl E. Anderson]

> > I think that *certainly* would be totally impossible, at least on the main
> > stage.  (They *do* have a second stage thing, don't they?).  Here in Columbus,
> > the four 'headlining' artists were Natalie Merchant, Lenny Kravitz, Rusted
> > Root, and Blues Traveller.  All four of those artists are an order of magnitude
> > (or more) well-known here in the states.  And they sell discs in the millions
> > rather than thousands.
>
> I think I'm now starting to understand the problems promoters have....
> I've heard Lenny Kravitz and I've heard OF Blues Traveller, might
> even have heard 'em but if so I can't remember! Now who da fuck are
> Rusted Root and Natalie Merchant? I guess this HORDE thing people
> are talking about plays to a student/hippy crowd right? Just the sort
> of freaks that in the UK like HW?

        No, not anymore really.  The early HORDE tours were a bit like
that.  Then it really was a bunch of virtually unknown bands with cult
followings who got together and decided to expose all their cult
followings to each other.

        Natalie Merchant is ex-10,000 Maniacs, a quite well known band,
Lenny Kravitz is even more an MTV darling.  Blues Traveller miraculously
got some MTV airplay, but they and Rusted Root (who opened for Page/Plant
and the Allmans) are probably the most HORDE-like bands left there.

        They should put ARU and Widespread Panic back on the bill.  Good
bands who could use the exposure.  The Spin Doctors shot to pop-star-dom
after the early HORDE tours, and Phish of course climbed slowly into
becoming a mega-cult band (They made one abortive video for MTV and were
so upset by it that they decided never to do it again! :)

        HORDE has really kinda gone downhill, I think.  Not that bands
like the Allmans and King Crimson aren't appropriate in sound, they're
just rather too well established to fit with the original spirit of the
thing.  And people like Sheryl Crow are _completely_ too bland.  Scott H.
and I saw a great band at the B stage a few years back called Cycomotogoat!
They and the Allman's were definitely the best performances there, which
just goes to show how lame the main stage was getting ...

Cheers,
Carl

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Carl Edlund Anderson                            *  "Ar det inte ett
cea20 at cus.cam.ac.uk                             *   fritt land?"
http://wjh-www.harvard.edu/~canders/hem.html    *
Dept. of ASNAC Studies, Cambridge U.            *   -- Pippi Langstrump
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