Camp Barefoot Five

We left around 2pm on Thursday...we stopped at The Rock Camp Store and packed up our gear, which only took ten minutes. We stopped in Lewisburg to pick up some Pink Moon posters we'd had printed at The Greenbrier Printing Company and had dinner at The Irish Pub. I had stew and Sethro had a corned beef and cabbage sandwich (and a bloody maria: a bloody mary with tequila instead of vodka). Dinner was wonderful! We stopped to stock up for the weekend before leaving Lewisburg and heading down 92 N towards Bartow.

We got to Barefoot, checked in, found our camping spot in "band camping", and set up...all before dark!  We took a walk around the venue, hung up some Pink Moon posters (which came out perfect), got some food and visited the vendors. We`decided to dragon after it got good and dark, but it was just the two of us, so Sethro took Puff's head and I strapped on the 50+ pound battery back pack with the tail boom tucked in it and shouldered all three of Puff's ribs. Luckily, we found two volunteer-dragoneers halfway through the set, so I only had to hold the battery and two ribs! We dropped the dragon at a friends vending booth and headed back to camp to cool off, warm up and relax. After hearing a couple bands from our cozy campsite we decided to dragon one more time for the night. I double knotted my sneakers and we headed to the vendor strip to pick up Puff. We found two dragoneers to help, so I was on the double-rib-battery routine (which is pretty difficult, but not that bad) while we did a short second set. We were escorted by Mr. Tambourine Man, jingling away throughout our whole set. Back at camp, Sethro and I happily curled up in the truck for a good nights sleep.
I woke up SUPER early on Friday morning...maybe around 6 or 7am. It was very cloudy all morning...looked like rain, felt like rain. I puttered around picking up camp till Seth woke up. When he finally got up around 8:30am, it REALLY looked like rain, so we threw a tarp over the truck and ez up and battened down the hatches. It was sprinkling lightly as we worked, and as soon as we were done it came down. We enjoyed the dryness and warmth in the truck, until Seth got the end of the mattress all wet, and still we remained relatively comfortable. Eventually the rain stopped, and the sun peaked out. I don't particularly mind morning showers at fests, as the sun throughout the day usually dries everything out. It's evening rain that really sucks...cause soggy nights are no fun. cMind you, through all of this, we had no clue what time it was. I geared up with bunny ears, big pink glasses, and an orange faux-fur shall. On our way to breakfast I asked a vendor for the time...when she told me it was only quarter to 11am, I freaked out! I couldn't believe it was so early! I must've looked like a crazy spunyun but I was merely surprised!
We got [delicious] breakfast burritos and smoothies from the bicycle-blended-smoothie place and bumped into a couple of friends. I got a pair of [awesome] tie dye pants from our friend James of Beandawg Artworks (they vended at Pink Moon II). We headed back to camp and picked up some fliers to pass out. We wandered all across the venue, meeting cool people and promoting Pink Moon. It's amazing how much more receptive people are to me compared to Seth when we're "street teaming". People who refuse fliers from him have turned around and doubled back to take fliers from me. It's amazing what boobs will do! Seth and I split up at one point and met up back at camp after a couple of hours. We promptly curled up in the back of the truck. It was an epic nap! So epic, it felt like a night's sleep and threw off my internal clock for the rest of the weekend.
It was dusk when we woke up. We rubbed the sleep out of our eyes, chugged some red bull and got some dinner. We both were feeling incredibly groggy...each festival we go to on tour gets harder and harder. Especially when you're carrying an entire dragon on your back. Despite the fatigue, we felt good....we were super prepared for this fest...with plenty to drink and munch on, plenty of clean clothes, sheets and blankets and pillows, and some spending money. It felt nice to be so together. It was also kind of nice sans crew...Seth and I really got a chance to spend some time together at this fest, which almost never happens.
We bumped into a friend of ours, Kenny, running a kick-ass gem booth on the vending strip: East Coast Rocks. He helped us with our first dragon set of the evening. I took the back pack and three ribs and he grabbed the tail (Seth is always on Puff's head). I was red faced and sweaty by the time we got back to camp. Zick and Jennie and their friend Whitney stopped by to say hello, and after a good conversation, some festie-tag creation and a couple beers they helped us with our second dragon set for the beginning of Kyle Hollingsworth's set. It was such a relief to have a proper compliment of 5 dragoneers to run around with. It makes it so much easier to give Puff some life and animation.

When we were done for the evening we headed back into the venue to catch H-worth's Talking Heads set. The crowd really filled in and Kyle killed it. His Psycho Killer encore was butt-shaking, spine-tingling great.
On our way back to camp we came across a spun-yun laying in the middle of the unlit path screaming. There were two guys there attempting to control him. We stopped to help, cause this dude was out of control. Slowly we got the whole story, this super-spun dude had torn apart these staffers cabin, and when they returned to find the place in tatters discovered him hiding in the bathroom. He decked on of them, twice...and they were still trying to get him under control. They had no clue who he was. Captain Spunyun got himself tangled in an orange plastic fence and while Seth and staffers 1 & 2 kept an eye on him, I went to get the medics. They were two, rather small, rather young girls, so even once I'd brought them to the tangled spunyun the rest of us stayed to make sure everything went ok. Dude had gotten violent once and it didn't seem like the gals would be ok on their own. The six of us (me, Seth, EMT 1, EMT 2, Staffer 1 and Staffer 2) half guided half dragged this guy back to the first aid tent, where we proceeded to give him water, and try to calm him down. As we delt with him, EMT #1's (a.k.a. Amanda) boyfriend showed up with a few friends. The boyfriend, Mark has been an acquaintance/facebook friend of mine for a while now, and also happens to be an incredibly cool guy.  Finding and truly befriending him was the karmic award for our good sumaritan-ness. There was now a solid group of between 6 and 8 people giving this off-the-wall spunyun defensive-circle-dance-party-therapy...keeping him chill and under control and with us by dancing around in a sort-of circle, and cutting him off at the pass any time he got too out of control or too far away. It was hysterical really, and an awesome experience. The people involved were mostly concerned, responsible, caring festie goers...with the exception of the two emt girls, who had to deal with this. Turns out this was their first ever festival, and both of them (nurses) were extremely straight edge. Mark (Amanda/EMT's boyfriend) kept tossing them hints on how to deal with the spun kid, and they did extremely well, still I felt bad for them. Eventually we decided to turn him lose on the crowd, hopefully to find his friends again. We danced him out to the middle of the crowd, and danced away. We all chilled by the first aide tent to be sure he didn't come back to harass the EMT/festie-first-timers. Good thing too, because not five minutes after we left him he'd spit in some dude's face, and was about to get a serious knuckle sandwich. We dragged him back, and kept an eye on him for a little longer till all of a sudden, his friend stumbled upon us. I grabbed this friend, Colin, who was almost as spun as spunyun, and told him to take his friend back to camp. They wandered off together and the rest of us convened to relax and unwind. We gathered in a close circle, immediately in front of the Headstash booth, funnily enough, and performed our unwinding rituals. We were all happy, light hearted, and glad to have been brought together (not to mention glad to be rid of dude). I was, I'll admit, very surprised there had not been some sort of "Official Barefoot Plan" to deal with something like this. It didn't seem practical for the only two, inexperienced-in-festival-land, tiny EMT girls to babysit this out of control spunyun all night. In fact, there seemed to be absolutely ZERO security at Barefoot, at all. Although that might seem cool...you need security at a festival, not to mess with people, but to keep everyone safe. A lot of crazy shit can go down during a fest, and the mere presence of some security can keep people in check.
Seth and I stumbled back to camp, unwound from the crazy spunyun experience, and went to bed.

Saturday morning was bright and sunny. We got breakfast from the best food vendor on lot: Shady Grove Wraps and hung up some posters. Most of the day was spent at camp cause it was too darn hot. Bunches of friends stopped by...Zick & friends, Mark from the trip sitters last night, and a  some cool glow guys...including another Mark (who'd helped the dragon by guiding him through the crowd at All Good XV) who glow-painted Puff. They used this cool spray paint which glows when activated by lasers.  At one point Sethro helped a small boy fly his kite (he is a kite expert after all). It was incredibly cute, and the kite got left behind, so Sethro gave me a quick lesson too!

Around dusk, once it began to cool off, Sethro donned the red dancing bear mascot and I the skeleton suit and we went on our last round of promotion. It went over pretty well!
Seth needed some time to recover after the nasty bear set, while I began packing up camp. After dark the glow guys came back, we grabbed Kenny, and we dragoned one last time. I took the tail this time (a dragon part I'd never done before) and we raged it. We chilled, rambling with the glow guys for awhile, threw the dragon in the back of the truck, and left. I was so glad to be going home...Barefoot was fun, but I was exhausted and looking forward to sleeping in my own bed and getting the house an Pink Moon together. It took us about two hours to get home. We watched some tv before passing out around 4am.
Barefoot was our last stop on tour before Pink Moon! We raged the dragon every night, and gave them an extra bear set. We got the word out on Pink Moon and met a ton of super cool people. It was a fun and rewarding weekend...but now it's time to put our noses to the grindstone and get Pink Moon up and running. It's going to be a great time, we've got a ton of good ideas, and we've met a bunch of great people willing to help. This party's gonna be crazy!

Elysian Fields IV - Heavenly

Seth and I had a little trouble getting motivated on Friday...the task of packing the truck and driving ~4 hours to Boyce VA was daunting. We finally got on the road around 4:20pm and stopped for lunch at our favorite place in Peterstown: KC's Dawg and Burger Haus. We dropped by Sabrina's house to pick up Justin and say goodbye to Jeremy, who left for California this weekend. (Good luck Jeremy, we miss you, we love you and there's always a place for you with RCP!). And so, Justin, Seth and I began our journey to Elysian Fields.
As we drove up route 81 to the sweet sounds of a great JGB show on Sirius Satelite's Grateful Dead Channel, I noticed the car ahead of us: a little gold sedan with the license plate "MIS JERY". I pointed this out to the boys and we pulled up closer and noticed his Jerry window sticker. As we passed I flashed him a peace sign, and he nodded back. I wondered if he too was headed to Elysian Fields and made a mental note to search the lot for his car. (I never did...womp womp)
The sun went down as we approached our exit. I always think of Dugald when we pass the Rt. 66 exit on 81N. Last year, around this time, we met Dug just off that exit and exchanged tickets and fliers in a random gas station parking lot. We looked so sketchy shuffling around that day, but it was just some goofy Pink Moon business. God I miss that kid. We actually first met Dugald at Elysian Fields last year...it's odd to think how close we became in less than a year. He was such a wonderful person.
As we got off the highway I got super excited. We passed the ice cream shop with the pink picnic tables that Jesse, Andrew, Brandon, Cree, Seth and I stopped at after the fest last year. It was about 10:30pm when we finally pulled into Elysian Fields.
We checked in and headed all the way to the back of the camping area, next to the huge stack of round hay bails. I HATE setting up camp in the dark, but it didn't take us very long. We could hear PBR and then The DJ Williams Projekt from our site as we laid Puff out and popped our EZ-up and introduced ourselves to Kristy, our neighbor who excitedly agreed to help us dragon for The Bridge.  And dragon we did! I threw on the 50+ pound battery back pack, grabbed the front two ribs while Kristy grabbed the back rib, Justin the tail, and Seth the head and out walked Puff. We slinked around the venue and picked up a few more dragoneers, including Dylan who graciously took the front rib from me and was an absolute natural. The fluidity with which he moved the dragon, beer in hand even, was incredible. At one point I tapped him on the shoulder and told him that if he got tired he could give it back, and he smiled and said "I've found what I want to do with the rest of my life". Note to self: find Dylan, invite him on a gig.
After a killer set we brought Puff back to camp and chilled with our new found dragoneers. We did another set for The Bridge's encore (feat. DJ Williams)...and then another silent late night set after the music ended (around 12:30). Back at camp we met Katie, an incredible woman with a wonderful head on her shoulders. We discussed her journey from Oregon to the Native American Reservation she now lives on. We talked about Pink Moon and Puff and our lives in WV. We talked about politics and festie rituals. It was wonderful.
Tom & Beck's son, Christian found us and chilled at camp for a bit, as well as the PBR guys (they'd helped us dragon as well earlier!)
The best reunion of the evening though was seeing Jesse again. We met Jesse at Elysian Fields last year. We has a great time and he ended up coming to the farm, living with us and helping a ton with Pink Moon II. He found us during our first set with The Bridge and camped with us all weekend this year. It was so fantastic seeing him again.
I think we finally drifted off to sleep, to an unusually quiet  festival scene, at around 4:30am.
I woke up at 9:30am to the sounds of dogs barking, babies cooing and a strong breeze. Jesse had not slept at all that night and was sitting in camp bleary eyed. Justin was asleep in the backseat of the truck and Seth was asleep on  the mattress in the back of the truck. I started the morning off by hanging some tapestries on the EZ up and painting some signs...one for Dugald and one for our Pink Moon website. I placed the "We miss you Dugald" sign right in front of our camp and the www.pinkmoonfestival.com sign up in the venue.

When Seth and Justin finally woke up we headed down to see PBR play. They killed it! No one was dancing though, so in my pink dress, sparkly sunglasses, and pink party hat I raged my butt off. I handed out a few Pink Moon fliers and we headed back to camp.
At some point, it started to rain. It started off light...enjoyable. Just a sprinkle, fun to dance in even. Then, all of a sudden...it came DOWN! I had just been commenting about how remarkably dry I was...when suddenly all of our stuff was getting soaked. Quickly we yanked the tarp out from under our mattress in the back of the truck and threw it over both truck and EZ up. This stopped most everything from getting soaked, but most of the damage was done. The end of our mattress was oozing brown water, Puff was kind of puddly, and I was finally very wet. Not to mention, our Pink Moon fliers do not hold up well in wetness. So all the fliers I'd handed out so far were ruined for sure.
We were all huddled together under our tarp/EZ up construction when I realized we'd have a lot more room if we weren't hanging out on top of a pile of trash. I spent a few minutes spinning in circles, standing in place, picking up trash in the 3-foot radius of me...and everyone laughed at my display. I did, however, create a lot more room and order.
Once the rain ceased, and the sun peaked out again, we emerged from our soggy campsite to hit the lot with a new round of fliers. I donned a pair of bunny ears and my big pink glasses and Seth his pink party hat, and we hit the town. We fliered and talked to tons of people. I think it meant a lot that we weren't just street teamers, but the people who throw the fest, the dragon people. I choked up every time I met one of Dug's friends.
Once we finished our street teaming we finally went to hang out with our super cool neighbors in their awesome hay bail/tarp tent. We were kicking ourselves for not going over there sooner....these folks were the bomb and their huge shelter was super dry. And when we finally heard the sounds of Keller and The Keels, we picked up our dragon and danced out to the venue for "Mr. Keller! Mr. Keller!"...we kept it to a short dragon set cause we have this hunch that Mr. Keller doesn't like Puff. Last year at Elysian Fields we came out during "Focus on the Bass" which, admittedly wasn't very good timing. After our dragon set, I wanted to see the rest of the show, making it  back to the stage in time for "Bird Song". Keller's "3 minute" encore was a cover of Cee-lo Green's "Fuck You"....and it seemed like an odd way to end the fest. When he warned the parents in the crowd "earmuffs" I got all excited that it'd be his gatecrasher song, but oh well. We headed back to chill with Kendall and Lynn (our hay bail neighbors) till we finally passed out before dawn.
I want to give a shout out to the security guy for Elysian Fields. Dude was awesome, and effective at his job.
I woke up on Sunday at 8:30...(ugh so early!) and the fest was already clearing out. I couldn't fall back asleep, so I started packing up camp and picking up trash. When everyone else woke up we finished packing the truck, said our goodbyes to Kendall, Lynn and crew, then went for a walk to do one more round of fliering. We met  a few cool cats who'd been to Pink Moon II, and said it was the best fest they went to all season!! I also met one of the members of Pigeons Playing Ping Pong, who was wearing a great pink fuzzy party hat, and gave him a hug and a bunch of fliers.
Finally, sweaty and tired, we said goodbye to Jesse and piled into the wonderfully air conditioned truck and headed home. The drive back took a lot less time (we didn't make any stops and didn't take the back roads). We stopped at home before taking Justin to Sabrina's, to grab a bite to eat and chill for a minute. It was incredibly difficult after spending a wonderful half an hour on the couch to get back in the truck and bring Justin home though. Seth and I were beat, and got the best night sleep ever.
I really miss Dugald, and I'm really glad we went to Elysian Fields. It was a great cathartic experience. Every one of his friends that I talked to could feel his love and his presence there. We raged our dragon for you Dug...we love you.

Website Work

TJ and I have been working relentlessly on the Pink Moon website. It's still a work in progress but it's getting there! I've been typing away all kinds of literature for the site..."About Pink Moon" and "Home Page" sections and more...god knows how many words. Eh, it needs to be done and it's a good excuse not to have to help Seth pick up the trash our dogs have spread around the yard.
Right now Seth and I are sitting on the couch talking through Pink Moon stuffs and watching the interactions between out many animals. We both agree that there's pretty much nothing cuter than kittens in boxes....except maybe kittens on top of boxes that are pestering kittens inside of boxes. And now they're asleep. Awwww.
Anyway...PINK MOON PINK MOON PINK MOON! Only 42 days left!! We're supposed to get our first shipment of flyers today, although they haven't come yet. They need to be revamped (they're not quite the correct resolution and we need to add a couple new bands).
We're leaving for Elysian Fields tomorrow. I think we're bringing Justin and Jeremy (wonderful, reliable, sensible kids from Rich Creek, VA...they were on our crew at All Good). Our old roommate Jesse is going as well, so that will be a nice reunion. I'm also going to make a sign tonight, a sign for Dug. Something to the effect of "We miss you".

Check out the site: www.pinkmoonfestival.com

Also I have a new Rock Camp Productions specific email address: jessofrockcamp@yahoo.com

Late Night Flier Design

Seth and I are sitting on the couch, Ginny and Lucy and kittens galore asleep at our feet. We're watching a DVR'd "Late Night with Jimmy Fallon" from Friday and designing the fliers for Pink Moon III. They look fantastic. We're both getting tired and grumpy though! Seth 's been working for four hours straight on the flier project. And he's got it! I'm a sleepy bunny...I think it's bed time!

Thanks to: Zach Korn, Brian Zickafoose, David Ashcom, and Eric Rautio for all of their help!

 
P.S. Happy birthday Jerry!

Gathering of the Vibes 2011 - It's too darn HOT!!

Together for a year!

Both Seth and I are veteran VibeTribe members, and we LOVE this festival. We love the unique Seaside setting, but this fest truly holds a special place in our hearts. I've been attending this festival, what I consider my "hometown" congregation, with my dad Robert FOREVER! Vibes is where Seth really got his start, on his own, professionally. Vibes (in'06) was the last time Seth saw his mom, Pinky, alive...the last time they partied together. And Vibes ('10) is where Seth and I began dating (and consummated our relationship). This Vibes was our one year anniversary.
Maybe that's why, after only having been home a day and a half from All Good, we left Wednesday morning for Vibes. We made good time to CT...though we were kicking ourselves the whole way...All Good is about halfway between Rock Camp and CT, and my dad lives in Bristol. Had we been thinking clearly we'd have left All Good straight for my dad's chilled out THERE for a day and a half then made the 45 minute trek to Vibes. Instead we drove 12 hours straight from Rock Camp, WV to Norwalk, CT to stay with a friend of ours.
Thursday morning, after a load of laundry, some showers, and an hour spent looking for our friends lost keys, we jumped in the truck and made our way to Seaside Park. We stopped at WalMart (evil, but unquestionably a one-stop-shop for all of your festie needs) and picked up the essentials (water, gatorade, redbull, ice, etc) then headed into Vibes.
We checked in at the artist/vip gate...and ran into our first hang-up. Despite the fact that we were billed in the playbill/schedule booklet, they didn't have us in their computers. Luckily, they recognized us as legitimate (we have our own department: The Freaky People Department), called our contact, and got us registered and in. Vibes gave us plain old "camping" bracelets...which would end up causing a number of hassles throughout the weekend. They did provide us with an AWESOME contact person though, Tony....who graciously helped us at every turn. If you ever read this, WE LOVE YOU TONY!
Alright, so now we're checked in...it's hotter-than-hell already, WELL up over 95...and though we enjoyed the air conditioning the truck offered we were anxious to get in to our campsite. However, at every gate we were redirected (incorrectly) because the poorly informed parking staff didn't recognize our Friends & Family parking pass. We drove around the venue and waited in line for 4 HOURS until we nearly reached a security check point at which they demanded $20 for day-early admission. At that we said "uh-uh" and finally called wonderful Tony, who escorted us out of line and through the venue to our proper campsite.
Funny enough, we ended up camping 50 feet and one fence away from where we were camped last year. In fact Seth had argued with a parking attendant (in '10) to camp exactly where we camped this year.
Check out this shot from the CT Post of our campsite: Picture #205

So we set up camp, met our wonderful neighbor, Smilin' Christopher, discovered the friend who's house in Norwalk we'd stayed at Wednesday was camped right behind us, headed into the venue to check out Dumpstaphunk and geared up for some DSO.
Seth jumped into the orange bear costume for his first bear set of the season. I donned my skeleton body suit, and we made our way to Dark Star. We wiggled our way into the front row, we wanted Donna Jean (who was singing with DSO for a special beginning of Vibes treat) to see us, as she'll be our Friday night headliner at Pink Moon III. We raged in the DSO crowd until someone smacked Sethro in the face and the chicken wire innards of the bear head sliced his nose open. It was so hot, even at night, that when we got back to camp Seth was DRENCHED in sweat from head to toe.

 
We were exhausted from All Good, from the drive to CT, from not enough sleep, from the heat, from waiting for hours in line, from our bear set...and even though one of our crew members was on their way an yet to check in...we crashed out in the back of the truck. We knew Alex (the crew member on his way) would have no problems getting in or finding us.

Alex

We were right! When we woke up Friday morning, there he was sitting in camp smoking a cigarette. It was HOT HOT HOT again. I showered off at the misting tent Vibes provided this year. My all-natural bug repellent soap was a real chick magnet under there, let me tell you. By the time I returned to camp two more of our crew members had arrived. Jessi and Slatkin are Cleo siblings of ours...(Cleo is a co-ed literary society on the Trinity College Campus in Hartford...kind of like a fraternity...Seth and I are both siblings there). They set up their tents and coolers while we all struggled to keep out of the sun. I'm telling you, Bridgeport CT (and the whole Eastern USA) had a record breaking heat wave! It got up past 103 degrees!

Cleos at Vibes, (L2R: Seth, Me, Jessi, Slatkin, Tom)

As evening, and some relief from the heat rolled in, another Cleo, an old friend and RCP veteran, Tom found us. We were still waiting on two of our official crew members who were trying to check in (they were ultimately unsuccessful, because of their own shortcomings, and stayed the night in a hotel to come join us on Saturday)...but with Tom we had enough people to dragon! So we headed out for our first set with Furthur. We knocked it out of the park, and returned to camp briefly to collect our heads. We hurried back our for a second set with Furthur, bringing along the heart I'd made at All Good for Phil. Vibes, which began sixteen years ago as "Deadhead Heaven" is truly a Grateful Dead Family party....and you could feel it in Furthur's set. I'm not saying they didn't put on a good show at All Good, but you could tell that they really were "bringing it" for the VibeTribe. My point was proven when Phil not only gave his organ donor speech, but ALSO gave Puff T. a shout-out! While this crazy, life-changing, long anticipated event was going on, I handed the heart to a wonderful gentleman standing at the very front of the stage (within the security barrier). He held it up in front of Phil throughout Furthur's entire encore (Ripple) and laid it on the stage for them. I saw a stage hand pick it up and bring it backstage. I know somewhere in my heart that Phil has RCP's heart. (If anyone has a video of Phil's shout-out, please email it to me at jessicajmola@gmail.com)
We made sure to hit Big Gigantic on the Green Stage with the dragon, to make sure they noticed us, as we hit them after Furthur at All Good.
We got back to camp and I gave Tom a back rub...he'd been wearing the 50lb, makeshift, battery back pack for three sets, and was hurting. Alex dressed up in the red bear suit and went out and did a set. Jessi and Seth and I went for a long walk on the beach, and sooner than we expected, watched the sun rise over the Sound.

It was at our sweet spot on the beach that Jessi and I met two other Jess' and a melodica player. After a fantastic sunrise jam sesh, complete with three guitars, a fiddle, a makeshift drum set and a melodica Seth, Jessi and I headed back to camp for a nap.

We woke up Saturday afternoon in the sweltering heat. As soon as we were alive, awake, alert, enthusiastic(!) we sent out a cast of crazy costumed characters. We were still waiting on two more cast members. When they FINALLY arrived at 6:30pm on Saturday evening; they'd already missed the majority of the festival. They didn't seem to understand that they were expected to work (despite the fact that one was a RCP veteran AND the deal had been explained to them) or why everyone was annoyed and frustrated with them after busting ass all weekend. Needless to say they will not be invited onto the team again.

As soon as the lollygaggers arrived we began body painting. We cranked out seven skeletons, but due to the lateness of our stragglers, we didn't get out before the sun set. It detracted from our skeleton set so hugely that we ran back to camp (gosh, security check points are easy when you're naked!) and busted out Puff T. in our birthday/skeleton suits. Elvis Costello seemed to love the dragon...I could see him staring it down and just smiiiiiiiling! He played a beautiful "Must've been the roses" that melted my heart.

When we got to camp, the latecomers decided they were going to leave (after only one set??). Seth begged them to stay for one more dragon show. Seth, Slatkin, Jessi and I went to sit by the beach to cool off before our Jane's Addiction set. After about fifteen minutes we headed back to camp, only to discover that the latecomers had left...Seth and I were so disappointed.
But we raged it for Jane's Addiction anyway. The crowd was rougher and tougher than even the Primus crowd at All Good...and a few of them didn't seem to appreciate Puff at all. Jane's Addiction didn't quite give us a shout-out, but they skirted around it quite a bit....I don't think they quite knew what to think of us.

We were exhausted, so we brought Puff home. On the way back to our campsite, we passed hundreds (maybe thousands?) of hippies sitting by the beach, all pissed off at the choice of Jane's Addiction as a Saturday night headliner (and vocal about it)...and they DID appreciate Puff!

Puff T. and Kate

Again, once we got back to camp Alex donned the red bear suit and raged the Green Vibes stage for P-Groove. We washed off our skeleton paint and promptly passed out for the evening.
Sunday is always an odd day at festivals, always a very uncomfortable transition back to reality. Slatkin, Jessi and I went on a hunt for an anniversary present for Sethro. I found a beautiful psychedelic print from one of our favorite Vibes artists, Larry Carlson. His wonderful wife Kate runs their booth and always charges our dragon battery for us. The print looks just like [a very psychedelic version of] our mountain here in Rock Camp. It was the perfect anniversary present.
Slowly but surely we packed up camp. We said goodbye to our remaining crew members and finally left Vibes.

All Good XV - beyond this point, there be dragons

All Good was all good! We busted ASS, and raged that mountain! Seth and I left Rock Camp Wednesday morning, picked up Jeremy and Justin in Rich Creek Va and headed to Morgantown. Jeremy fell asleep in the backseat while Seth drove and we listened to 'Jamtronica' on Jam-On. We stayed at the Morgantown Motel. We saw this amazing "rasta-bus" in the parking lot outside our building, so immediately ran down to chill with those people! It was a great 'lot scene' in the Morgantown Motel pre-All Good.
We woke up early the next morning and headed to check in at the Ramada. We were thrilled  to not have to stand in the incredibly long line, since we were checking in as artists/performers. Seth and I got "grassroots" artist laminates and Jeremy and Justin got vendor bracelets. We really need the laminates at these big festies...they make our passage through gates, check-points, and the crowds so much simpler. They tell people "we were hired to do this"...


We met up with some of our caravan, Christian Critzer and his wife Jenn as we were leaving the Ramada. They followed us to Masontown, but we lost them on the way into the festie. We had a "vending" parking sticker on the truck, they didn't.
At the first security check point, we got All Good's playbill/schedule booklet...and there on page 15, was our billing. It still wigs me out that an, albeit brief, piece of literature I wrote was published by All Good! Check it out here!
We got all the way through the check points and back roads, only to end up in the wrong place, unable to get to the RIGHT place. We back tracked to 'gate one', and headed through the main entrance of the festival, escorting Christian and Jenn down Production Ave straight to our camp site behind the yet-to-be-graffittied water bus. We set up camp and relaxed in the heat of the day. Then Seth and Jeremy and Justin and I donned some goofy hats, wigs and sunglasses and went for our first stroll through the festival.
We met some cool cats from NJ over by the ferris wheel, then got our pictures taken as dancing bears (teehee)!

We headed back to camp to do our first real bear set of the fest. Jeremy jumped into our orange bear suit, Justin into the red one, and Christian into the blue rasta bear...I donned my skeleton body suit and roses and out we went!
It was a long bear set, we covered a lot of ground, kept our poor hotter-than-hell bears as hydrated as wee could, and stopped for LOTS of impromptu photo shoots. Everybody loves da bears!
After our crazy bear stint we headed back to camp to chill out for a long while. It was hot, and for 5pm on Thursday at All Good, we were doing really well.

As the sun set we did another bear set, this time heading into the venue rather than canvasing the crazy camping areas. We were a hit, stopping for pictures with babies and babes, old hippies and young ravers. We danced our bear buts off to the sounds of Hot Buttered Rum, then headed back to camp.
While we'd been our bearing it up, two more of our crew arrived. Brendan (and his brand new dragon who we fondly named 'Tronic) and Raph were setting up camp in the dark.

When the John Butler Trio came on we did a set with Puff T. Magic-Dragon...and got a shout out!! To us, under the dragon, it sounded like someone right next to us made the "I hope that psychedelic snail-slug thing is helping the night" comment...but lo and behold it was John Butler!!!
After that knock out Puff set, we went for a round with 'Tronic, the newest member of our glowing family. Brendan was thrilled, he'd been looking forward to blowing it up for STS9. I was on 'Tronic's head, Brendan on the battery-pack-backpack right behind me, various other crew members filling the rest of the dragon out. We raged the second half of STS9 so hard we blew a fuse! Brendan RAN back to camp to get another, and we finished out the crazy set, and the crazy night.

Friday was a whole new day. First thing in the am we body painted up Brendan and Jeremy as metal bunnies. This requires some explanation. All Good bases it's theme every year on the Chinese Zodiac. Last year was the year of the tiger, the year before was the rat, etc. This year, 15, was the year of the bunny. More specifically, according to the Chinese Zodiac, it's the year of the metal bunny (as opposed to a wood bunny or a water bunny etc). So we sent our two male metal bunnies for a jog. They headed straight up the crazy All Good hill into the camping areas. Bradley, another RCP crew member showed up to camp right after they left.

They came back sweaty and smiling and surprisingly body paint intact. They only met a few intolerant festie goers on their jog (receive a few slurs, "faggot" among them). However, we didn't let that phase us. We painted up most of the rest of our crew (as metal bunnies of course) and two of our neighbors as skeletons and "All Good Man". We went and staked out a spot under the red lanterns, organized our body paints and brushes, then I in all my naked, body painted glory started advertising FREE body painting.

Justin decided to opt out of the body painting, for fear of roasting alive in the sun (he has very fair skin) but held the umbrella for us so the rest of the bunnies could have some shade.
After hours of body painting mischief we headed back to camp. Jeremy, Raph and I went to wash our body paint off at the water bus fifty yards from our camp site. That was cute until I'd washed of most of my paint....then I was just that naked chick washing at the water bus cause she didn't want to pay five dollars for a shower.

FINALLY it was time for Furthur. Though they started their four hour slot super late, we were ready with a puppet and a dragon. We got Puff T. Magic-Dragon and Sid Glo out there with the brand new glowing beating heart I made for Phil. We RAGED it...gave Gertrude the Jellyfish a hug from Sid and made our way down to the front during "We bid you goodnight"...expecting a "donate your organs" speech from Phil (and an encore)...but sadly, nothing. The plan had been to hand Phil Lesh the afformentioned heart when he called for the audience to donate their organs. We were bummed out about the lack of speech, but Big Gigantic raged SO HARD immediately, we didn't have time to pout. Sid chase Puff out of the venue and home to camp.





Saturday morning started off hot and slow. We went out for a bear set with Rex Jam, and canvassed the crowd to help raise funds for the local school music and arts programs. We were out in the hot sun for TWO HOURS...and returned to camp completely dead. I passed out immediately until right before our night shows.
We got Sid out for the end of moe. and the begining of Primus. Then we really busted out Puff for Primus...fighting our way through the tough and rough crowd. At one point I turned around at a tugging from behind my vantage point of the first rib, only to see Puff's tail wrapped around a random audience-member's fist. This bro was playing tug-of-war with our dragon! We got a shout out from Les Claypool...although leave it to him to give us a quote we can't REALLY use....something about his manager smoking crack and chasing dragons.
Then...FINALLY...it was time for Pretty Lights....we pushed to get ALL of our glowing cast of characters out there for this crazy bumpin' late night! Sent Sid out for a loop, chased him with Puff T! then sent Brendan and a crew out with 'Tronic. My camera battery gave out before this, and I'm bummed, because there were some great photo ops with our crazy cast of glowing characters! We were all back at camp when he remixed Country Roads, and our crew collectively groaned, knowing we shouldn've been out there for that climax....but we were ALL beat from a crazy weekend (and a CRAZY bear set for Rex Jam).
Sunday was a light day. We did a single bear set, then packed up camp and said our goodbyes (for now). We were all sad to hear about poor Nicole, the young girl who died in a tragic accident Sunday morning. What an awful way to end such a wonderful weekend.
Still, we put our hearts and souls into this All Good show. We blew minds and held hearts. Next year is the year of the "water dragon"....Seth and I are already planning our show for All Good XVI!

An Introduction

This is the OFFICIAL blog for Rock Camp Productions! RCP is a unique production company I help run with my wonderful boyfriend, the founder, Seth Abramson. We tour a Giant Glowing Puppet Dragon Rodeo (Glodeo! for short...) to most of the major music festivals across the country and some smaller local festivals as well. Our tour this summer has included All Good XV and The Gathering of the Vibes XVI so far. Next weekend we're taking our giant glowing family (Puff T. Magic-Dragon, Siddhartha (Sid) Glo, and Dr. Molly Glo) to Elysian Fields Festival in Northern Va and then we're headed to Camp Barefoot!
We live on a ~500 acre family farm on top of a mountain in Rock Camp WV. Seth is a partial owner of part of the farm, but he and I (and our many pets) are the only ones who live here. We're slowly but surely renovating our little farmhouse. From our front porch we have the best view of our main stage.
Oh yeah, we also throw a great grassroots music and arts festival on this beautiful mountain: the Pink Moon Festival (check out our facebook event page here) in honor and remembrance of Seth's late mother, Pinky. Pink Moon is held on Pinky's birthday, September 16.  Last year, for Pinky's 60th birthday party we had EOTO, boombox, Telepath, Archnemesis, Sol, DJ Williams Projekt, the lee boys, yo mama's big fat booty band, the rogan brothers, DJ Rahbee and about thirty other bands. We got a great article in the arts section of the Roanoke Times  right before last year's fest.
This year we'll be hosting Donna Jean Godchaux (formerly of The Grateful Dead), Particle, and a whole slew of national and local talents.

Check this out, from GOTV last weekend: Picture #22