I Like Things.: December 2013

Here, finally, is part 2 of my Floridadventure of September. I last left you with the end of our Disney Day, where Abby and I gallivanted through Disney World with Saskia, riding rides, not waiting in lines, and meeting Doug. Now, for the reason I traveled to Florida in the first place...

DAY 3: Mumford Takeover and an Excess of Sand

Before we checked out, Abby and I took a walk around the whole Art of Animation resort taking pictures. Each section was so well done, with little details that I kept noticing for the first time. I was really impressed with the Cars section; though it’s not my favorite movie at all, it was so well done, down to the sidewalk painted as a road and the orange cone cabanas around the pool.

Photo by Abby

The time had come to say farewell to Disney World. There was a glorious weekend awaiting us in St. Augustine. As we drove we sang along to Mumford & Sons, The Head & The Heart, The Decemberists, all the music we’d listened to our senior year of college. It was like we’d never been apart, and we’d both missed this. Before St. Augustine, we stopped at a beach that Abby had found online before our trip. Washington Oaks State Gardens boasts formal gardens and lush walking paths, but much to the dismay of the employees at the ticket booth, we were really only interested in the beach with cool rock formations. Abby and I frolicked in the waves and on the rocks, and sunned ourselves until the tide decided to change all of a sudden and the ocean tried to take our belongings. It didn’t succeed but everything was wet and covered in whole-wheat-textured sand afterwards.

Even before we arrived in St. Augustine there was evidence of the Mumford takeover. A half an hour before we even entered the city limits there was a sign on the highway directing festivalgoers to parking. When we reached our Holiday Inn Express, we were greeted by employees of CID Entertainment, which we had booked our tickets and hotel through. They handed us our Gentlemen of the Road wristbands, passports, posters, and t-shirts. Before we could go downtown and get our Gentlemen of the Road (GOTR) on, showering was necessary.

When we stepped off the shuttle from our hotel to downtown, we were met with crowds of people and music and flags and mustaches everywhere. We were starving (ok I was starving), and the first food place we saw was a tent selling barbeque. We got a couple of pulled pork sandwiches and ate quite fast. Though the gates to the festival were now open, the first band wouldn’t be on yet so we decided to walk around town. There were mustaches EVERYWHERE. Big ones, little ones, black ones, neon ones, on every shop window and sign. Official GOTR flags with all sorts of designs and shapes and bright colors hung on every other building. I was obsessed with the flags and repetitively voiced my desire to have them all. Shops without official flags had put up Union Jacks or painted their windows with “Welcome Mumford & Sons” and banjos and mustaches. Tedi’s Ice Cream had temporarily changed its name to “Ted’s” in honor of Mr. Dwane and businesses were offering deals to festivalgoers. The whole town was just so into it and went absolutely all-out, which created an incredibly happy atmosphere. There were musicians strumming guitars and playing harmonicas and singing on the sidewalks and in bars. And best of all, most of these shops and cafes were on pedestrian-only streets, perfect for the influx of music lovers now wandering the nation's oldest city.

Aviles Street - Photo by Abby

Me, just resting on some history. -Photo by Abby

St. Augustine is adorable on its own, actually. As it is the oldest continuously-occupied city in the United States, founded by the Spanish, there are loads of historical, Spanish-y buildings now converted into shops and cafes and painfully adorable B&Bs. There are streets named after Spanish cities and azulejos (Spanish tiles) naming homes and businesses and the occasional Spanish flag. Every other shop is an art gallery and I didn't even count how many museums there were. Keep in mind this is all within like a three-block radius. One particularly notable shop was a popcorn store, featuring over 100 colorful flavors displayed in big clear plastic bins, with labels like "Birthday Cake" and "Spicy Taco." When I tried the apple pie flavor and commented on the cinnamon flavor, the woman giving out samples practically flew to the back of the store exclaiming, "Oh, you HAVE to try the Halloween flavor!!!"

Rainbows of popcorn! -Photo by Abby

Can't imagine how quick these B&Bs got booked for the festival.

Mustaches and Mumford songs

We really enjoyed wandering St. George Street and the surrounding area, but it was time to enter the long-anticipated festival. Passports in hand and wristbands on wrists, we passed through the tunnel of flags to St. Francis Field just as Willy Mason was starting his set. We. Had. Arrived.

There were lines of people dotting the field, all queuing to get passport stamps. There was some sort of drawing you could enter once you got all the stamps, but we kind of just collected them for ourselves. There was a stamp for each band on the lineup, plus other fun themed stamps like mustaches, a man with a top hat, and a stamp to match the enormous arm raising a dumbbell planted on the field. Abby attempted to get a tank top from the merch booth but gave up after waiting 20 minutes in the line. Surely there had to be a better system. I didn't mind the wait though; I sat on the ground to rest my already-tired feet and listen to Willy Mason open the festival.

My passport

Thao & the Get Down Stay Down were up next. Abby and I had actually already seen them in 2011 opening for The Head & The Heart, and actually saw them again open for the same band at their Chicago show this past October. Which would be awesome if we liked Thao. Which, try as we might, we just do not. She plagues us. But the crowd seemed to enjoy it. And Thao et al. actually are talented musicians... just not our cup of tea I guess. But enough about Thao. Abby left to try the merch line again, determined to acquire a tank top. I stood around and unsuccessfully tried to make friends with the people around me (hello, I kind of sort of smiled at you, why haven't you struck up a stimulating conversation with me? okay maybe I didn't try that hard) and watched the sun set as The Walkmen came on. They were completely fantastic and I really need to listen to them more. Lots of energy on stage and everyone in the crowd seemed to love them.

Just before the next act, Big Mike (of Apache Relay), the festival's MC, came on stage. "I don't usually have to do this, but I have to make an official announcement. We're going to be having a little less fun tomorrow..." Fun. had been scheduled to perform in the slot before Mumford & Sons the next day, but they had to cancel for health reasons. "But we're going to get you someone really good, we promise." A murmer of disappointment rippled through the crowd. I was only slightly disappointed I wouldn't see them; they were the band I thought didn't quite fit with the festival and to be perfectly honest I had been looking forward to them the least of all the bands in the lineup. But who would fill the popular band's spot? It was a mystery.

Any negative feeling in the crowd was soon eradicated by the magically good vibes of Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros. Before the band came on, lead singer Alex Ebert came on stage to introduce the premiere of their latest beautiful music video for "Life Is Hard", which they had just finished earlier that day. Once the show started, the music and performance had the audience hanging on every note as if they were at an Evangelist revival. Ebert took the microphone to the crowd, handing it to a few as he asked them to tell a story or to sing the chorus of the song. At one point someone thew a koala backpack onstage and Jade looked through it a bit. Everything was very colorful and happy and everyone at the festival seemed bound together by joy.

As we were exiting the park we stopped at the Hyppo Popsicle stand. We'd been admiring their flavor list earlier. I bought a Sangria Plum popsicle and Abby chose Champagne Mango. Both were delicious and we ultimately ended up trading. We were dead tired but were determined to stay out like the cool kids, so we wandered the streets, which were full of people and music and activities, all bars and restaurants open late. Abby and I settled on an uncrowded bar and ordered $3 glasses of sangria, which we sipped as we discussed who might fill in for Fun. Yum yum yum. When in pseudo-Spain!

Day 4

At some point Abby echoed my thoughts (which had been happening a LOT during the trip) that maybe Disney World and then a 2-day festival was a bit of a marathon and, in retrospect, not the best idea. We were exhausted. But it was the last day of the festival, and the best day. We stocked up on water so we wouldn't die in the blazing heat (BLAZING), and once downtown we made our way to Castillo de San Marcos, the oldest fort in the United States. We could have chosen to appreciate the rich history inside the fort, to marvel at its construction and the way the conquistadors lived in America's oldest city, but we were too cheap to pay the $7 and instead walked around the fort and found refuge in the shade of the palm trees surrounding the fort. Because, as I mentioned, it was an absolute OVEN outside.

We walked around St. Augustine’s shops a bit more, doing some hard-core passport stamp collecting from the local shops. The shop with the rainbow mustache stamp won for originality. Just before re-entering the festival grounds, we made a quick stop at the Deering Banjo tent.

I think it suits me.

We made sure to get into the festival on time because Bear’s Den was up first and I was really excited to see them. They only have a couple of EPs out so far, but since my Mumford-loving friend Hannah introduced me to their music, I’ve fallen in love with the bearded band. I was half-disappointed to see a sizeable crowd already at the stage, because it meant we wouldn’t get very close, but I was also glad to see so many people turn out for them. They were fantastic live and fit lots of energy into their melancholy folky songs. Here’s a good one:

Bear's Den invited Big Mike on stage, presumably because of his sick beard.

As I might have mentioned earlier, it was as hot as A THOUSAND BLAZING SUNS so we exited the crowd after Bear’s Den’s set. We sought out the strawberry lemonade we'd seen people carrying around and found it next to a kiosk selling hot dogs topped with pulled pork. GENIUS. So we sat in the grass in the shade eating this magical pulled pork hot dog (ugh so good) and sipping the lemonade until only the ice was left--and then eating the ice--as we listened to Those Darlins. They sounded good to me but the shade was still more appealing. We finally ventured into the sun when Half Moon Run began. Having never heard their music before, we decided we really really liked them and joined the crowd. They had a really great energy and a harmonious, vibrant sound. Here's a sample:

After their set it was time for the shade again. Even as a Lollapalooza veteran, I had to duck out of the body heat and UV rays of the crowd. Call me a wimp, whatever, I managed to stay alive. We listened to Justin Townes Earle, who I thought was pretty good, kind of an old-school bluesy singer/songwriter from Nashville. We ventured back into the crowd for The Vaccines.

The Vaccines are old friends of Mumford & Sons, though Justin Young has since moved from his softer folky tendencies to loud, energetic indie rock-punk-pop (I really am terrible at ascribing genres to bands). Absolutely dance-inducing music, and I was jumping around as I sang along to “Wetsuit” and “Bad Mood,” just to name a couple songs. I’d seen them last February at the intimate Lincoln Hall, which was a great show, soured only by the fact that Justin lost his voice near the end of the show and they didn’t come back for the encore. So this huge festival crowd was definitely a departure from that last show; the people around me weren’t dancing as much but the crowd nearer the stage was giving the band proper love. And for the first time I got to hear them play "Norgaard"!

As soon as The Vaccines left the stage, some drums started up on the right side of the field. We had seen signs earlier about a “Powder Paint Fight” commencing after The Vaccines’ set so we retreated through the crowd. In a square of grass marked off by yellow caution tape were five drummers dressed all in white, each wearing a bowler hat of either red, yellow, blue, or green. When the drumroll ended, all the people inside the square (also dressed all in white) reached solo cups into bags full of colored powder and began the onslaught. Everyone in the vicinity was quickly engulfed in a thick cloud of blue and red and green and yellow. The white-clothed people were now covered in a rainbow of color, and they turned the powder on the observers. Pretty soon Abby and I were inside the square, powder being flung at us from every direction. Abby took a big shot of green to the face and my back was hit hard by a shower of red. By the time we exited the cloud, hardly an inch of us had escaped un-dyed.

We still didn’t know who would be filling Fun.’s slot after The Vaccines. I hadn’t even heard any rumors. Everyone in the crowd was all ears when Big Mike took to the stage. “We promised we’d give you someone great. And we’ve got him! We got you a legend! He’s in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame! Ladies and gentlemen, supported by the Gentlemen of the Road house band, JOHN FOGERTY.”

Whoa. John Fogerty.

The crowd was going crazy and hardly had time to process this information when Mr. Fogerty entered the stage and he and The Vaccines launched into “Susie Q.” He sounded great, like he hadn’t aged a year since the 70s. The Vaccines (Winston from Mumford & Sons was up there too, on the maracas) looked beside themselves; Pete and Arni had huge smiles on their faces, while Justin looked intensely focused, as if he were concentrating harder on playing the guitar than he ever had before.

They couldn’t have found a more fitting artist for the weekend, for that place and atmosphere. To be part of that huge crowd singing along to undeniable classics like “Fortunate Son” and “Down on the Corner”, I’ve never felt so connected with music past and present, and just really goddamn American. I never expected to hear and see those songs live, and certainly not that weekend. He even played us a couple new songs, which I’m sure his backing band had to learn quite quickly before the show.

Somehow during the course of the set The Vaccines switched with Mumford & Sons, who were just so excited to be up there with their hero. They even wore matching plaid shirts for the occasion. And by matching, I mean Ted and John Fogerty were wearing nearly identical shirts, and Marcus and Ben wore the exact same. Winston, aspiring mountain man that he is, probably already had one.

I later learned that John Fogerty had previously expressed interest in working with Mumford & Sons, and upon receiving the call flew overnight from L.A. He arrived in St. Augustine ready to work, and he and the bands rehearsed for four hours before the show. My guess is that The Vaccines rehearsed until their own set, and then Mumford took over – hence the mid-set switch-out.

To sum up, seeing John Fogerty at Gentlemen of the Road with Abby while we were covered in brightly-colored powder is definitely going down in my book of Best Life Moments.

SO MATCHY

The 50-minute set came to an end, though it seemed everyone felt it had just begun. The crowd seemed sad that great moment was over, but the feeling didn’t last long because it meant the Band of the Weekend was up next! Mumford and Sons were the reason for the whole festival, after all. As we stood there, filled with anticipation, I began to see flashes of lighting illuminate the clouds. They were far off, but I was still nervous. If the storm got to close I’m sure they’d have to cancel the show; it was a crowd of 25,000 people facing an enormous metal stage. Of course, I thought, it would storm right as the moment we’d all been waiting for was about to happen.

But, right on schedule, the lights dimmed, and Big Mike entered the stage. He gave a speech about how this was the best weekend of his life. “I’m ready for what you’re ready for,” he said. He ripped off the shirt he was wearing, and with that, marched offstage. No introduction needed.

It started quietly. “Love was kind… for a time. Now it just aches and it makes me blind,” Marcus Mumford lamented as he picked his guitar. By the time he was declaring “I’ll walk slow” the crowd's silent, rapt attention had transformed into a chorus, the audience and band united into one entity of euphoria. The feeling lasted the entire show. They wasted no time with “Little Lion Man,” whipping it out second. It got everyone jumping and dancing and segued perfectly into one of mine and Abby’s favorites, “Whispers in the Dark.” The crowd was too packed to do the hoedown dance that that song demands, but we made do.

I was beyond pleased when they played “Lover of the Light.” It’s been one of my favorites since I saw them for the first time in 2009 before I’d even heard their full album, before I knew that it wasn’t even properly recorded yet. This song was full of excitement and happiness and, most importantly, DRUMS. For some reason they cut down this best part on the Babel recording, but live "Lover of the Light" still shines.

Meanwhile, the lightning was getting closer. I was nervous but the band showed no sign of stopping, even after Winston, their loveable scruffy banjo player, noticed a flash. “Did you see that lightning? F**k!” But the storm provided an incredibly fitting backdrop for the dark and stormy “Thistle and Weeds,” with actual thunderclaps accompanying cymbal crashes. “The sky above us shoots to kill.” Indeed.

By the time the band were standing around one mic for a very quiet, beautiful rendition of Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire,” the storm apparently decided that it couldn’t possibly interrupt the bliss in St. Francis Field, and just… went away. A Mumford miracle, if you will.

I was sure the encore would be great, and I was correct. After they’d serenaded the crowd with the acoustic “I’m On Fire” and the a cappella (!) “Sister,” Marcus traded in his mandolin for an electric guitar and they turned it up to eleven by bringing out their longtime friends The Vaccines and Bear’s Den. “These two bands… have inspired us for longer probably than even Fogerty has,” Marcus Mumford told us. “We love them to f***in’ bits.” He then informed us that they were all ‘[freaking dingbats]’ (actual language changed because this is a family-ish blog), but in a loving way, of course. And with some very familiar chords, the three bands launched into “Come Together.”

Mumford & Sons a capella, or, How to Get 40,000 People to Shut Up

They couldn’t have chosen a more fitting song. One of my favorite things about Mumford & Sons shows is the feeling of togetherness and celebration they create. Nearly every time I’ve seen them they’ve brought other bands on stage for an encore jam session, and you can tell that they are having just the best time up on stage, playing music with their friends. The incredibly good vibes spill over into the crowd and everyone is caught up in the same moment, reveling in music and the joy of being alive. Everyone had come together, so to speak, to sing along with their favorite band to one of the most iconic songs ever written; whether you were Winston Marshall or Justin Young sharing a mic on stage or a festivalgoer in the audience, you had a huge smile on your face.

Of course they could have ended with that, but why only do a three-song encore when you could fit in five? They followed with Babel’s title track, and then closed out the show with the ever-rousing “The Cave.” After the final note was played, the band took a bow and waved goodbye to the adoring crowd. I, and everyone I’m sure, was sad to see them go, after we had waited so many months for this day.

Masses of people were leaving the field, but the festival wasn’t quite over. Yacht Club DJs were on hand to close out the festival with a huge dance party. Abby and I joined the remaining partiers for a bit of dancing under the iconic string lights, but couldn’t remain long as we had been on our feet for about three days straight. It was such a great festival that we didn’t really want to leave, but… bed. After taking a few obligatory pictures of the glowing Strongman, we left to scrub off the multicolor dust and dirt but not the freaking fantastic memories. God it was good.

Day 5

Abby and I spent the last day re-living the past four days in photos and Instagram videos, driving around Gainesville (home town of Tom Petty!), and swimming in Abby's aunt's pool. I was due to fly out of Orlando that evening... which of course meant we had one more stop to make before the weekend was over...

Friends, Disney, Doug, music, Mumford, and montaditos. I can't think of a better way to fill five days.

I Like Things.

Friday, December 27, 2013

Sushi Quest

Sunday, December 8, 2013

Floridadventures! Part 2: Fake Spain and the City of Mustaches